Marlo Aberdein | Crimson Chronicle Reporter
Imagine this: you’re writing a fictional story and you know exactly what you’re doing. It’s practically your life. When you finish it, you feel a sense of accomplishment, but also… boredom? Since you know the majority of what you need to, you end up reusing the same ideas, plots and characters over and over again. This mundanity can take away from the fun of the writing process. When taking a creative risk, however, and writing something completely different than what you’re used to, you may find joy in the uncertainty. Writing what you don’t know can empower you to learn more, improve your thinking skills and step out of your comfort zone.
As any expert will tell you about writing, research is the key to a realistic world. You want to put as much thought and consideration into your story, so that readers will actually feel like they’re in that world. According to the Center for Fiction, thorough research is what “enables suspension of disbelief in readers by building their trust.”
When it comes to writing stories about topics you don’t know, research is the only thing keeping your story together. So by default, you’re going to learn a lot of things you don’t know.
As a fiction writer myself, one of my stories is set in New York City, a location I’d decided on before I actually visited, so I didn’t know a lot about it. Research has definitely helped me, especially when it came to the different boroughs. Another thing in my story is baseball, a sport I don’t know much about. To get all of these different moving parts correct, research has a big role to play. As a result though, I’ve learned more about New York than I ever wanted to know.
Graciela Batac, a freshman in the SAS magnet is a fellow avid writer who is currently penning a fictional story on a subject she doesn’t know a great deal about. Her story surrounds an orphanage in the 2000s and a group of kids who run away.
“[Research] kind of helps me form real ideas for my story and set it on some foundation,” said Graciela.
Learning things is part of why we exist and it helps improve your thinking skills, which is further strengthened by writing what you don’t know. Since you’re learning things, your brain is developing new ways to think about these things. Being in this unknown creative territory forces you to find ways to evolve your story, while keeping it balanced—factual and biased. Most stories have multiple characters, and these characters will have different opinions and beliefs. Research doesn’t only help you create an accurate world, but it helps you find enough information to create different opinions, using your thinking skills.
“Writing my story has helped me develop new perspectives,” said Graciela, “It helps me see the world through a different lens.”
Developed critical thinking skills are helpful in all aspects of life, not just in writing. It’s a skill that will influence the way you perceive and understand things, so starting to write about things you are uninformed of in high school is a way to set yourself up for success later in life. These skills can lead to development of nurturing intellectual and emotional abilities such as empathy. Being able to understand different topics by putting yourself in another person’s shoes can be crucial. While writing my stories, I’ve always found that I struggle with the male characters, because I’m never sure how they would react to certain things, but I’ve learned to feel empathy and I try to walk in their shoes while I’m writing their points of view. This is something I never would have done if I didn’t have the skill set or stepped out of my comfort zone.
Lastly, this approach to writing helps you step out of your comfort zone.
Melissa Tydell, an experienced freelance writer, shared on the writing community The Write Practice that “by getting outside my comfort zone, I open myself up to discover something new and fresh and fun.”
Our comfort zone tends to be the main source of our writer’s block and repetitive storylines, so finding ways to step out of it is very important.
“This has helped me become a better writer because it pushes me to do research about my idea and learn more about different perspectives,” added Graciela.
Stepping outside of your comfort zone will also make for better stories. When I was younger, all my stories had the same stiff plot, little diversity and repetitive names. Now I have a long list of plot ideas, all of which explore relationships in different ways. Our comfort zone tends to hold us back from doing amazing things, so to be able to push past that line we’ve mentally drawn is a great feat.
You should consider writing about what you don’t know because it helps you gain more knowledge, it gives you the skill set to process that information, develop the skills to use the rest of your life and it helps you step out of your comfort zone, which will in turn help you become a better writer. Hopefully, you are encouraged to be bold and go for that new story idea!
