I set myself a target to submit 30 articles to 30 publications in 30 days. One submission per day.

Anangsha Alammyan said: “You’re going to blow something up with this. Mark my words.”

I marked her words. She was right.

And I did it!

Did I meet my targets?

Submissions: Achievement unlocked ✅
Goal: 30 submissions
Achieved: 30 submissions

Follower growth: Achievement unlocked ✅
Goal: 250 new followers
Achieved: 260 new followers (increased from 989 to 1,249)

Income: Achievement unlocked ✅
Goal: $250
Achieved: $427.56

I typically write while researching at around 1,000 words per hour — sometimes even faster. Writing at this speed means I can finish an article in as little as 90 minutes. You can write this fast too using the techniques I’m about to share.

What’s more, by following these techniques, you’ll likely improve the quality of your creative work. Fast writing is usually good writing. As Ray Bradbury writes:

In quickness is truth. The faster you blurt, the more swiftly you write, the more honest you are. In hesitation is thought. …

Writing is pain — the myth that keeps writers blocked

I spent years taking my writing too seriously. I told myself “I want to write”, then I didn’t write anything. I believed writing takes special inspiration. Writing has to be hard work. I thought I needed to wait for the muses to descend, then sweat blood onto the page.

Or worse, I’d sit down in extreme anxiety, forcing words out of my fingers, feeling everything I wrote fell short of my aspirations.

It’s one of the most common myths in our society: writing is always hard work. Writing is struggle. Writing costs your life, your soul, everything you own and…

Most of my life I spent fleeing from pain, especially difficult emotions.

I suffer from dark moods that take me to desperate places. Anytime they arose, I’d try to escape them. I’d flee into overeating, unhealthy relationships, or mindless browsing on social media. Video games, Netflix, anything to numb my inner life and distract myself from the void within.

What I didn’t realize: my distractions only made the void bigger.

I especially hated upsetting other people. I forged my own path as much as I could, but all the while I built my life around what I thought others wanted…

You came as my mirror
A perfect reflection of
My imperfections

In your eyes
I saw my own insecurities
And felt secure

In your pulse
I felt my own heartbeat
More alive than I’d
Even known

The dance was real

I fell into your arms and
You held me

You fell into my words and
They released you
Into poetry

You glimpsed something more:

The dance could never be
Enough

You reached through the mirror
Broke the glass
And handed me my heart

A gift, unexpected
Bruised, painful
Real
And needed

I wanted you to keep it All that life…

Welcome!

POETRY

life was simple
in a bubble
of knowing the answers
lectures
friendship
a small community
150 people
the perfect size
in a perfect village
in the perfect country

a community
built around a well
of healing
an army major’s determination
and a holy book
the book with all the answers

a signed statement
that you agreed with these answers
that you fit in
you’re one of us

there’s one problem with having all the answers:

questions

questions
always outnumber the answers

questions
prod
and probe
and pull apart

and when the question is a person who is the very meaning…