WRITE-ing A Love Letter
by Edward A. Bordi
I first discovered "easy writing" back in college (many years ago). The memory is crisp. I sat in the back row with a sharpened pencil, an overturned assignment and a blank pad. I patiently anticipated the start of the pending timed exam. I waited for the second-hand to reach 12 and upon arrival, the professor said, "Go!" I lowered my head, read the assignment, picked up my pencil and began to write, writing fast so I'd finish on time. Out of necessity a new skill was born. I wrote the words that came to me. No labor involved, almost no thinking - just instinct, in Lady Hesketh's words, "what came uppermost."
It all came together that day for some reason. I was able to write like never before. Writing was no longer a struggle; it was no longer a painful effort.
It literally was easy.
By combining this "easy writing" technique I just happened to stumble upon that day with methods I picked up over years working as an engineer, I created an easy-to-remember system for writing love letters, a system that makes letter writing fun and easy.
Stress-free too.
I call it, The WRITE System.
With this simple system, you lose the guesswork, enable writing from the heart and stop hanging on every next word. And the best part is, you won't need to wait until you just happen to stumble upon it, because I will show you how to use it on-demand!
Over and over again.
When you decide to write a love letter, start by following my simple 5-step system and you'll be creating original works of art that stir your lover's passion with no problem at all and in no time at all.
The 5-Step WRITE System
Step # 1 ~ W stands for a who, what, where, why or when question. Thinking of your true love, ask yourself one of these questions.
Step # 2 ~ R stands for rapid response. Right off the top of your head, list as many single word answers to your question as possible.
Step # 3 ~ I stands for include only 3, which means pick the top 3 answers from your list and toss the rest.
Step # 4 ~ T stands for timed writing. Here’s where the love letter starts to take shape. Write for a specific amount of time and then stop. Put down your pen.
Step # 5 ~ E stands for editing. Once your writing is complete – then all you need to do is make the necessary touch-ups.
Well, those are the five WRITE steps.
The rest of this page will explain each of them in more detail and when you’re finished reading it you will own, arguably, one of the most important skills you will ever acquire.
I think the best way to describe the WRITE system is to go through an example. As I'm sitting here in my office, writing this section, I am going to take my own advice and write a sample love letter, starting with Step 1, "W."
Step # 1 ~ W ~ Question.
Thinking of your true love, ask yourself a who, what, where, why or when question.
Okay, so here I go. Sitting back in my chair, scratching my head, scrunching my eyes, thinking real hard ~ I have it, "Where did I meet you?"
"Hmm," I think to myself, "It's not that great, is it?" But it is a question! Should I scrap it and think again? Nah, I'll go with it.
The question is not what matters most. It's how you answer it that matters.
After step 1, you know what you're going to write about. Great, we're making progress.
Step # 2 ~ R ~ Rapid Response.
Right off the top of your head, list as many single word answers to your question as possible.
My question: "Where did I meet you?"
As I'm rattling off this list, I'm thinking (again), "... this is a bad question, there's not much to work with here..." But I just keep going.
- Home-town
- 7-11
- Hot dog
- Parking-lot
- Car
- Friends
- Party
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Done! Yep, it's short. But that's Okay, it's all I can come up with, kind of like popcorn in the microwave. Once the pops start to slow down, stop.
After step 2, you'll have plenty of ideas to include in your letter. You have more to say (usually) than you realize.
Step # 3 ~ I ~ Include Only Three.
Pick the top 3 answers from your list and toss the rest.
So I'm sitting here just looking at my list. A minute or so goes by as I think of what each answer means to me and then finally I choose three with the richest meaning. I am left with,
- Home-town
- Hot dog
- Friends
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Those old friends are not around anymore, but that hot dog counter is and more importantly, my true love and I are still around - and going strong! This is what I'll write about.
After step 3, you know exactly what you're going to write about in your love letter. But you still have no idea what your love letter is going to say, exactly. But that's a very good thing. You'll find out why in the next step.
At this point, you learned all about steps 1, 2 and 3, which, by the way, are crucial to the whole process. Skip them and forget about it! Your love letter just won't be the same. But even if you completed them (now you have a basic outline), you'll still have no idea what your love letter is going to say, exactly.
And that's a very good thing...
Why? Because you're not stuck with the stress of over-thinking and over-analyzing every word, resulting in writers block! You've created a framework enabling you to write from the heart. To write what naturally comes to mind ... so now you can just relax and just write whatever you would say in a conversation, if your true love were sitting opposite you.
Now the fun begins.
Step # 4 ~ T ~ Timed Writing.
Here's where the love letter starts to take shape. Write for a specific amount of time and then stop. Put down your pen.
Before you get started, here are some must-dos
- Respond to your question using your top 3 answers
- Use all three of your answers in your letter
- Start your first sentence with one of your answers
- Write as fast as you can without stopping for the entire time
- Write whatever comes into your mind
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Trust me! This system and these rules work. They keep your letter interesting, relevant, fresh, true and perhaps most important, natural.
Remember, since you know how to talk, you know how to write. (Read more about this concept in my book, "The Love Letter Handbook") So don't worry about being all technical and precise. Just write as the words come to you, write from your heart, "what comes uppermost."
You'll edit later.
With those rules in mind, put your 3 words in front of you: "home-town," "hot dog," "friends," set your timer for 5 minutes and
start to write.
Writing fast for 5 minutes
"Home-town love is what we have. I met you in my home-town over a hot-dog counter. It doesn't sound romantic, but it was the single most important event in my life. Meeting you among old friends who I can barely remember... meeting the girl that would become my wife.
I bought a hot dog in my hometown on a day that (when it started) I didn't know would be so significant. Before meeting you I always dreamed of what my wife would be like. How would she act? When I would meet her?
The day those dreams came true were great and I would have never guessed that it would have been over a hot-dog. But honestly it doesn't really matter where it was... over a hot dog, in the park, or over-looking the ocean. Those are moments for the movies - the moments of real life, of love, and with you are the ones that I treasure most.
Where I met you was and always will be burned in my memory... the day that I met my wife, the day that changed the course my life...
That day, in my home-town, over the hot dog counter... I met my wife."
Buzz... time's up. When the timer rings, you must STOP.
After 5 minutes, you'll have a letter about a page long. Yes it may (highly likely) have grammar problems, misspellings and flow
errors. But you can clean all that up. And when you do, you'll be left with a beautiful love letter for your sweetheart.
Next, I'll tell you how to edit (with Step 5) -- when to fix and when to leave "good enough" alone. Watch my love letter (from above) transform into something that literally brought tears to my wife's eyes.
So far, I revealed a very personal detail from my life. I told you where I met my wife of 16 years by sharing a love letter I wrote all by myself in just 5 minutes flat, using the WRITE system. In that letter, you may have noticed some errors. But that's fine. Now I'll clean them all up with the last step of the WRITE system, step 5, Editing.
You can use these simple editing techniques, too -- to transform your thoughts into the perfect love letter.
Step # 5 ~ E ~ Editing.
Once your writing is complete - then all you need to do is make the necessary touch-ups.
Odds are that your love letter is not perfect after a single try. Even the greatest writers in history make numerous revisions.
Remember, the idea is to get all your ideas down on paper first, and make changes second. Your original words capture how you feel, but your careful revisions show how much you care about your true love.
Take some time to make it special.
As noted in the Simple Directions on Letter-Writing,” An attention to correctness in spelling and grammar is of course necessary, to escape being thought wholly uneducated..." (Read more about this in my book, "The Love Letter Handbook"). Now you don't need to go crazy on the editing, just clean up the major blunders. To help you with that process here are some basic editing guidelines.
Some Basic Editing Guidelines
# 1. Remove unnecessary or sloppy wording
# 2. Rearrange words & use punctuation to improve flow
# 3. Add transition sentences between paragraphs
# 4. Use imagery instead of always being wooden literal
# 5. Use your thesaurus
# 6. Avoid clichés, be original
After a few revisions, following those guidelines, I had a beautiful love letter.
After a few revisions
"Home-town love found over a hot dog counter. It doesn't sound romantic, but it was the single most important event in my life. Among old friends that I can barely remember - among those fading names and faces - I met the girl that would become my wife.
I never expected that ordinary day to be so significant. I always dreamt of it - what she would be like, how she would act, and where I would meet her? When it arrived, it was a wonderful surprise.
By no means, would I have ever guessed our meeting-place to be over a hot dog counter. But honestly the location doesn't really matter. In the park, on a mountain-side or over-looking the ocean are perfect settings found in the movies. The moments of real life - like over a hot dog - are the ones that I treasure most.
Where I met you was and always will be burned in my memory. The day that I met my wife, the day that changed the course my life, that day in my home-town over the hot dog counter I met my wife."
Now that you have a completed letter, go ahead and add a greeting like "Darling," "Dearest," "Beloved," "Sweetheart" - or whatever name you call her or whatever adjective you feel at the moment. Add a title like "Our meeting place," "A Breathtaking reality" or "Hometown love." Finally add a signature like, "Your true love," "Always loving," "'Til we meet again," "Your own," etc. Draw from your feelings; be descriptive.
Well, that's it. It doesn't need to be more complicated than that.
By the way, the ideas you pen in your love letters are the basis for your next (or your first) poem. After I wrote this little letter I noticed that, by accident, the last two lines rhymed. So I decided to exercise my poetic ability a bit. And after some further editing, my love letter finally transformed into a poem (see below).
I submitted this poem into Poetry.com's poetry contest and won their editor's choice award. Check it out. Go to their site, search for me "Edward Bordi" and leave a rating (if you want). If you do, please be nice :)
While you're there - enter a poem(s) of your own and then let me know... I look forward to reading it (them).
My First Poem
"Home-town love found over a hot dog counter
Amid fading names and faces.
The girl would become my wife despite the stage.
An encounter from early dreams
with mountain tops and ocean scenes, once of age.
But breathtaking reality that momentous day
Altered the course of my life.
That day, in my home-town,
over the hot dog counter, I met my wife."
It's not Petrarch, but I think she'll like it. I'll post this one to my wife's personal Love Letter Blog.
Now remember, writing love letters (and love poems) is an art; that is, the more you do it, the better you get at it. So just keep on WRITE-ing. It will get easier and you will get better and better.
Actually, that leads me to my next point. I'm going to add one more letter to the WRITE acronym, S, which stands for send and start over. Then you're not someone who just wrote one letter, but instead someone who WRITE-S lots of letters!
Final Thoughts
Keep writing, practice and you will improve. And your true love will be happier too. Because what's better than one love letter? Two love letters. And what's better than two love letters? Three love letters. And what's better than...
Now listen close. If you're not happy with your ability today, I say, get over it. I don't want to belabor this point, because I've already made it over and over again already. But it's worth one last mention. Write your love letters. Try and try again. Write and write again.
- You may not write a masterpiece by the world's standards (at first), but it will be a masterpiece by your true love's standards.
Now there's one last thing.
What if you're doing great, writing feverishly and then all of a sudden your 5 minutes is up?
BUZZ... But you're not finished, because you have more to say.
So don't stop. You're not constrained to a single page or just 5 minutes of writing. Write as long as you like. Write as many pages as you like. Go ahead and even write a whole book. You can use the WRITE system to write 1-page, 2-page, 10-page or even 200-page love letters.
The way it's outlined in this email course is 5 minutes at a time though; a system that produces about one page at a time. But if you have more to say, then by all means...
I sincerely hope you take this advice, grab a pen and a crisp sheet of paper, pull up a chair and (perhaps) a hot cup of coffee and start to WRITE.
Surprise your true love with a love letter tonight!
One last thing. Remember that big claim I made a moment ago? That (when finished reading this article) “… you will have acquired (arguably) one of the most important skills of your life…” Well, here is what I mean… now you can sit down anytime you want and make a smile… by turning your love into words. And when you do that (repeatedly), you’ll be securing your most precious asset in life – your relationship to your true love.
- Nothing! Absolutely nothing on the planet compares to the love you share.
Things will all pass away. But that love – if you nurture it – will last forever. That love will be there right beside you, for the rest of your days. So cherish it, hold it close, cultivate it, look after it devotedly and work very hard to keep it secure. This is (in my humble opinion) one of the most valuable lessons you could ever learn.
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