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Quarter Turn + Robin Wilding
Boom shackalacka

Robin’s genius Medium banner
When I started writing on Medium in February, I knew no one. I wrote into the void for a while while I figured out things like titles and formatting.
Until one day, when it happened. A stranger with 12K followers and a hilarious profile picture sent me a private message on one of my stories.
You’re screaming into the void, she said. You should try publications.
Her note was a generous act (and she was right), and it was followed by an even more generous invite later to a community of writing friends in Discord. Robin Wilding is the kind of person you hope to meet when you start writing on Medium.
Experienced, helpful, kind, self-assured—and freakin’ hilarious.
What’s your online writing origin story?
I took journalism in school. Print journalism to be exact. It was right around the time people were wondering if ‘this internet stuff’ is going to be ‘a thing.’ Spoilers, but…it was. Sadly, that meant I graduated as print jobs were having massive layoffs so I pivoted career-wise.
A number of years later, after working at a tech company, then teaching English in Korea I was a tour guide on a pub crawl in the Caribbean. I could afford a great lifestyle working a few nights a week in the high season. But the low season was bleak, and boring. So I thought I’d try writing online.
I quickly went from working for a content mill to getting clients off Upwork and freelance job boards. And voila, I was a professional writer.
Stay tuned for my villain arc.
What have been the most important tools, topics, or ideas in supporting your journey?
Well, seeing as the only ‘tools’ you need are a laptop and internet — it would definitely be ideas. Even small ideas can make a big difference in your journey. For example, I made a portfolio website for my writing (back when this wasn’t so easy) and just having that made me look significantly more professional than the majority of people applying for the same writing jobs.
Ideas are also your bread and butter. Hiring a writer to write something predetermined is dime-a-dozen. Hiring someone with their own ideas and unique spins is what differentiates you.
When it comes to finding an audience — your ideas are your brand.
How about advice: what’s a favorite quote or piece of advice that you’d share with other writers?
My favorite advice is, ‘Nobody cares’. I find it a great, and funny motivator. “Gasp, I can’t say that can I?” Nobody cares, just say it. “Why aren’t I getting more followers?” Nobody cares — you have to give them a damned-good reason to; as a writer, it’s your job to make people give a shit.
What writing advice do you think is wildly overrated?
“Write daily” is the advice I think is most overrated. The pressure this motivates people to put on themselves is sheer lunacy and not conducive to creativity. To me, it’s part of the hustle-hard culture.
I like to say this instead, write what needs to be written. If it takes you some time to ruminate on it mentally — that will get you further ahead than forcing out words on topics that don’t inspire you. I see too many people getting caught in the trap of thinking volume improves quality over time. Time improves quality, when you take your time and work on things.
Also, whoever is out there telling people to write in solely single-sentence paragraphs — can go step on a Lego. Lauren you and I have talked about this before. Single-sentence paragraphs are for emphasis and spice. 107 single-sentence ‘paragraphs’ in a row likely mean you have disjointed ideas.
Which books — on ANY topic — are the ones you recommend to people most often?
I gave up recommending books a long time ago. Book selection is so personal that the odds of someone liking exactly what I like is rare.
Having said that, my favorite book is Last Chance to See by Douglas Adams. This quirky and hilarious sci-fi writer was sent out on assignment to document endangered animals around the globe, for some weird reason. He adapts beautifully and the results are hilarious. It’s a great lesson in getting out of your comfort zone while bringing the ‘you’ to everything you do.
What’s something you’ve taught yourself to do that you’re proud of?
Pronounce the letter R. I couldn’t do it as a child, and speech therapy wasn’t as big back then. So yes, my name was ‘Wobin’. So I sat in a room by myself, hidden from everyone else, going ‘rrrr….r-r-r-r-r…arrrrgh’ endlessly until I could finally do it.
That, and web design and Photoshop.
PLUS a bonus question: one thing no one ever talks about when it comes to writing funny.
Great question. Have you been peeking in my drafts folder Lauren? I have an upcoming article on exactly that topic.
Here it is: very few of us are naturally funny writers. We don’t sit there at a keyboard and hilarity falls onto it. We get inspiration elsewhere, we google ‘funny ways to say ____’, etc.
And we (well, me and most of my funny writer friends) are consistently worried that people won’t get a joke, or think it’s lame.
