Recognize the Subjective

Complete objectivity is not possible, even when you've developed heightened skills in critical and creative thinking. At the same time, as you enhance your thinking skills you will be better equipped to separate objective evaluations from subjective conclusions.

Subjectivity can be exploited to write content that provokes. Nor do you have to play fair when you write. However, there is a fine line between provocation that engages and provocation that alienates.

In critiquing, the subjective aspects of the work and your subjective reactions can give you insight into how a piece works. Being reactive is normal, but an effective critiquer  also need to assess from whence a reactions come from, separating the personal from the universal.

Training the Brain

Training your brain is like exercising any other muscle. You work out until your body responds without conscious thought. Like great thinkers, athletes may be born with an innate talent, but without training, these talents are not fully realized. Moving past prior limitations can be painful, but worth the effort. The initial discomfort of brain training pays off, especially when writing.

Discovering and assimilating new information is one way to train your brain. The key is the assimilation part. Gathering information isn't enough. Learning to integrate the new information in a way that broadens or deepens your original thoughts takes effort and a willingness to alter your thinking.

One way to apply brain training to writing is sharing your work with others and learning to assimilate feedback in a way that improves your work. This takes practice and more practice. You will falter, stumble and fall numerous times before you are able to get up and do the work that needs to be done. 

Target Audience

For whom are you writing? If your answer is one of the above, you're doing yourself a disservice. Not only will the marketing of your work suffer, but the work itself will also suffer.As you think about what you will write, focusing on a target audience can help you shape your work effectively.

Thinking strategies for articulating your target audience include:

1. Choose someone from your life you believe would value and enjoy your work and write for them.
2. Visualize reading your work (or having it read) to a group and think about who would be included in that group.
3. Identify other works that share your target audience.
4. Determine where your work would appear in a directory or bookstore.
5. Think about what makes your work special.
6. Look at your social media interests as a way of focusing your intent. 

The form your work takes may change during development, but your target audience is likely to remain the same. 

Danger, Will Robinson

Ah, the conundrum of provocation. On the one hand, you want your work to make others think. On the other hand, your work may inspire emotions your readers do not wish to feel. 

As a critiquer, your challenge is to recognize and accept your reactions to a piece of written work. Monitoring your reactions can give you insight into the effectiveness of what is written. Did the content get under your skin because you disagree or was it because the writer didn't back up their conclusions with evidence? Did a particular character push a button in you or was their a disconnect between who they are and what they did?

Critiquing isn't only about the work, it's about you and your thinking process. Think of this as an opportunity for possible insight.

(If you don't know who Will Robinson was it's because you never watched LOST IN SPACE)

Critiquing and Criticizing

Critiquing a developing work is a process, not a proclamation. Learning to critique constructively will help you develop your work. To learn effective critiquing skills requires:

• developing skills in creative and critical thinking
• recognizing the "rules" of writing and how they can be broken
• learning the language of constructive feedback
• practice, practice, practice

There are no shortcuts and the learning effective critique includes blunders and gaffs. However, this learning process helps you look at your own work in a more constructive way, reducing your anxiety when you share your work with others.

Writer's Block

Writer's block? Feh! Thinker's block is more like it. Sometimes you have to trick yourself to think in a way that moves your work forward. This can mean anything from walking the dog to cooking a gourmet meal to picking a fight with your best friend. Some require physical movement, others sensory stimulation and other prefer emotional upheaval. Whatever shifts your thinking. 

Voting Helps You Write

It's election day and you are reminded of how your opinions differ from others. Candidates and advocates of initiatives, propositions and referendums successfully persuade through sound bytes. However, oversimplification does not promote thinking. Ramifications are easily ignored, replaced by righteous rants that feed emotion rather than explore the often complex process of governing.

Voting is an exercise in critical thinking. Exploring opposing opinions that go beyond attitude, rhetoric and name-calling with additional research requires an open mind. You are required to understand conflicting intentions and ways of thinking.

The root of good writing is effective conflict. To immerse yourself in conflict requires the ability to think critically from different points of view. Train your brain to embrace the power of conflict by voting.