the writing kraft » personal essays

Great book for inspired writing

04/13/2011

Great book for writing exercises

Don’t know what to write? Are you stuck staring at a blank page? Then it’s time to get the book “Old Friend from Far Away” by Natalie Goldberg.

This book is a lifesaver when writer’s block strikes. Goldberg provides great advice to writers and also tons of writing exercises to get you started. The exercises are awesome. There’s everything from describing mashed potatoes to writing about the first time you slept outside.

I highly recommend this book for people working on personal essays too. The book focuses on memoir writing, which is the perfect segue into a personal essay. By flipping through this book you may just come across the question that triggers your brain into the “ah ha” moment when the perfect topic is revealed.

And if you don’t like the first writing exercise you come across then keep searching, there are so many you’re bound to find one that works.

Word choice in a personal essay

03/09/2011

Image credit: east718

When in doubt, stick to words you would use when writing a term paper. That means avoiding words like awesome, rad, or gnarly. Definitely don’t use words or phrases associated with the “valley girl” talk of the 80’s. Not only is it no longer timely, but annoying.

Also, avoid using these words in cover letters or professional correspondence. Something to keep in mind down the road when applying for a job. Awesome, rad, or gnarly doesn’t exactly convey professional job seeker.

And even more important than word choice, never use an emoticon to convey a sentiment in a personal essay. Never. This also applies to cover letters and job related emails, just don’t do it. It’s comes across as unprofessional and weird.

Don’t end a personal essay with a question

03/07/2011

Don't conclude with a question

Being creative with a personal essay is tricky because you want to make sure your essay stands out from the crowd so to speak. But you also want to make sure that what you write serves the purpose of a personal essay, which is to convey something about you, your background, how you think, your writing style, etc.

By ending a personal essay with a question, you take yourself out of the personal essay and direct precious space to the reader. The reader in this case is someone on the admissions committee of your dream school and they already know what they think, they want to know what you think!

If the question is important to the story or the point you’re making, then write about the question’s topic in the essay. By writing about what you think, you are providing the admissions committee with a chance to get to know you better.

So keep more of you in the essay by leaving the questions out.

Simple and effective editing techniques

02/20/2011

Photo credit: MichaelMaggs

You’ve finished a draft of a writing project and now it’s time to edit. But the last thing you feel like doing is reading it one more time. It’s time to take a break from your writing project.

Go for a walk, do the dishes, just do something besides stare at the screen. Walk away from it for at least an hour, preferably much longer if possible. I recommend waiting a full 24 hours before returning to a writing project, especially a really tough project like a personal essay or cover letter.

Once you’re rested and ready, print your project. If you don’t like to waste paper, then print it on scrap paper, because the best editing jobs are done on paper. There’s something about reading on a computer screen that causes your eyes to miss mistakes and scroll over typos and problem areas.

Next, pick your favorite editing color, it doesn’t have to be red, any color that’s easy to see between black text. Then with your editing tool in hand, start reading your writing out loud. Now this might sound crazy, but I’m telling this works!

Reading out loud brings all the awkward sentence structures, grammatical errors and missing words to life. This is a really important step for personal essays and cover letters. As you read out loud, mark mistakes with your colored pen or pencil and take detailed notes on problem areas. Then go back to your computer and start editing. Go through this process as many times as necessary until reading out loud goes smoothly. Once you’ve reached this point, you’re probably set. But make sure you run spell check and also have a few trusted friends or family members read it as well.

Don’t use slang in a personal essay

02/17/2011

Even candy hearts use slang

Even though my advice in this post may seem obvious, it’s worth repeating: don’t use slang in a personal essay! (Also, avoid using exclamation marks.)

Thanks to text messaging and twitter, certain acronyms and abbreviated words incorporating numbers have become common place, such as lol, ur, 2morrow, etc. But no matter how universally understood these terms are, don’t use them in a personal essay. It comes off as unprofessional and annoying.

Even if you think it’s cute or some sort of play on words that people will think is funny, don’t do it! If you want to add cool words, revisit the list you memorized studying for the SAT and incorporate some of those. But even then I urge caution, make sure you use the words correctly otherwise it could weaken your essay. My essay rules are: when in doubt delete and have at least three different people read through your essay to check for mistakes. The last thing you want is a perfect essay marred by a typo.

The look of a personal essay

02/12/2011

Image credit: Evertype

When it comes to writing personal essays or personal statements for college or scholarship applications, the number one rule is keep it aesthetically pleasing. This means stick to using basic fonts that are easy to read.

I’m not trying to inhibit your creativity, just channel that creativity into the actual writing of the essay, not the font choice. Why? Because when the admissions committee is reading your essay you do not want them distracted by a strange font.

Remember there is a good chance that the people serving on the admissions committee are 30 plus years of age and more likely 40 plus and 50 plus years of age. The early 40s is when many people start using bifocals and reading is a bit frustrating sometimes, so don’t make it worse with a weird font!

Know your audience and go easy on them. Stick to Times New Roman, Arial or Calibri. If you just have to try something more unique, then use Georgia or Courier New.