What do you do if you want to cultivate your own distinctive writing style?

Someone else said it best here: Read with intent. I completely agree with that. Reading with intent helps you think about how you would convey the same message. How would you word things differently? How is your perspective different? It's also a good to use writing prompts and do free writing. It can even be helpful to do talk-to-text and then refine it so that you develop your own voice.

Read with intent. Analyze the writers way and pay attention to what you could have said and how that would have changed it for better, or it would signify that it comes from you.

When reading widely, take notes and actively define your aspirational writing style. Is it formal or informal? Is it direct or expressive? Do you want to be a storyteller or a point maker? Position your style to align with your authentic voice and capture the audience's attention, given your industry and broader purpose (to inform, inspire, provoke, etc).

It is essential to read a lot, which gives you great cultural background, words, expressions and phrases. On the other hand, it is important to write, exercise and correct. Inspiration and work must go hand in hand. Lastly comes the rhythm. Just like breathing, the work must have a unique rhythm that distinguishes us. Let's read the text aloud or in our mind and try to find that inner music that is reflected without interruptions from the beginning to the end.

Writing regularly can - increase your bandwidth to write with more perspectives while you reach your deadlines. - helps you to organize your thoughts which can result in creating your own style. - helps to formulate your own unique thinking designs.

Seeking feedback can - Help you understand better with different perspectives - Might land you on better options. - Can help you overcome writers block as it explores you to new ideas.

To develop your own personal writing identity, it is important to step out of your comfort zone and try out new styles, just for fun. Experiment with new techniques and adapt your writing to new ideas and methods to discover what you are most comfortable with.

Discovering your unique writing style demands patience. It won't develop overnight; it requires dedication and practice over time. If setbacks occur, reassess and adapt. Keep trying until you achieve satisfaction. Persistence is key; don't quit until you're content with your style..

What you're calling style here professional writers often refer to as voice. That said, if you want to be a professional writer you need to both find your own voice that is uniquely yours, and through doing that, learn to emulate other voices that aren't yours. If you're familiar with the practice of "code switching" in speech, it's not entirely dissimilar to emulate another voice on the page. Finding your own voice is hard for some people, and very natural for others. But basically, it's a version of your own speaking voice, put to paper. It's not you pretending to be smarter, funnier, edgier, or cooler than you really are, it's just you being as authentically you as you can be on the page.