3 Tips For Strong Writing
There are a few rules you’re usually taught to craft good writing:
1) Something has to happen.
A story can have the most beautiful prose in the world, but if nothing happens or changes from the beginning of the tale to the end, you haven’t written an actual story. You’ve probably written a good description, but not a narrative.
2) Show and tell.
Balance descriptions with dialogue. Mix exposition and explanation. Don’t just tell your reader about what’s happening, show them with setting and characters, and conversation.
3) Explore tension.
All great writing needs tension, and for the purposes of our discussion, let’s think of tension as two seeming opposites that really aren’t opposites at all.
My therapist would refer to tension as two sides of the same coin. Most people will already recognize the most common forms of tension because they drive our favorite stories: win or lose, live or die, will they or won’t they? It’s the “miracle” Olympic hockey game from 1980, Ross and Rachel, and every action movie you’ve ever seen.
I read once that there’s a reason Walker: Texas Ranger always wins in the ratings game over more cerebral dramas. The tension — life or death — is easily recognizable, the stakes are high, and that tension is usually resolved within the same 45-minute window week after week.
You can thank another tension — guilty or innocent — for the incredible proliferation of the Law & Order franchise.
Tension is all or nothing. In life and death, there is no in-between. You either survive, or you don’t, and nothing is more imperative than winning that fight. We all want lasting love over heartbreak, and no one wants to go home a loser, but those are also the only two possible outcomes when you’re in it.
Tension is also what drives our greatest genres — comedy, and tragedy. It has been said that tragedy plus distance equals comedy. Embarrassing yourself in front of a love interest is devastating at the moment, but usually funny a few years later once you’re dating someone else, in the same way, that tripping on your way to scoring a winning goal is not funny when it happens. It is only with time and perspective that we can laugh at ourselves later. And sometimes it is much, much later, if at all.
I’ve been told that the only difference between a comedy and a tragedy is a laugh track — that it isn’t the storyline itself that lets us know whether to laugh or cry, but cues from our peers. Whenever I hear this, I think of an old episode of Frasier when Niles has, yet again, been thwarted in his efforts to win over Daphne. He retreats to a spot under the piano to drink wine and sulk. It is the laughter from the audience that lets us know we’re supposed to find this funny as opposed to empathizing with Niles’ pain.
People also say life is a comedy for those who think and a tragedy for those who feel, but I don’t like that one as much. I don’t think it’s a difference between feeling and thinking that makes for comedy or tragedy. Most of the funniest people I know feel things SO VERY DEEPLY. It’s that they’ve learned to use comedy to navigate a world that is hard on the sensitive, not that they are thinking any less critically about the world around them or missing any observations.
This life will break your heart a million times over and keep going — grief, failed relationships, lost opportunities. Read the news — “We found news ways you can die!” “Mother never expected to find this in her child’s crib!” “Miscommunication at work ends terribly!” — and you can cycle through all of the emotions in a matter of minutes. Hell, I cried watching the Real World: New York reunion the other day because those precious babies were so young when MTV put them on the air and now they’re middle-aged like me. So there’s really no telling if I was crying for them or me or a world in a pandemic, but I was crying while watching Paramount+ on a Sunday night as I folded laundry all the same.
We are all broken. Hearts are much too tender for what we put them through in a lifetime.
The tension for humankind is finding a way to be both broken and whole at the same time because that’s what we all are — broken and whole. We’ve all been hurt and knocked around, but we tend to our cuts and bruises and go on. Sometimes, we can’t go on, and that’s a whole different tragedy that requires its own kind of reverence.
Our challenge has always been to find a way to go on despite the brokenness, to bind the pieces together into something more.
I believe that what you bind those pieces together with is usually what gives your life meaning — be it God or family or community or pet rescue or the search for the perfect donut. If you live a religious life, you are very familiar with the idea of being a broken soul made whole by God’s love. If church isn’t your thing, it is no less remarkable that you’ve chosen to go on in this life by pulling your broken pieces together with a different kind of purpose.
This weekend I watched a story about the lost Ark. (It was the real one; I’m not watching Indiana Jones and trying to pretend. Some people don’t have a TV. I love mine, and I’m not afraid to admit it.) Whenever I think about The Temple and The Holy of Holies, my mind circles around how much time and effort it took to build that first temple, and how devastating it must have been when it was destroyed.
But the greatest act of faith isn’t building, it’s re-building. Putting in all of that work again, when you know what can be lost and how much it will hurt, is such a pure expression of love.
We are worthy of re-building. We are worthy of taking the time and effort to put the pieces back in place. We are worthy of feeling whole.
The saying goes “be kind because everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.” I say to be kind because we are all just a little bit broken, so handle with care. We are all carrying precious cargo, and we need some consideration of the load.
It’s true in this year, and it’s true in all the years: Be kind. Watch your step. Grab someone’s hand if you think you might trip.
And in the spirit of making sure something happens between the beginning of this essay and the end, yes, a lot of writers break the rules. But it’s also true that you have to know the rules before you can break them. Good writing sometimes breaks things apart before it puts them back together.