Why Is Writing So Difficult?

From a young age we were taught how to write. On the contrary, speaking just happened , it was a natural thing. So why is writing hard for many to do? Right from elementary school we were told to follow specific rules, and then we were either corrected or criticized based on our writing. Maybe that's the reason many students hate writing. It shouldn't be so strict, I mean yes there are certain rules that have to be followed, other wise writing would have no flow. However, we've lost the passion for writing that we had as kids and that's because we do not have the option to always choose the topic we want to write about. Instead we are assigned a topic and expected to add our own spin to it. How are we supposed to do this when the topic doesn't speak to us, when we don't connect with it? Maybe this is the real issue. We no longer connect with the writing we do. We just write to write instead of writing to understand or to explain. If you don't know anything about a topic then research it until you find something you like about it. Add a piece of yourself to it and surprise your professors with how passionate you are about it. We get so caught up in trying to finish a paper or assignment that we just want to get it all over with but we lose sight of what's important and in this case it's writing. Writing to communicate, writing to imagine, writing to explore, and writing to learn.

- Sabrina