Who Is Your North Star?
Photo by Marek Piwnicki on Unsplash
I love me some Mel Robbins. I love listening to her podcast, because she gives down-to-earth, no-nonsense advice on how to live your best life.
Of course, the best advice in the world is no good if you don’t apply it, and a recent episode had me thinking: Who is the North Star of my writing?
This concept comes from an exercise that Mel’s daughter did in her performing arts program at university. Your North Star is simply the person whose creative journey most inspires your own.
There are three steps to finding your North Star:
Emulate – think about who you admire, and why – is it their character? The skills they possess? Their career?
Assimilate – learn what your idols do, then practice it. You’ll quickly discover what works for you, and what you can learn from it.
Innovate – put your own twist on it
It’s also important to visualize your future self:
What does the future version of you look like?
What skills do you have?
What do you do on a daily basis?
What do you believe?
How does all this build on what your idols do?
Thinking about your future self brings what you imagine into the realm of possibility: now that you have a vision, how will you make it happen?
Now, this may rub you the wrong way. Aren’t creatives supposed to be, well, creative? Original? Well, yes, but firstly, you WILL be original, simply because you’re you. You can’t be someone else, no matter how hard you try.
But that doesn’t mean you can’t take the best of who someone else is, and what they are, and iterate from that. There’s a reason why we say “representation matters” when it comes to seeing a diversity of experiences in books, TV, films, etc. Sometimes the right person can be a beacon of light, showing us the way forward.
There’s nothing wrong with that. It doesn’t mean you are lesser, or not creative enough. Creativity is a mix of ideas, and inspiration from various sources, and your own special something. We don’t think “Well, Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet. Guess there’s nothing more to say about teen romance and family dysfunction.” Thousands of plays/films/books/TV shows would beg to differ.
As a writer, ask yourself some questions, such as: What writers do you admire? Whose career do you want? Who does dialogue really well? Who creates the characters that move you the most?
Are they writing in one genre, or many? How did they learn their craft? Who were their influences? What was their writing routine like? Are they prolific? Do they write series, or single volumes?
It can also be about why you write: do your idols tell deep truths? Do they tell amazing stories? Are they vulnerable on the page? What about their writing is compelling?
We are often told, and rightly, that there is no one perfect way for everyone. That what works for one person may not work for you. But how often do you do a deep dive into what worked for someone else? Too often, it seems we feel like we have to do it “our way.” We struggle on alone lest we be seen as derivative, not a “real writer.”
Many writers got their start emulating other writers. They wrote out passages from their favorite writers to see exactly how they crafted their works. They wrote passages that emulated that writer’s voice. They absorbed sentence structures, vocabulary, and other aspects of craft. It is said that Hunter S. Thompson hand-wrote every word of The Great Gatsby so he could absorb it and learn how to write that well. If you read his work, however, you would never confuse him with F. Scott Fitzgerald!
You don’t have to write out an entire novel to see how it’s done. You can try certain chapters or passages, to see what you can learn.
Writing out an entire chapter or scene helps you learn how to build scenes: tension, dialogue, setting, action, interior thoughts, pacing...
Writing out a section of description or dialogue, for example, helps you learn those specific skills
Going through a novel and picking out a character arc – including those key moments when the character is shown being challenged, and the consequences – is a great way to learn to build character motivation, and how to weave it in among the action plot.
As you can see, there are a number of ways to learn through emulation and assimilation, leading you to innovate in new ways in your own writing. Your distinct voice will emerge as you practice and grow as a writer.
Who are my idols, and what have I learned from them? Dorothy Dunnett is my all-time favorite, and I can learn so much from emulating her: language, character, plot, setting, weaving in details, creating mystery, raising stakes... if I could do what she was able to, I‘d be very happy!
Who is your North Star? Who are the writers you’d love to emulate? Let us know in the comments!
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