All this to say that yeah, it can be really hard to sit down and read books, but...if you want to write them it really helps to learn what you love and don't love about the experience of reading.
You can learn how to create stories that work around those problems!
I do think that it would be best to find stories in the medium you would like to tell them, but it's OK if that's too big a hill to climb for some reason.
Just engage with stories. Your own storytelling improves when you spend time with them. You can't help but learn.
And if, for various reasons, reading books aren't your thing there are SO MANY other ways to engage with stories. It's really awesome!
There are audiobooks and TV shows and movies and YouTube channels and D&D actual-plays. There are endless ways to tell and hear stories.
It's also hard to build that experience, that innate sense of storytelling, any other way. Part of learning how to tell stories is engaging with stories themselves.
I wouldn't go so far to say you can't be a writer without reading, but I do think you miss a lot if you don't.
If you want to tell stories, you have to get a sense of how they work and how certain choices affect the audience engaging with them.
Reading other works gives writers an invaluable look at how others put stories together and how we're affected by them. It's grounding.
...less of a writer than someone who reads a whole lot. There are a few reasons for this problem that don't feel like excuses, and I get folks who think it's an ableist thing.
But I also think the argument "a writer must read" points to a true thing.
RT @MattytheMouse@twitter.com
I wanna find somethings my out. Like and retweet if you know about the giant Eddie Murphy head, and comment if you actually know the movie that it’s from. Don’t reply with the name of the movie; I’m showing a friend that the giant head is that movie’s only enduring legacy lol
🐦🔗: https://twitter.com/MattytheMouse/status/1549593284397481984
RT @danidonovan@twitter.com
Found this in my drafts 📋✅
🐦🔗: https://twitter.com/danidonovan/status/1549527241272573952
RT @mjmarrom@twitter.com
Are ppl actually asking you to stay home forever and never do anything fun ever again in your life
or are they asking you to expand your definition of fun to include things that lower risk & harm (meeting outdoors, wearing masks, limiting large indoor gatherings during waves)
RT @SlackSupremacy@twitter.com
Sesame Street when black children ask for a hug
🐦🔗: https://twitter.com/SlackSupremacy/status/1549346904642932736
YUP. Honestly, get him out of there for someone who will do the job they were hired to do.
RT @CheriJacobus@twitter.com
Biden will and should be primaried by a pro-justice Dem. Someone who will run on cleaning up corruption and holding criminals and traitors accountable, no matter who they are. And to nominate an AG who will ensure NO ONE is above the law.
🐦🔗: https://twitter.com/CheriJacobus/status/1549421280109150208
RT @JoseSPiano@twitter.com
Why does this keep making me laugh?!?! 😅
🐦🔗: https://twitter.com/JoseSPiano/status/1548884261998141441
RT @LeanandCuisine@twitter.com
Me leaving my 3 bedroom spot after I just wake and baked https://twitter.com/hellfiresbyers/status/1548737138681909249
🐦🔗: https://twitter.com/LeanandCuisine/status/1549214388565037063
RT @NomeDaBarbarian@twitter.com
Nah.
"In the same way your heart feels and your mind thinks, you, mortal beings, are the instrument by which the universe cares. If you choose to care, then the universe cares. If you don't, then it doesn't." https://twitter.com/Sciencenature14/status/1547613211783860227
🐦🔗: https://twitter.com/NomeDaBarbarian/status/1549255789755305984
THIS THREAD RIGHT HERE. I think we’re doing our cause a disservice by not paying attention to how our messages are received by the people we hope to convince.
I understand we’re all tired of having the same conversations over and over, but we have to be better about this.
RT @tilton_raccoon@twitter.com
I feel like I should expand on this a little bit, with more seriousness and less flippancy. One of the big problems I have with social justice movements in general is that the people striving for social justice all too frequently ignore basic human psychology. (1/7)
🐦🔗: https://twitter.com/tilton_raccoon/status/1549089847997894656
We HAVE to start being more concerned about what’s right over what’s legal. In the US, we are increasingly living under an immoral legal framework.
It’s time to be Chaotic Good, friends.
RT @kylegriffin1@twitter.com
In Wisconsin, a woman bled for more than 10 days from an incomplete miscarriage after emergency room staff would not remove the fetal tissue out of fear that doing so might run afoul of state abortion restrictions. https://wapo.st/3aHOcRA
🐦🔗: https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status/1548473936223932418
RT @SahilBloom@twitter.com
A “razor” is a rule of thumb that simplifies decision making.
The most powerful razors I’ve found:
🐦🔗: https://twitter.com/SahilBloom/status/1548654048739528706
A digital jackalope living in a black man's body. Pronouns: he/him/his. I love my blackness, and yours.