Personality in writing isn’t just about your style…

Call me dumb, but I never grasped the idea of personality in writing.

I felt it when someone used it.

But I never understood how I could use it in my writing, or what makes someone's words radiate personality. This went on for a while…

Until I made a realization:

Injecting personality into your writing isn’t a magic trick. Yes, you can’t really see the elements at first, but once you understand what personality in writing is you can debunk the whole concept pretty well.

First of all…

It’s not just about “your style”.

For example, John Carlton. His copy is filled with power-words and every sentence just punches you in the face.

That’s the way he writes.

But if you look at Gary Bencivenga. He uses power-words sparingly. His copy is simpler but, he pushes the parts where he needs a bit more oomph.

That’s the way HE writes.

For a good while I believed style is the only thing that pushes your personality through your words and makes it come across for the reader.

But not so fast, Bucko.

Your personality isn’t just about the way you speak, it’s also what you speak about that matters.

Same with writing.

It’s not just your style, but also your thoughts, opinions, and actions on paper that project an image as a whole of your ‘personality’.

Those things makes you, YOU.

See? It’s not rocket science.

I’m sure I already read about this earlier but it looks like I had to come to this conclusion myself to truly realize what the matter is all about.

And that’s a lesson in it of itself.

Anyway, back to where I was…

Your personality(in writing or not) is the whole you. Everything.

The good, the bad, the ugly.

Because of this it’s hard to make the whole picture come across in a tweet or in a single email - in those mediums I would just depend on your style, that works pretty well too.

But to fully make your personality come across you need something like this email list.

And the best example I can make is Ben Settle.

He incorporates his way of thinking, opinions, actions, reactions to events, and everything else into his emails.

All that with his style makes Ben, BEN in the eyes of the reader.

And that can make you, You in the eyes of your readers too. But beware…

This is not something you snap your fingers to and it starts working.

This will take time, a lot probably.

So start now.