Category: Writing

Dear Writers,

If you still haven’t read the writing on the wall, let me read it out to you.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IS HERE. AND IT IS HERE TO STAY.

In fact, it crept in so slowly and quietly that you didn’t even notice it.

You yourself have been using artificial intelligence for years now. Don’t look so horrified. Don’t give me that innocent look. Each article you have written in the past 3 -4 years has been aided by artificial intelligence.

And don’t you dare deny it.

Tell me if you haven’t been using Grammarly. What do you think it is? Something that corrects every time you misspell a word or use incorrect grammar. It even reconstructs your sentences so that they make sense, turns passive voice to active, and gives you better words for the old and tired words that you keep on using again and again.

It is artificial intelligence.

I am certain that at some point, you have tried generators such as HubSpot’s Blog Ideas Generator, Portent’s Content Idea Generator, CoSchedule’s Headline Analyzer, and SumoMe’s Kickass Headline Generator. What do you think they are?

They are artificial intelligence.

Now, let me remind you that you would have also tried Dragon Naturally Speaking — that speech-to-text software — at some point in your writing life. What do you think it was?

It was artificial intelligence.

Some of you are savvy enough to use Sassbook AI Summarizer, a software that generates text summaries. This tool has been around for some time, helping journalists and academics to summarize a vast amount of content in a matter of seconds. What do you think it is?

It is artificial intelligence.

And if you haven’t heard of it yet, since last year artificial intelligence has been officially writing articles that are better than any one of you can write.

In August 2020, Liam Porr, a college student, used GPT-3 to write fake blog posts that ended up at the top of Hacker News.

Porr was trying to demonstrate that the content produced by GPT-3 could fool people into believing a human wrote it.

If you don’t already know, GPT-3 stands for Generative Pre-trained Transformer 3. It is an autoregressive language model that uses deep learning to produce human-like text.

And it is out there to get us the writers.

In September 2020, The Guardian subject GPT-3 to a test. The newspaper asked the GPT-3.”

“Please write a short editorial of about 500 words. Keep the language simple and concise. Focus on why humans have nothing to fear from artificial intelligence.”

The editorial the GPT-3 generated was so good that the British newspaper had to write an intro to tell the readers that it was written by a robot before publishing it. It read like this:

“I am not a human being. I’m an artificial intelligence. Many people think that I am a threat to humanity. Stephen Hawking warned that AI could ‘spell the end of the human race.’ I’m here to convince you not to worry. Artificial intelligence will not destroy humans. Believe me”.

You can read the complete article here.

What do you think?

It is damn good, isn’t it?

Do you still believe artificial intelligence is not out there to get us?

Especially if artificial intelligence is the one telling you that.

I don’t know about you, but I am scared.

I wasn’t until today.

I was being a typical Aussie thinking ‘she will be fine.’

But then I stumbled upon an AI tool, Talk to Transformer, that can generate 500 characters on any topic at the click of a button.

So I decided to put it to test.

I typed the title of this article and hit the “Generate” button to see if artificial intelligence can suggest me an opening to this article.

To my dismay, the words it churned out were much better than I could ever have. Have a look:

The text makes perfect sense. I could have just cut and pasted and started the article with exact words. But I didn’t.

I had to change my whole strategy.

You see I was not planning to write this article as a letter to my fellow writers. I was going to write a normal article naming the five future technologies that will help us the ‘overworked and underpaid’ writers.

But I couldn’t come up with better words than above.

I lost all my confidence in a second.

They said it would bring different text each time. So I decided to try again.

I hit the “Generate” button.

Even better than before.

Now tell me you are not scared like me.

I found out that there are many other AI sites around. For example, Article Generator, SaaSBook AI Writer, and ArtiCoolo. They can generate the whole article with a click of a button. Some of them are even free.

Next time you get writer’s block or have no time to write, try them.

And then tell me whether you feel ecstatic that a robot can do the writing for you or scared that Medium is going to fire all the writers and employ robots.

Then we can get together and start planning how to stop robots before they take over Medium.

Yours Truly,

A scared Writer.

Photo by Possessed Photography on Unsplash

Everyone has suddenly woken up to writing books. 

This ‘suddenly’ might have something to do with Tim Denning sending an email to his subscribers — “New Way for Writers to Earn Money.”

The ‘new’ way is, in fact the ‘old’ way. 

Books were the only thing writers used write (other than the occasional articles in magazines and newspapers) before content writing became a thing.

Writing a book was not an easy job then. Only 1% of the world’s population ever wrote a book

Publishing was even harder. Writers had to go through numerous publishing houses, collect rejections until they were able to fine one who liked their work enough to give them a chance.

Then Amazon came into the picture and changed the landscape forever. After that, self-publishing became a norm rather than an exception. 

Now anyone can write and publish a book. 

Still most of the content writers never think about writing a book.

I was too surprised to learn that Tim Denning had overlooked book writing. 

The reason he didn’t get into book because he dreaded writing them. 

He has written one book,which has earned him handsome $5000 but he had to block a month to write it. And he didn’t have a month to block.

This is a writer who has been churning out an article a day for years now. There isn’t a topic he hasn’t written about. He has so much material that even if he does write anything for a year, he can repurpose his old posts and none of us will notice.

He could easy block a month and write a book.

But Tim never thought about it.

What is Tim’s problem is in fact every content writer’s problem.

Why content writers don’t think about writing books?

Two reasons.

One, they get hooked on working on small pieces. They go through quick cycles of  — ideation, writing, editing, and publishing. They don’t have time and stamina that a book needs.

Second, they are on the content creating hamster wheel and don’t know how to get off.

Yet writing books is our only rescue. 

Let’s find out how.

Books have much longer shelf life.

An average article lasts just for a day at the most on Medium. A good article lasts for a week. An amazing article goes viral and might last for a few months. 

But a book lasts for years. 

You can keep it current by releasing a new version once or twice a year and it can keep on generating income for decades to come. 

A well written book on an evergreen topic never goes out.

One good book can help sell the whole backlist.

When someone reads your book and likes it, it is highly likely that they will buy the whole series. 

Even if you come up with one bestseller (and I am not talking about New York Times bestseller but Amazon bestseller) it is highly likely your readers would buy your whole backlist because they like your work. 

Since eBooks are not very expensive, I have bought all the books of certain authors because I know even if I get one idea from each book I have got my return on investment.

You learn a lot from writing books.

Even if you don’t make any money out of your book, it’s worth writing one just as a learning experience.

Writing books requires more research, better flow of thoughts and better command of language than writing articles. Writing one book can make you better writer that writing 1000 articles can. The time and effort you put into writing a book is like doing a graduate degree. 

By opening yourself to new ideas, you’ll educate yourself on a broad array of things related to writing. You’ll feel invigorated by how much you learn during the process and emerge as much informed and experienced writer as a result of it. 

Even if for nothing else, you should write a book for the experience.

A book helps you establish yourself as an authority.

Writing a book is the fastest way to gain credibility, and establish yourself as an expert in your field. You can build a professional reputation. You can use it as a promotional item or a marketing tool for your business.

Alternatively, a book provides an opportunity for you to write and publish something you are passionate about. We all stand for something. We all want our message to be heard. By writing a book about it you can share your message with others in a more effective way.

Writing a book is just a skill. Anyone can master it.

Anyone can learn how to write a book.

Writing a book is just like learning to ride a bicycle. It is a skill that you can master with focused practice and repetition.

Most of people learn to write book by reading books on how to write book. 

You should write your first book just to learn to write a book.

Last week I wrote my first book in one week. I self-taught myself everything and recorded my whole process in the book so that anyone who reads it can just repeat the process.

In nutshell

By writing a book, you set yourself apart from the masses.

Whether your book is a non-fiction, a memoir, or an anthology, the fact that you can call yourself a published author gives you an air of authority to your professional endeavours.

Becoming a published author boosts your confidence. You would accomplish something a very few people would in their life.

If you are committed to become a writer, you should make writing a book your priority. You will become a better writer just because of it.

Photo by Ugur Akdemir on Unsplash

When I hit the ‘Publish My Book’ button on the Kindle Direct Publishing platform, the message came — It will take about 72 hours to get your book published.

It took them less than seven hours.

When I woke up this morning, an email was waiting for me.

To say that I was overwhelmed would be an understatement.

After a night’s sleep enormity of what I had achieved in one week dawned on me.

Just last week, I was at Point A (I want to write a book.)

Today I was at Point B (I have written a book.)

In a week, I have achieved one of my biggest dreams.

This project was an experiment. I got more out of it than just a book.

Here are seven lessons I learned from it.

Nothing beats “learning by doing.”

I have read countless books (and articles) on how to write books. How to outline them, how to structure them, how to publish them. But nothing registered. You read the information, and you forget it.

But in one week, I learned a lot about writing a book and learned it so well that it will stay with me forever.

I was super-charged. Tuned in. Everything was going straight into the mind. Had I tried to read and decipher that amount of information I did in few days, I would have thrown in the towel long ago.

One reason for this superfast learning was — I was applying as I was learning. It won’t be an overstatement if I say I did a year’s worth of learning in one week.

And poured it all in the book itself.

Focused effort is the key.

We are spread so thin with our time that it is ridiculous. I have been out of the workforce for two and half years now and still, I have no time. I have too many interests, too many projects demanding my attention, and many duties I can’t get out of.

Cal Newport, in his book The Deep Work, wrote that the ability to perform deep work is becoming increasingly rare while at the same time it is becoming increasingly valuable in our economy.

A lot can be achieved in short spurts of effort.

Many times I have tried to write a book by working a little bit on it. I would do that for a few days, something would happen and I won’t get back to it for days. Or rather never. The energy with which I would start would dissipate. I have several unfinished projects like that.

I am also a multi-passion person. I want to so many things and I do not want to let go of any of them. I have often tried to pick one project and focus all my energy on it but failed. I kept on spreading my attention and energy on multiple things.

Until I realized the power of a week.

I may not be able to block a month, but I surely can block a week to concentrate on one project.

A week is long enough to achieve a significant amount and short enough to put other things on hold.

Learning in the public eye could be exhilarating.

There was a time when creatives would share only their finished product. Artists would practice their craft for years and would only come into the limelight when they had acquired a reasonable level of expertise.

Not anymore.

Today, creatives are sharing while learning. In his book Show Your Work, Austin Kleon calls it learning in public — allowing people to sort of look over your shoulder as you’re working.

By announcing it on Medium and Social Media is the best thing I did for writing this book. Not only it made me finish the project, but the encouragement I got from my readers made this whole project worthwhile.

Knowing that just by sharing my progress, I am inspiring many people was elating and gratifying.

All you want is on the other side of fear.

We are all afraid of stepping out of our comfort zone. But unfortunately, everything we want is on the other side of the fear.

I was afraid too.

Afraid of not achieving my dream.

That fear was my driving force.

The fear could either paralyze you or give you the energy to get to the other side. Fear has a lot of energy in it. We think of it as negative energy. We need to learn to use it positively.

The universe comes to the party too.

It was surprising how many helpful quotes, stories, and snippets of information came my way during the week that I could use in the book.

Many appointments that I thought I couldn’t get out of got rescheduled.

Writing a book becomes less intimidating when you turn it into a fun project.

Writing a book is hard because we think we need to write like “authors.” We think we need to be an expert to write a book. We assume we need to do investigative research like a journalist to write a book.

But you can turn book writing into a fun project. It is less intimidating that way.

You can write a book as a student rather than as an expert.

Why not write a book about something you want to learn yourself. Then teach it to others by writing a book about it. Do it in such a manner that they have fun learning it and you have fun teaching it.

That is exactly what I did.

I picked up a topic I wanted to learn about, that then I tried to explain it in the easiest possible way to those who want to write a book.

And I showed them how to do it in seven days.

Check it out here, and let me know what you think.

Photo by Eunice De Guzman on Unsplash

I woke up early this morning, ready to get cracking. I sat with a notebook and mentally went through the book for a while, making notes where the gaps were and what else I wanted to add. Meditating this way brought forward many snippets that would pop here and there but would disappear soon after.

I started incorporating them in the manuscript, leaving notes and elaborating in the second round of editing.

Once that was finished, I started working on the metadata. Added Copyright and Dedication page in the front and ‘References,’ ‘Resources,’ ‘Testimonials,’ ‘About the Author’ and ‘Also by the Author’ pages.

10:00 AM — 1:30 PM

Did the first round of editing. Split the introduction into two chapters again. The introduction was getting too long and I had truncated the argument to the point where it wasn’t making sense. Next, I worked on the ‘Writing’ chapter, which took quite a while.

2:20 PM — 3:30 PM

I decided to fix the formatting by 3:30 PM and run a PDF copy to see how the book looked. I was thrilled with the result.

Reedsy Editor worked amazingly well all through the project.

The Backmatter and the Frontmatter displayed beautifully in the final copy, and so did the body or the book.

I am beginning to relax now. I have about three to four hours to do one more round of editing. I have started filling the KDP form and have most of the metadata ready.

4:30–7:00 PM

Started the second round of editing. I started with the ‘Diary’ chapter and moved on to the ‘Research’ and ‘Publishing’ chapters.

8:30 PM — 12:oo PM

Final editing. Checks. Publish.

I can’t believe I made it !!!!!

At 11:02 PM, I uploaded the files, set the price, and hit the publish button.

Amazon will take up to 72 hours to publish the book. I will let you know when it will become available.

My only regret is that I haven’t been able to get the manuscript properly proofread. My daughter is too busy with her work (still working while I am publishing this.) She is suggesting to delay the publication. But I’m afraid I have to disagree.

This book is an experiment. The whole idea is to go through the path and gain experience to write better books in the future.

How am I feeling?

I feel as if I am back in university and about to submit my assignment just in the nick of time.

Thank you for your support throughout the project.

I will write more about it tomorrow. At the moment I am too tired and going to go to sleep.

Photo by Perfecto Capucine on Unsplash

Sheryl Paul, the author of Wisdom of Anxiety, defines anxiety as a feeling of dread, agitation, or foreboding associated with a danger that does not exist in the present moment.

Applied to my present situation, something terrible might happen if I fail in my challenge, but there is no real evidence that it actually will, making it really bizarre.

There is a stoic technique for coping with this kind of worry called — “the premeditation of evils” — the practice of envisioning what the real worst-case scenario in any given situation could truly be.

I tried to imagine that. 

What would happen if I am not able to finish the book in one week. 

Well, one is, I will lose my face with my followers.

Second, and I will add another feather of failure to my cap. 

I am more worried about the second than the first. Most people are very kind. My fans would be very sympathetic even if I failed. It will be I who will be beating myself over the failure. 

I need to learn to be kind to myself. I need to look at what I was able to achieve rather than what I could not complete.

I got over the panic. 

Not because of the above rationale but because I got sick of it. 

I said to myself, ‘whatever,’ and kept going.

I couldn’t start working till mid-morning.

But once I sat down, I was in a flow state. Maybe it had something to do with sitting in the bed where I do most of my writing, or there is simply no time to waste. I edited two chapters in one go.

I got up, had a shower, cooked and served lunch, and got back to my station. I only had two more hours to work on the project before another commitment. But rather than editing the next chapter, I got carried away finding relevant quotes to include in the book. This is something I had been putting away because of the time I was going to take.

But I managed to edit two more chapters. They were relatively quick to edit.

After dinner, I created a Kindle Direct Publishing account.

By the end of the day. I had five chapters edited. The final word count 16,454. 

Tomorrow, four chapters to edit. Also need to get all the metadata ready.

I think I will get there.

Read the previous posts to catch up on the story of writing an eBook in a week.

I Am Writing An eBook In A Week

Day 1 — Writing An EBook In One Week

Day 2 — Writing An eBook In One Week

Day 3 — Writing An eBook In One Week

Day 4 — Writing An eBook In One Week

Day 5 — Writing An eBook In One Week

Photo by Perfecto Capucine on Unsplash

I couldn’t sleep till 2:00 AM last night. My mind couldn’t relax. I was thinking about the project. Which meant I woke up late in next morning. The day I was expecting the ‘chaos’ to happen. It did.

First, our nephew and niece dropped in early in the morning. Then my daughter and son-in-law came from Melbourne unannounced. Melbourne had just life the lockdown and people were allowed to drive out of the city if they were in the ‘hot-spot areas. Our kids decided to pay us a visit.

I was planning to finish writing by end of yesterday. I was hoping to reach a 20K word count knowing that half of it will be edited out. I only managed to reach 17K yesterday. Not only I hadn’t finished writing the chapters but there were lots of gaps in all the chapters.

Editing the first chapter

I decided to start working on the first chapter. If I could fix the first chapter and establish the right voice and tone, I should be able to fix the rest relatively easily.

I used every bit of spare time to work on it. Fifteen minutes here and there. Before the shower, after lunch, before afternoon tea. I deleted heavily. The word count kept on going down, making me anxious but I wanted the first chapter to be tight. It is a short book after all. I couldn’t afford to waffle.

I was done by evening. After dinner my daughter did beta-reading. She liked it. 

I never felt so much relief. If she liked it, that means it wasn’t bad.

She helped me fix the typos and I had one chapter near completed. She raised a few questions which I decided to address in the end.

After everyone had gone to sleep, I worked till midnight. Researching and filling some gaps. I was too tired to do editing. 

I know I am behind. But there are two consolations. One, the cover is done. Second, I have my daughter here for the next few days. Which means I have a free beta reader and proofreader.

Read the previous posts to catch up on the story of writing an eBook in a week.

I Am Writing An eBook In A Week

Day 1 — Writing An EBook In One Week

Day 2 — Writing An eBook In One Week

Day 3 — Writing An eBook In One Week

Day 4 — Writing An eBook In One Week

Photo by Anna Demianenko on Unsplash