Malcom & Roxane

Last night I spent several hours watching Malcom Gladwell's and Roxane Gay's masterclass on writing. I had never heard of Roxanna Gay before but discovered that she was going to be one of the judges of the Medium Writing competition. 

So after completing Malcom's great class, I took Roxane's masterclass as well. I feel like I have learnt a lot from both these writers. More from Malcom for me since he is just more easy to listen to. He seems like a fascinating person regardless of his writing skills. 

Malcom made me feel like there is no point in sharing a story that has already been told. Just like David and Goliath. The only reason he wrote a book with that story is because he discovered that Goliath was blind. Most books don't share that fact so he wrote the book to point the non-obvious side of the story. He encourages doing something similar with whatever topic you select to write about. For that same reason, he encourages doing a lot of research. When someone reads your piece, they have to feel like they got something substantial out of reading it. These are great pointers that I didn't think about before but I am definitely doing it now. 

Roxane made me think about one specific point. She encouraged me to think about what story I am going to write about and why I am the most qualified person to share it. As I listened to her share about her reasons for the stories she selected, I got to thinking about what story I should share. 

I have a few stories that I suspect are good but coming back to why I should be the one to write this piece made me land on one specific story. I liked that I gravitated towards one story and know that I am qualified to share it. Now I feel like I can work on my first draft and get it out of me post haste. 
Great you've got some value out of MasterClass. I get the advert for it regularly but I didn't have the urge jet to buy it. Although Gordon Ramsay's one would really interest me :)
2021-08-11 08:57:46
Well, what I wanted to ask is, is the subscription worth it? :)
2021-08-11 09:50:17
I'm not Keni, but in my view it's totally worth it. It's not so much that you learn techniques or "how to", as in a real class, but that you learn about the process and approach from people who are masters of their domain. You get insight that you don't get anywhere else. 
2021-08-11 10:26:31
Yes I am getting more than I expected. I wasn't too sure at first cause I get disappointed by most online classes but this subscription is absolutely worth it for me. 

I have specific skills that I want to develop. Writing is definitely the one I am focusing on right now but I am slowly getting very interested in screen writing, movies, comedy and history. This natural gravitation to things I had never thought about before is telling me something about myself. 

As Gabriel said, the people who are teaching the courses share so much wisdom that it is unlike any other class I have taken. I know I am going to listen to the tips many times over and try and put it to practice.
2021-08-11 18:28:27

Mastery