Writing Advice

[HelloGoodbye]

Hello everybody!  I know for a fact that there are tons of talented writers here on the Arena, and I was hoping you all might be able to give me a hand with something.

I have two main bad habits when I write.  The first one is switching between tenses all the time.  I'm training myself out of this, but even when I slip up it's easy enough to find it and fix it when I'm revising.

The bad habit that I'm really struggling with right now is that I lapse into a passive voice when I want to be writing in an active voice.  It's a really lousy habit, and I do it constantly.  The problem is, I have a hard time distinguishing between the active and passive voice for some reason, so I don't even realize when I do it and I have trouble seeing it even when I revise.

I was hoping that some of you may have some tips to help me with my passive voice woes!  Thanks a bunch!   

[Loa]

Can you give us some examples?

[okamigirl64]

I feel ya on the tenses! When I write, I always get them switched up! My crazy 12th grade English teacher wanted to nearly kill our whole class because of this. 

The trick my teacher taught me for passive/active voice is EXTREMELY simple. If you can insert the phrase "by zombies" after the verb and it makes sense, it's passive voice.

For example:

Twilight was chased (by zombies). <-- makes sense, so passive
A monster chased (by zombies) her. <-- doesn't make sense, so active

More examples:
“A great time was had (by zombies) …” Yep, passive.
“We had (by zombies) a great time …” Nope, that was active.
“You’re invited (by zombies) to stop in and visit soon.” Passive.
“We invite (by zombies) you to stop in and visit soon.” Active.

I hope this helps!

[Sweet_Stuff]

I feel ya on the tenses! When I write, I always get them switched up! My crazy 12th grade English teacher wanted to nearly kill our whole class because of this. 

The trick my teacher taught me for passive/active voice is EXTREMELY simple. If you can insert the phrase "by zombies" after the verb and it makes sense, it's passive voice.

For example:

Twilight was chased (by zombies). <-- makes sense, so passive
A monster chased (by zombies) her. <-- doesn't make sense, so active

More examples:
“A great time was had (by zombies) …” Yep, passive.
“We had (by zombies) a great time …” Nope, that was active.
“You’re invited (by zombies) to stop in and visit soon.” Passive.
“We invite (by zombies) you to stop in and visit soon.” Active.

I hope this helps!

Good tip!

[Lore-Lei]

The bad habit that I'm really struggling with right now is that I lapse into a passive voice when I want to be writing in an active voice.  It's a really lousy habit, and I do it constantly.  The problem is, I have a hard time distinguishing between the active and passive voice for some reason, so I don't even realize when I do it and I have trouble seeing it even when I revise.

Then Hemingway is a must for you: http://www.hemingwayapp.com/

As for switching tenses, I can't really help you with that. I write in past tense all the time because it suits be better, I'd advise you choosing the one that you feel the more comfortable to you more and sticking to it.

[CadePony]

I had a serious problem with switching past and present tenses in my earlier writing as well; I think that's a common bad habit for most people who write, be it for school assignments or for fun.

Not sure what to do about the passive/active voice, but it sounds like okamigirl64 gave you a pretty helpful tip in that regard. =)

[Sarahlacewing]

I think everyone slips into passive voice sometimes. I can't say much about stopping it, but I will say that I often do two things as I edit. I 'find' function -ing- and look at my ing vebs. Also, I use a few of the free editing pages that will help to show passive voice. (http://editminion.com) (prowritingaid.com)

[kaoskat]

I don't have much advice, but I wish you luck in improving your writing!

[HelloGoodbye]

Thank you for the advice everyone!  I really appreciate it! 

[Katika]

My personal rule is to not worry about anything other than getting the general idea of the story told during the first draft.  I'll put it aside for a while before going back to read it again, and I'll highlight/circle all of my passive voice, weird tense changes, excessive -ings/adverbs/adjectives and the like and go back to fix it then.  If you worry about aiming for perfection from the get-go, it'll make things SO much more frustrating.

I fix my passive voice by looking for forms of "to be" (am, is, are, was, were, be, being, been, have, has, had, do, does, did, shall, should, will, would, may, might, must, can, could - emphasis on the "was" and things like "should have been") and seeing if there is an elegant way to reword the sentence to say the same thing without those words.  I typically will not touch any of this stuff in dialogue, since I don't want the speech to sound unnatural.

Please do keep in mind that there is a time and a place for every word when it comes to writing.  There isn't anything inherently evil about using passive voice, and you don't need to get *all* of it out of your MS

[northstar3184]

I feel ya on the tenses! When I write, I always get them switched up! My crazy 12th grade English teacher wanted to nearly kill our whole class because of this. 

The trick my teacher taught me for passive/active voice is EXTREMELY simple. If you can insert the phrase "by zombies" after the verb and it makes sense, it's passive voice.

For example:

Twilight was chased (by zombies). <-- makes sense, so passive
A monster chased (by zombies) her. <-- doesn't make sense, so active

More examples:
“A great time was had (by zombies) …” Yep, passive.
“We had (by zombies) a great time …” Nope, that was active.
“You’re invited (by zombies) to stop in and visit soon.” Passive.
“We invite (by zombies) you to stop in and visit soon.” Active.

I hope this helps!

I've had this problem too. Thank you so much for sharing this tip!

[okamigirl64]

I feel ya on the tenses! When I write, I always get them switched up! My crazy 12th grade English teacher wanted to nearly kill our whole class because of this. 

The trick my teacher taught me for passive/active voice is EXTREMELY simple. If you can insert the phrase "by zombies" after the verb and it makes sense, it's passive voice.

For example:

Twilight was chased (by zombies). <-- makes sense, so passive
A monster chased (by zombies) her. <-- doesn't make sense, so active

More examples:
“A great time was had (by zombies) …” Yep, passive.
“We had (by zombies) a great time …” Nope, that was active.
“You’re invited (by zombies) to stop in and visit soon.” Passive.
“We invite (by zombies) you to stop in and visit soon.” Active.

I hope this helps!

I've had this problem too. Thank you so much for sharing this tip!

No problem! 

[ringwraith10]

I feel ya on the tenses! When I write, I always get them switched up! My crazy 12th grade English teacher wanted to nearly kill our whole class because of this. 

The trick my teacher taught me for passive/active voice is EXTREMELY simple. If you can insert the phrase "by zombies" after the verb and it makes sense, it's passive voice.

For example:

Twilight was chased (by zombies). <-- makes sense, so passive
A monster chased (by zombies) her. <-- doesn't make sense, so active

More examples:
“A great time was had (by zombies) …” Yep, passive.
“We had (by zombies) a great time …” Nope, that was active.
“You’re invited (by zombies) to stop in and visit soon.” Passive.
“We invite (by zombies) you to stop in and visit soon.” Active.

I hope this helps!

I love this! I might have to use it for teaching, myself.

As for switching tenses, I feel like this might just be a practice makes perfect situation. Once you've corrected yourself enough times you might get a better feel for it. Or also, as Katika said, you might be better off leaving your writing alone and not trying to edit as you write, just so you can let your ideas flow more smoothly. Then when you have writer's block you can go back and make edits. Sorry I can't be more help here!