Category: Thoughts

I have many issues with writing. I’ll admit that openly. It’s not something that I really thought of doing, writing for any purpose, but having done it almost consistently in morning pages for over four years and daily for this for the better part of the past twelve months, I’ve learned some things about myself.

One, it’s important to just do it. I can create any excuse to not, but as long as I sit down and actually write, then I’m writing. It’s really that simple.

I love research and learning, and the act of discovery. Partially why I love to travel. But when I get an idea, if I’m not careful, I can research it to death. To the point where I don’t even want to write about the idea. And if I just sit down and get some of this stuff on the page, then it’s out of me.

Two, writing to an audience is a challenge. Once I start writing to someone (or someones) that I don’t know, I start to self-censor. And that, I’ve found, to be incredibly limiting. Not that I want to throw around a lot of swear words in whatever I’m writing, but that bit of mental blockade starts to creep up – the one where you worry about what people think about you.

Steven Pressfield calls this the Resistance. On Resistance, Pressfield writes in Do the Work: “…any act that rejects immediate gratification in favor of long-term growth, health, or integrity.

Or, expressed another way, any act that derives from our higher nature instead of our lower. Any of these acts will elicit Resistance.”

Now I don’t know whether my form of writing could in any way be called ‘an act derived from my higher nature.’ But I do know that I have things to say, and I seem to do okay writing them out.

In writing to a mass audience I seem to lose my presence of mind in the face of resistance.

So, three, it’s better to write as if you are writing to someone specific. When Tim Ferriss wrote The Four-Hour Workweek, he wrote it “with two of [his] closest friends in mind, speaking directly to them and their problems…”

You can find a lot of inspiration for how you write from your friends who are in the same boat. Creatives who are stuck in survival jobs, or can’t seem to get past the block they’re feeling, or just can’t create for any number of reasons. I write these posts mostly to them, and also myself, trying to tell me things I’d like to hear.

Four, Ira Glass said something that resonated with me:

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this.”

And it’s true. You emulate the writers you like, and the work you do isn’t only derivative – it tends to be not good. And that can be crushing. The resistance takes ahold of that, and it reinforces your belief that this is all you’ll ever create: bad work.

But it isn’t true. It takes time to become better. It takes commitment. Just by the act of doing it, creating bad work, making mistakes; you get to improve then. Which leads me to;

Five. If you’re not shipping, as Seth Godin calls it, it doesn’t matter. You have to ship the work. Get it out there. Ignore the resistance as it attempts to dissuade you.

That’s a lot of what makes up my writing practice now. Come next year I’ll likely know more. And that, my friend, I’m okay with.

 

Usually, weekends are a great time to relax. To shrug off the work week, get some things done around the house, and take it easy.

The new world doesn’t seem to take that into account. We haven’t yet sorted out the unique ways that our emotional and mental stability needs restructuring during these stressful times.

I wish that it wasn’t the case. I’d love for nothing more than this pandemic to never have happened, or at least be far behind us. But, it isn’t. Not yet.

I don’t really want to write about it. But I, like most everyone, has the virus implanted securely in their mind. It’s an incessant thought and even in those moments where you are enjoying time with loved ones, it’s burrowing its way forward trying to remind you that the world is different.

Lacking some great advice that will surely make the strain less, it’s difficult to write about much of anything. There are few words to make this moment any better. It’s a generation-defining moment. It’s an inordinate challenge that few of us, if any, were equipped to handle. We’re all trying our best and doing what we can.

So this weekend, I hope everyone is being safe and considerate as best they can. That they know with certainty that this too will pass. And that, hopefully tomorrow, I’ll have something a little to write about that isn’t focused on how I’m spending quarantine or isn’t about a pandemic.

I’ve been somewhat isolated up here in Alaska. I’ve enjoyed it. I’ve gotten a lot reading done, worked on a couple of projects, though not nearly as many as I should have (yet). But while I’m writing now every day, I’m wondering how much “water” is in the well.

That is, how many ideas can I pull out of my current situation?

Here, or anywhere, that can sometimes be a difficult thought.

I don’t recall which Seth Godin book I read this in, but Johnny B. Truant said: “You don’t hear plumbers complaining about plumber’s block.” (Found this quirky counterargument that, yes, plumbers can get plumbers’ block…).

People using creativity can get stifled. It happens. Stephen King doesn’t let it happen, by setting up his time to write in routine. Every morning he sits down and writes. The thoughts don’t get in the way.

Neil Gaiman also: when he sits down to write, he can either write or do nothing. By nothing, he’s talking about any other tangible task. He’ll sit there and think, stare out at the scenery, and basically let his mind wander.

And that’s what shower ideas are so damn useful! And sometimes annoying, because, you know, if you want to write that idea down, you’re in the shower and paper and pen aren’t really nearby. And you’re wet.

There was a podcast I listened to at some point, could have been three years ago, or eight, or anytime between. I don’t remember when. But the guest was talking about writing music. And how the muse would strike at the most inopportune times, like driving down the road. The tune would just fully form. But, the guest was driving, and at the time this was happening I’d assume there weren’t recording devices on cellphones.

So this guest made a deal with the muse. I’ll paraphrase what I remember, but it went like, “Muse. I’ll give you ample time to lead me in creativity. But it has to be the times that I’m able to use what you’re giving me. So, no more coming to me when I’m driving. I’ll sit down and open myself up to you every day, and that’s when you’ll visit.”

And it worked for the guest. (No, I don’t recall who the guest was, or even if it a male or a female. Only that it was a songwriter.)

All that is to say, the ideas can come from anywhere. As long as you’re open to them.