Anyone here has problem with find words to express ideas and thoughts? I'm currently working on an informative paper and I have a lot of ideas. However I can't find the words to express my ideas and link them together to form a paper. I often find the words or phrases that can be used to express my ideas when I read other people's writing. I know the words that I encounter but for some reasons they don't come to mind when I write. Does anyone have the same problem?
Yes, I do have the same problem. I suggest that instead of trying to find the perfect words, just try to write your ideas down. It's a first draft so it doesn't matter if it's good. (Heck, most of my first drafts are so bad that I would never wish it upon anyone to have to read them.) When you have the basics on paper you can try to revise it, structure it and improve it (maybe leave it for a few days and come back with a fresh mind, too).
Just my two cents, but this could be first draft-itis. When it happens to me (every time I start something new) I know they aren't the words I want to end up with, but they're the best I can come up with at the time. I get the ideas down in whatever form I can, then redraft, rewrite and polish until they are the words I want to use... or as close as I can come. I can't say it's the best way to approach the problem, but it's all I have.
To me it sounds like you are expecting your reading vocabulary and writing vocabulary to be the same and I don't believe that is ever true. I would say that we can read at a much higher level than we can write so finding that other people express something and you feel that is exactly how you want to be able to express some idea yourself but can't, is not to be unexpected. The more you read the better you can become at expressing yourself, the fact that a word exists is proof that someone else has defined and used it already, but that doesn't put it in your vocabulary unless you mentally put it there. BTW, old age really makes this happen a lot.
There are enough words in my vocabulary that are very specific and niche, so much so that I do not know how to explain them without using other words that are incredibly specific. Koy*kkuris being one of them. Sense I cannot possibly explain it without going into all the meme's leading to it. At least I can explain "meme" though.
Yes it happens to me to, though in a slightly abbreviated form. Sometimes I am disgusted at what trivia I am writing right this moment but I stick to it how long I can bear. Then I shut down the computer in disgust But next morning I 've been sometimes amazed at the way the words sound in the light of a new day. Mostly it really is just my own darker emotions who want to convince me to stop writing right this second. But what I put down is sort of better as what I believe in this minute. What you are describing could also be ascribed to spoken words by me. They just don't stick together then when I write them down!
I think every writer feels this. Sometimes I brainstorm on paper that way I don't have to think in terms of complete sentences and paragraphs. Which can be overwhelming. It's more about just generating words and phrases and then starting to find ways to link them together. For instance if you wanted to write about apple pie you might think & write - cinnamon dough those dough scraps mom used to bake up apples apple peelings apple peelings curled seeds the scent of pie baking And so on and so on. Nothing seems earth shattering in the list but the way to do it is to let one idea generate a few more ideas and branch off till you have something you can work with.
