metomeya said:
Are you a writer? Just wondering, I have the hardest time with writing. I know how to write, but I just do goofy errors all the time. It is like I can't focus when I proofread even if I read out loud. I can proofread something 3-4 times and reread it a few weeks later and still find some really dumb errors or typos in it. It is like I'm dyslexic or something.
Yeah, it can be hard to focus sometimes (understatement)-- you really need to know why you are doing what you're doing clearly while also staying conscious of legitimate positive and negative motivations to actually get it done. And this goes doubly for writing. I can't tell you how many times I've written myself into a bog of persnickety flim-flam. Writing is easy, but writing anything worth reading and that hasn't already been said better (for your particular audience and forum -- forum used in the broad sense) is usually extremely difficult. That being said, sometimes one perspective cannot be seriously considered better than another, and in that case the multiplicity of perspectives allows the inquisitive reader to have a more realistic understanding of the topic than if he were only to study one man's convictions.
If you want to get better at writing, to really learn the craft, one area in particular that I find modern educators fail to give proper instruction in is sentence construction. Most people think the basic units of sentences are "words', but in reality words are simply vessels for meaning. The basic unit of a sentence is actually the proposition, propositions being statements about reality that can be accepted or rejected. If you learn how to put propositions together well; if you learn how to be deliberate in the creation your sentences as instruments for conveying ideas, even someone with dyslexia can write masterful sentences. A great place to start could be developing the habit of favoring free independent modifiers over bound ones, and you might also be surprised at how fast your writing improves after you figure out what the cumulative and periodic syntaxes are. I'm actually writing an essay for another website on a similar topic right now, so I could perhaps share that with you when it's done if you're interested and I'm not just rambling here
Cheers,
Oskar
