One of the worst blogs to write is the blog about blogging, but here we are regardless.
What I’ve learned about myself over the past five years is that I’m very good at following through on daily commitments or going all in on something important and focusing exclusively on that thing. Where I struggle is with the periodic and the non-urgent.
For a while, I’ve felt the desire to resume a regular practice of writing, but I’ve had lots of reasons to choose not to do it.
My life feels busy. A young daughter, a full-time job, social events, travel, and the daily things that come up in life make it hard to imagine adding more activities to the day. But I’ve felt that something is missing when I’m not engaging in some creative activity.
When I am getting too much input in my mind and too little output I notice I feel annoyed a lot more often. I’m bothered by other people’s opinions and by current events in a way I’m just not when I’m consistently writing and exploring ideas.
Writing regularly is not just something I’d like to do, but something that makes me feel better in many different aspects of my life. And writing, in any way other than daily, is a practice that I just haven’t been able to stick with.
With that in mind I’ve set out to do a new project, getting back to writing daily and doing it with the constraint of a 30-minute timer to write the post. I’m committing to trying this for 30 days, but hopeful that it will work well and be something that I continue longer.
Another secret motivation behind the project is to practice more consistently getting into a state of flow in my work. Since the birth of my daughter, there are a lot more potential distractions in my life. Sometimes I think worrying about “distraction” is a crutch. A rationalization for why I’m not getting everything I want to get done, done. I think that controlling your environment to be able to focus better and do good work is valuable and important, but it’s equally as important to develop a reliable ability to focus and work in an imperfect situation.
Returning to focus from distraction is a muscle and writing is a good way to build the muscle. So for the next 30 days, I’m committing to sitting down, setting a timer for 30 minutes, and writing, editing, and posting a blog post within that time. If I get onto a topic I want to go deeper on, I’ll make a part-two post.
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