My writing process

I am thrilled but also nervous at the same time when Kavitha from RedBohemia has chose me as one of the three to blog on my writing process. It was so great to finally meet her in person in Kota Kinabalu, she is such a sweet positive lady who only have kind words for everyone. I am glad we hit off well!

Yes, I write but never had I ever question myself on the process of writing so this is going to be an interesting topic as I self explore into this aspect.

What Am I Working On?

I am currently working on a couple of posts for this blog but I have yet find the inspiration to finish. Sometimes I just need to write a little, leave it for a little moment before continuing. Besides these, I am also in the midst of writing a guest post for a fellow blogger. There are a couple more on my mind which I should get started on… and what? *gasps* I only have 24 days to 2015 and 17 more days to Christmas. *panic mode switched on*

I have bits and pieces of ideas everywhere. I like to jot down the topics I want to work on, some days I will give it a little extra thoughts so by the time I am ready to turn it into a post, I have some materials available.

How does my work differ from others of its genre?

Everyone always like to think of themselves as unique individuals who are different from the rest right? Of course we are all different in our own ways!  😛

While I am still experimenting to find a comfortable style of writing, I mainly write about my personal travel experience and opinions because these are the things which makes me stand out from the rest right? We cannot possibly share the same experiences again and again with  just any other travellers on the road.

I also like to add in a little of my own personal posts here and there just to make it more ME, more personalise.

Why do I write what I do?

I write because I want to leave trails of my travel memories in the virtual world, it feels more real this way because sometimes memories become too vague and there are days I will start questioning myself if I can been to somewhere in particular or done certain things or they are just my imagination. I enjoy reading the past entries occasionally when I am in my wanderlust mood. I like that sometimes I write down the minor details/ incidents that I forget over time, so it refreshes my memory.

No way am I am solely writing for myself because I can always do it offline or jot it down in a notebook or something. It is also for friends and family to read and keep track with my travels if they are interested.  Sometimes I have friends who are interested to visit a place which I have been to and want to find out more, I will usually direct them here have a read to get a rough idea. Furthermore, photos does enhance the whole idea right?

For a girl who likes to travel, having a travel blog also helps me connect like-minded travellers, which means having more friends! Yay!

There is also a little hope in me that I can inspires someone to travel solo or just decide to visit a place because they read about it on my blog.

How does my writing process work?

Is there even a process on writing? Do I even have a process? I just hmmm.. write, or type for that matter.

First of all, I need to confess that I am someone who get distracted easily. I can never complete a post in one sitting. My friends will agree that I am a random person. I can randomly compose a few liners of an entry while I am doing something else (I am a multi-tasker!), when I am ready to put it down in pen and paper or rather fingers typing away on my trusty Evernote, I will be lost for words.

I am not so much of a pen and paper person because I believe in saving the environment. :p I just prefer typing as it is faster although I have a love-hate relationship with the Delete key because on one hand, it is a clean way to get rid of all the rubbish I typed but on another, sometimes between the rubbish I typed, there will be a liner or two of worthy phrase/ sentence which I absolutely cannot seems to compose anymore.

Before I go into my writing process, allow me to rave about how much I love Evernote. I created a number of notebooks in Evernote, each one for a different purpose. I will draft it my posts on Evernote, it enables me to sync my notes where I can access from my Mac or Window OS and even my phone with just an application or simply with web access. I love how functional Evernote is in assisting me to draft out my posts and the premium account is worth every penny. By the way, I do not receive any commissions raving about them but if you would like to try out this amazing notebook, I will be grateful if you can sign up here to help me accumulate points in exchange to sustain my premium account.

By the time I spend some quality time with my laptop, it is is split between catching up on some shows and writing. Most of the time, I can be found in my bed with my laptop but recently I try to work on my kitchen table because I seems more productive this way. Don’t I have a proper study table? Of course I do, it just conveniently turn itself into a storage area. *guilty* I am not exactly the tidiest or neatest person around.

I am able to concentrate better and draw more inspirations deep into the night and this is what usually happens: I type, delete, type again, delete some more, rephrase the sentence, continue typing a few words, get distracted by all the happenings on different social media courtesy of Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. I will favourite/ like/ comments on tweets/ status/ pictures/ articles before command+tab back to Evernote. then I repeat the process again until I decided that my brain is mentally fried or I need to sleep because I got to work the next day before zonking out on my bed.

I like to refer back to the photos I have taken because they aid me in my process of writing too. When a post is finally drafted, I will take a day or two to gather photos for visual purpose and edit the draft before copy and pasting into WordPress. The last process is getting the fonts, alignments all checked, that usually take me another day or two to get some photos for visual purpose, then editing will take me another couple of days before I am ready to copy and paste them into WordPress, get the fonts and alignment right, preview and edit again to my satisfaction before finally hitting Publish button!

Yeah, it is a really long process for me.

Ok! Now that you have read all about my writing process, I would like to nominate the following people to share on their writing process, maybe there is a thing or two I can learn from them!

1) Yun Qing from YQ Travelling
2) Lok from RealGunner

Take it away lady and gentleman! 🙂