(Not that kind of dictator.)
My writing goals are insane this year. I want to write six new books in a new series as part of a rapid-release independent publishing project to launch next year. In researching the best ways to attempt this, I heard that the fastest writers dictate their books. So I figured…what the hell? If it helps me write a gajillion words in a week, I’ll give anything a shot.
To start, I decided “I’ll dictate a blog post and see what happens.”
Aside from many typos and weird voice-to-text issues, it didn’t turn out too bad. The main casualty was my brain, as it clearly tried to scramble and adjust what it normally does when drafting.
Equipment: I used the iOS built in voice-to-text on my iPhone and a cheapy lavalier microphone clipped to the front of my t-shirt. I drafted in my iPhone app version of Scrivener.
Results: This was hard. My brain is still trying to wrap itself around how to do this for a long haul project. But, in about five minutes I hit 850 words. Therefore, it feels like something to pursue.
In the interest of showing the process to those of you who may also be attempting dictation, I am posting the entire blog post I drafted…unedited.
Good luck.
I mean…um…enjoy!
In an attempt to learn dictation. I am trying to dictate this entire blog without struggling too much. Unfortunately, it feels really really awkward and I am not entirely sure what to say except I don’t know how I will manage to dictate an entire book in this manner. I keep forgetting to add punctuation. I keep forgetting to Formalize my thoughts. I don’t have a good structure to follow even this little bit. Like I just messed up and said. Instead of,. And now because I said. And, and; all of those punctuation marks are appearing rather than words that I want to say. it at least appears that my microphone is picking up all the words. It didn’t seem to be doing that earlier. I think I had to structure it on my shirt a little bit differently so now it’s positioned in a way that it can find my voice. Do people dictate in just a stream of conscious Attitude. I don’t even know that I have that many thoughts in my head. A horrible blankness just appears when I am asked to speak into this microphone and say words. But theoretically, it helps you write faster, even now I have written an amount of words, and it seems to be going faster and there’s only a couple typos. so I guess that’s pretty good? I wonder if it uses curse words. Fuck. Dammit. Shit shit shit. OK. It will at least talk the way that I talk. Now I will dictate where I am in the room. I am sitting in my living room. On a snowy day. Upstairs my kids are probably half listening to what I am saying because I sound like an idiot. My dog is next to me sleeping. And it’s cold outside. There’s a little bit of a draft coming out of the window. The TV is off. I finished watching top Chef.. Not entirely sure where I’m going with all of this. It didn’t record my laughing because I was just laughing at myself. Just FYI. You didn’t know that you were going to get this interesting reading in real time. As I struggle to think of something to say. I think with dictating it will come down to clarity of thought, clarity of speech, clarity of purpose. And I think right now I’m learning that I don’t have any of these things which is kind of frustrating. I think it may lead to a more authentic voice, especially if I’m struggling this long in this hard. I was reading that to gain a new skill productivity actually goes way down at first. And I for some reason, but that dictating would be a different experience. I thought I would be able to get on it pretty quickly, because after all, I talk all day long right. I mean, I know how to speak, I know how to write, so together, those things should work out. However, I’ve learned that structuring a story is a very Left brain activity. I can talk all day long. But in order to have coherent thoughts, I have to have some creativity and some logic which is working both sides of the brain and right now my brain is clearly using other skill sets to try to develop even this sentence. I couldn’t think of a single punctuation mark as I was going. The interest of complete honesty I’m going to post this blog un transcribed and unedited to demonstrate how dictation changes what you’re doing. I was watching Joanna Penn post on dictating and how she does it because right now all I do is listen to Joanna Penn and try to follow her advice. And I’m enjoying she comes up with. She did say that it would be very awkward and that it would take time to adjust. And boy oh boy was she right. I’m dictating into my phone and like Joanna Penn I cannot look at what I’m dictating or I start to get that self critical editing tone in my head. It’s amazing. It’s y’all should try it. That’s really what I am learning here. It’s harder than it looks. But I think I can get better and better at it as I keep working. I will definitely need an outline in front of me to do creative work. Because I can feel the stream of consciousness coming in, and I feel that that would be a stronger Way to approach this. But you can approach a book so illogically. Even Virginia Wolf would have trouble with this. She probably I don’t know struggled over every word because Virginia Wolf strikes me as a perfectionist and actual transcription would probably have driven her back shit crazy. And I said bat shit not back. There’s a lot wrong with that sentence anyway moving on. Give it a shot. Have you tried dictation. If you have, I would love to hear your stories, please let me know and I will hopefully get better and better at this as I move on.
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