Touch others with words: Tips to be an EFFECTIVE writer
Do you sound better, when you use fancy words?
The answer is NO, according to a research published in Applied Cognitive Psychology.
Complex writing, in fact, makes you appear narrow-minded. Take a look at the study’s title: Consequences of utilising erudite vernacular for no reason: issues with employing big words unnecessarily.
Isn’t it more appropriate to title this study, The Effect of Using Big Words When You Don’t Need Them?
You must stop attempting to sound intelligent in order to sound intelligent. Simple writing is brilliant writing; it expresses a meaningful concept in a straightforward and straight manner.
Here are 11 tips to start sounding smart right away:
1. Be simple in words
Use instead of employ, close instead of immediate contact, help instead of assist, for instead of in the quantity of, and begin instead of commence.
Only use lengthier words if your message is so precise that no other words would work.
2. Be short with sentence
Sentences should be brief for the same reason that paragraphs should be brief: they are simpler to read and grasp.
Each phrase should include only one simple idea. More than that adds to the complication and confusion.
3. Use the active voice
Readers in English favor the SVO sentence structure: subject, verb, and object. This is what is known as the active voice.
Consider the following case:
Passive sentences bore people.
The OVS, or passive sequence, is formed by reversing the active sequence: Object, Verb, Subject.
Consider the following scenario:
People are bored by passive sentences.
Although you cannot constantly employ the active voice, most authors should do so more frequently.
4. Have something to say about?
This helps and speeds up the writing process. When you don’t know what to say, you’re driven to construct statements that seem significant but don’t deliver.
Read a lot of books. Make a mental note of everything. Consider your options carefully. Then tell your readers what you’ve learned.
5. To the point
Consider the following two sentences:
· In my backyard, I have a lot of flowers.
· Pink coneflowers, purple asters, yellow daylilies, Shasta daisies, and climbing clematis are among the 34 flower kinds I plant in my backyard.
Which do you think is more exciting? Which of these boosts your view of my backyard?
6. Short Paragraphs
Take a look at any newspaper and you’ll see how short the paragraphs are.
This is done to make reading simpler since our brains absorb information more effectively when it is broken down into little parts.
Every paragraph in academic writing supports a single concept and frequently contains many phrases. The style is less formal in informal, daily writing, and paragraphs might be as short as a single sentence or even a single word.
Isn’t it?
7. Remove any extra words
Fluffy extra words like very, little, and rather contribute nothing to the sense of your statements and suffocate them.
Consider the following scenario:
It’s critical to eliminate fluff words as much as possible because they’re empty and can be distracting.
“Substitute damn every time you’re tempted to write very,” Mark Twain said, “and your editor will erase it, and the text will be just as it should be.”
8. Don’t go off on a topic
For many authors, rambling is a major issue. Not as serious as some other issues, such as access to inexpensive health insurance or the Middle East, which has been a concern for decades due to territorial conflicts. Speaking of which, the word “territory” comes from the Latin word terra, which means “earth.”
But the point is, don’t go off on a tangent.
9. Don’t be repetitive
Furthermore, avoid from writing the same thing over and over. To put it another way, rather of saying something multiple times, say it once. Because your readers will get asleep if you keep repeating yourself or writing the same thing.
10. Delete is your best friend
This is the most important point to remember. Always ready to remove your work, write, rewrite and edit again and again. Anything that does not add to the meaning should be shortened, deleted, or rewritten. It’s ok to write in a casual tone, but don’t use more words unless there’s a strong reason.
Break your writing into three steps to make it easier:
a. Make a whole text.
b. Set aside your text for a few hours or perhaps days.
c. Return to your writing with fresh eyes and make changes.
Nobody expecting us to be ideal writers because none of us can ever be. However, by following these techniques and writing freely, we can all enhance our style and seem wiser.
