a Guide to Song Writing
Rasmus Nertlinge
I was invited to lead a lecture on songwriting and AI-music by a nonprofit organization (RSMH Trelleborg) that supports people dealing with mental health challenges and social exclusion.
Writing songs has gradually elevated the baseline of my life.
It has brought me closer to friends, family, and myself—
and I want to pass that forward.
Songwriting began with poetry for me—poetry that eventually grew into songs.
Here are 11 tips that reflect some of what I’ve learned along that journey and outline the songwriting part of my lecture.
- Say something you haven’t said before
Creativity begins the moment you step outside the familiar.
Your first task is simply to say something new—it doesn’t need to be good.
If it’s good, that’s a bonus.
If it’s awkward, that’s raw material.
Bad phrasing often contains the seed of great phrasing.
Explore first. Refine later.
- Where attention goes, energy flows
Creativity moves in the direction of your focus.
Whatever theme, emotion, or image you hold in awareness becomes a tuning fork—
and surrounding ideas start to resonate.
Notice where your emotions naturally lean.
That’s usually where the song wants to grow.
- Treat inspiration as a conversation
Inspiration isn’t a one-way street.
You’re not only writing;
you’re reading—feeling how your inner world responds as you experiment with wording, phrasing, and structure.
Songwriting becomes fluid, surprising, and alive
when you treat it as a dialogue rather than a command.
- Follow the energy, not the plan
Songs rarely grow in straight lines.
If a lyric, melody, or image pulls you sideways, follow it.
Detours often reveal the heart of the song more clearly than the outline you began with.
Don’t be afraid to abandon the map in service of discovery.
- Write beyond the song
Not everything you write will end up in the final version—
and that’s the point.
Sometimes you need to wander through a bit of nonsense
just to find the one sentence that matters.
Let the process be larger, looser, and freer than the result you’re aiming for.
- Don’t chase originality—chase honesty
The quickest way to become derivative
is to try to be original.
Instead, write what feels true in your voice—
your story, your angle, your strangeness.
Originality arrives naturally when honesty leads.
- Use constraints as catalysts
Limits can spark directions you’d never find otherwise.
And limits can exist on many levels:
a theme, a mood, a viewpoint, or even a self-imposed stylistic rule.
You don’t have to constrain your writing style if that doesn’t resonate—
but exploring the idea of limits can reveal textures and surprises you might otherwise miss.
Constraints aren’t cages—they’re launchpads.
- Let silence shape the song
Silence is part of your toolkit.
Pauses create emotional space, tension, and rhythm.
Listen to the rhythm of your voice;
sometimes the song appears in the quiet just before a line arrives.
- The beauty of imperfection
Messy drafts are signs of movement, not failure.
Creativity lives in the willingness to be imperfect long enough to find clarity.
Be patient with your process.
Brilliance often enters through doors opened by clumsy beginnings.
- Become friends with your frustration
Frustration is to be expected when refining lyrics.
That frustration is a friendly guide—
making you uncomfortable for your benefit.
It nudges you toward the deeper version of what you’re trying to say.
Once frustration has helped you reach your destination,
it transforms into elevation.
- Adopt a safecracker mentality
When working with lyrical segments, approach them like a safecracker with a stethoscope.
Listen closely.
Turn the dial slowly.
Test subtle variations—word choice, phrasing, structure—and feel for the tiny clicks of alignment.
When everything lines up, the emotional vault swings open,
and you’re suddenly bathed in feelings you didn’t know were waiting for you.
Those moments are seductive, precious, unmistakable-
and they make the price of frustration feel cheap.
