“It’s perfectly fine to try my hand at writing,” you might say, “but I have no idea what to write ABOUT.”

Subject matter is important when you’re writing, whether you’re writing creatively or informatively. But you cannot let yourself get hung up on subject matter and stop writing completely. If you stop writing because you feel you don’t know what to write next, you risk hindering your creativity permanently–first, you’re afraid you don’t know anything to write about and you stop, and next, you’re afraid to start up again because it’s been so long since you tried, and so on.

So, how can you decide what to write about? The following blog article delves into the various ways:

Write About Your Life

No one can tell all that there is to know about your life except you. You are the one who has had the first-person experiences you have. Whether they are funny anecdotes, sad memories, wild and crazy tales, or even just small, wistful moments, they are YOUR stories, and they ARE worth writing about.

Why are your personal stories worth writing about? Because when you share about your life, you are sharing a story that could inspire someone else to get through a similar situation he or she is going through. Humans are social creatures, after all, and we like to know that we’re not alone in whatever tough or strange situation we get into. That’s why social media is so big right now–it’s suddenly very easy to uplift each other by sharing about our own experiences. When you write about your life, whether you choose to make it a Facebook status, a Twitter message, a blog article, or an email to someone else, you are taking time to reach out to someone else and tell them “Hey, I went through this, too. I understand.”

Write About One of Your Passions

It’s darned near impossible to write about something if you could give a flying flip about the subject matter. If you want to write something to interest your audience, write about something that you love–your very passion for it will draw others in.

Take this blog as an example. I write about six subjects I love, all week, every week (giving myself time off on Sundays, of course), and I have passion for each one. Because I love each of the subjects I write about, I’ve taken time to become more knowledgeable about each one, and I can write about being thoroughly involved in each subject’s activities.

Writing about things I’m passionate about even entered my schoolwork once–I was giving a presentation in one of my graduate English classes, which was part of my huge final project. I was covering how girls fare in education, and at one point, I covered a sub-topic about girls and gaming, which is becoming much more popular as more girls feel “normal” playing video games. After the presentation was over, the professor and several students commented that most of my presentation was delivered in a rather flat way, but that they were really interested to hear about the “girls and gaming” segment because I looked so much more lively and so much more interested in what I was talking about. I ended up making the “gaming girls” segment into my major final project, and I had a whole lot more fun writing about that than I had had working on the other, larger-topic presentation.

Whatever your passion is, whatever you love doing, seeing, or being involved in, that can be a source for your writing. Don’t worry about it, thinking “But no one else will find this interesting”–remember, in this age of the Internet, there are bound to be people who will find your digital writing VERY interesting!

Write About A Subject that Gets No Attention and Needs It

This is how social activism and social projects get started. From well-established groups like MADD all the way down to growing projects like Freecycle, these projects all began with someone talking and writing about a subject that had gotten very little attention and needed it. Whatever subject or issue you firmly believe in, whatever has gotten your attention and keeps you awake at night, write about it. The very act of communicating about it can start the social ball rolling and fix the problem, raise awareness, or just help people come together and share their personal stories with each other.

This doesn’t have to be for just solving problems, either–this can be about happy events, such as a new group of local moms working together to help each other with kids, or a new chapter of a family-friendly social group starting up in your area. Whatever you need to advertise about, tell others about, your writing can be a powerful, personal voice for that topic.

Summary

Writing does not have to be frightening–in fact, writing can be incredibly freeing for your mental “voice,” your thoughts, feelings, and dreams. I know I can say a lot more through writing than I ever could by speaking–I’d stammer and chase too many topic rabbits, while my writing voice flows as smoothly as water. I hope these three tips about choosing a subject matter help you figure out where YOUR voice belongs…and I hope it inspires you to start or continue your written communication with the world.