Is being a writer in the Philippines easy? (Version 1!)

In a previous piece, we discussed how hard it was to be a writer in the Philippines.

Now, in this third piece in a series that would (hopefully help fellow Filipino writers answer some of their everyday questions about writing, let’s go to the second question: Is it easy to be a writer in the Philippines?

Frankly, you can even start now, provided you have a good idea and are ready to give the hours needed to flesh that out, edit it extensively, and finish the whole thing.

Here are the reasons why it is easy to become a writer (i.e., start one’s writing journey) right now in the Philippines.

Let’s go first to the tools of the craft, which is the bread and butter of every writer out there:

It’s easy to improve your writing if you set the time for it. Whether you’re writing in English or Filipino, there are a lot of language resources out there nowadays that would help you in your writing journey.

To start with, Word and Google Docs have their spell check software, while Grammarly could definitely help fix nearly all of your grammar, usage, and execution problems. Trust me, even university professors with numerous writing books under their name definitely recommend using these tools – besides, it’s simply common sense: Don’t you want to make your own writing life easier?

Second, there are many e-books out there for reading about writing – and samples of great writing are found all over the Internet, whether it’s creative nonfiction, fiction, poetry, drama, etc. 

The reason why this is important is because you have to read in order to write. As many writers have stated on their respective autobiographies: Read books, even the bad ones, for you’ll learn how to write and how not to write your own creative works.

In connection with this, you might want to set yourself a regimen of one finished book per week. The goal here is to make you read consistently – while the things you get from reading books aren’t immediately apparent right after you finished reading that particular text, they do help shape your writing in the long run – without you even noticing it at all.

As for much-needed feedback? There are many writing groups on Facebook, Reddit, Discord, and elsewhere nowadays. You can definitely post your work and try to find readers, just ask questions about the craft, or simply find new friends. This does not include the plethora of real-life writing groups and creative writing courses out there, even in the Philippines – the main advantage of these two is that they ensure that there’s a community of people who would read your work interactively,

Being a writer may be a challenging journey, but it’s worth the hard work and long hours – especially if you love the craft and see the fruits of your labor become, for a lack of a better word, immortal.

Hoping that this piece helps you a little bit on your way!

Good luck, have fun, stay sane, safe, and healthy, keep writing, and keep slaying!

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