Week 8 Reading and Writing

 I think the biggest improvement I've seen is in my writing.  I didn't feel that good about my first couple stories, but in recent weeks I've been much more confident in my writing and I think I've improved a lot from just reading stories and the writing of other people!  In most of my writing I felt like I was stretching to meet a desired length because I wasn't very good at setting up the scene with descriptors in a way that flowed naturally.  However, my first storybook writing flew by in no time and it somehow ended up being much longer than I anticipated.  I figure this is how writing should feel when it's natural and unforced, although I think it was helpful that the story was about a topic that I already had an interest in!

I've noticed that all of my favorite writings (so far being my storybook content and introduction) were all about observations and concepts of the world, not necessarily narratives of people or everyday things.  I also felt this when writing microfictions about Siddhartha a couple weeks back. I think one sure way to improve my writing is to start recognizing my strengths and weaknesses, and focusing on what I know I will enjoy reading and writing.  I love to reflect and analyze, so it's no surprise that all of my favorite writings so far involved some self reflection (and hopefully some self realization for readers as well)!  I will say that I've found that the show I based my storybook off of is lesser known than I thought, which has made it difficult for people to understand it at first glance.  I think the fact that I'm trying to highlight my own observations in addition to the already very confusing world of the Avatar is pretty difficult for readers to jump into. Despite this, I still enjoy the concept for myself and maybe some people will look into the series themselves after reading it!

4 scenes from the live of Buddha, Source

This image is from my microfictions of Siddhartha, the first writing assignment where I noticed some improvement!