Find the magic in your writing.

Something interesting is happening with AI writing: It’s becoming easier to spot. With its perfect grammar and squeaky-clean syntax, it’s like an apartment that’s been cleaned out, scrubbed spotless, and painted white. It looks good, but it’s completely void of personality.

And sometimes that’s okay. Not every piece of writing needs to sing the song of self. Car manuals, tech specs, even most SEO blogs can stick to the facts and just the facts. But when we need our writing to move people—to motivate, inspire, and persuade them—we need the kind of writing that can only come from humans. 

This kind of writing doesn’t magically appear on your screen.

You fumble around for it, grasping for a word here, a sentence there. It’s the process of your brain at work, and this process is almost always messy and imperfect. As Joan Didion famously said, “I write to know what I think.”

We all need to know how to write like this. Not just those of us who’ve devoted our careers to writing, but everyone who posts on social, sends emails, or presents their ideas in any way that requires authentic, meaningful, and convincing communication. So basically, all of us!

But great writing doesn’t just illuminate your ideas. It also shows who you are. Are you friendly? Confident? Funny? Wise? Or are you (gasp!) boring as hell?

Okay, I know you’re not really boring as hell. But your writing may make you, or your message, seem boring. Just as we have to practice writing to hone our thinking, we also have to practice writing to bring a strong voice and personality to it. When we outsource our marketing content, letters, emails, and even our LinkedIn comments (!) to AI, we forfeit our own original thinking. And our personality. 

My hope for you is that you’ll keep writing the hard and messy and imperfect way. You won’t get the magic trick of seeing full paragraphs of grammatically correct writing appear before your eyes. But you will get something far more satisfying—and powerful. Your own ideas, written in a strong and distinctive voice, pulled straight from your head and onto the page.

Because when you can write like this, you can change things—whether you’re trying to promote the impact of a climate action plan or inspire a colleague to evaluate their environmental footprint. With patience and practice, this type of original, open-hearted, and clear-headed writing is possible for all of us. And this is where the real magic lies.