I Apologize For Writing This Post…

I apologize for this picture as well. This is how I feel right now...sans the awful mullet wig.

I bet that title got your attention.  Next time I should consider attaching such an intriguing title to something actually worth reading.

I don’t like this post.

I am starting with that statement.  I don’t like that I am writing it.  Unfortunately, I committed myself to publishing something tonight – after two weeks of silence – and this is the only thing I can force out of myself at the moment.

I have been struggling with the worst writer’s block for the past two weeks.  Actually, the problem isn’t the writing so much as the completing and publishing.  I have succeeding in writing and rewriting and then trashing several posts over the past couple weeks.  The trouble is with the framing.  You, dear reader, don’t just want information.  You don’t just want rambling opinions.  You don’t just want perspectives.  You want all of the above wrapped up in a neat little package that makes the whole thing seem compelling.  The neat little package is the difficult part.  Or at least that is what keeps repeating in my head, paralyzing my refinement muscles.

I don’t lack for ideas.  In fact, I have far too many ideas at the moment.  All of them potentially worthwhile but none of them coalescing into anything contextually compelling.  I know the longer I allow myself to procrastinate the more ingrained the avoidance will become…so this is me breaking the cycle.  Feel free to stop reading now…though I may manage to squeeze out a few insightful gems, now that I have disclaimed all responsibility for wasting your time.

So hear is a question: What counts as procrastination?

The answer is not as obvious as it seems.  Of course some things are obvious and unequivocal; I actually cancelled my Netflix account a few weeks back (completely unrelated to the whole Qwikster fiasco).  However, many activities occupy a grey area.  Most of my writing develops out of social media activity in one way or another, either consuming or conversing.  That leads me to question #2:

How do you know when your forum of choice has ceased to act as a source of inspiration and become a distraction?

Anyone who has ever attempted something creative knows that you can’t force it.  Beyond a certain point, the harder you try the more your vision narrows.  Sure, I could rehash something I’ve written previously, expand on it somewhat, apply it to some new situation.  I have several of those sitting in the hopper.  Unfortunately, they all seem to be missing something.  Time for question #3:

How you know when to trust your intuition, or ‘muse’ if you prefer that term?

Many bloggers today advise their comrades to just hit ‘publish’.  But I’m sure you know when something sucks.  More importantly, you know when something is missing, when there is a critical piece of the puzzle just outside your conscious awareness, waiting to be grasped.  I commonly read bloggers who claim that they are perpetually surprised by which of their posts do well.  I have found exactly the opposite.  The posts here that have attracted the most notice have been the ones I was most excited about beforehand.

So this is me trusting my muse.  The voices in my head are telling me that this is what I should be publishing today.  All the half-baked nonsense I have created over the past two weeks will continue awaiting further reformulation.

If you have read this far, please lend me your comments.  What is your creativity hack of choice?

 

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by Greg on October 21, 2011
  • http://www.newcommbiz.com/ tacanderson

    I’m often very surprised by something I thought sucked but pushed out anyway (for the same reasons you are now) only to have it be one of my “better” (as in more popular) post. Then I’ve published posts I was quite sure were the most brilliant thing ever published on the interwebs only to have it land like a lead turd. I’ve recently quit judging my own content. I write what I’m interested in and what I would like to read and let the readers tell me whats crap and whats not. then I do my best to internalize that feedback and go on writing what about what I’m interested in and what I would like to read. This isn’t the way to have a popular blog, but I think we’ve covered that one before. 

    • http://OnTheSpiral.com/ GregoryJRader

      One piece of the puzzle is that I need to allow myself to write shorter posts.  It is one thing for a 500 word post to be an unexpected hit and quite another for the same thing to happen with a 2000 word post.  Beyond a certain word count, garbage is easily identifiable as such…it becomes a big muddled and incoherent mess.  

      • http://www.newcommbiz.com/ tacanderson

        Very few 2000 word posts will ever get a lot of readership. But writing a really good, high value post under 500 words, while more likely to be read, usually takes significantly longer than than the 2000 word post. 

        • http://OnTheSpiral.com/ GregoryJRader

          Sadly, very true.  Perhaps I should say, I need to allow myself to limit the scope of some posts.  Not condensing 2000 words down to 500 but instead limiting to 25% of the scope of the larger post.  

  • http://www.jonone100.com/ jonone100

    I suffer from the same completing & publishing block. I’ve had periods of 6 months or more when I’ve not published anything, even though there’s been lots happening in the world of money. What’s got me thru is my annual cash burn. Focuses my mind and serves to remind me that all this stuff people are writing about money is important. 

    Your last post reminded me of that too. I love Star Trek but I always moan that amidst the holo-deck and warp speed there is a militaristic social structure that suffers from cutbacks to their budgets. Its not even considered that in the future we might understand money differently. Indeed, our future might depend on a new understanding of money.

    My next burning is this coming Sunday btw, you’re very welcome to join me !

    Looking forward to the next post.

    • http://OnTheSpiral.com/ GregoryJRader

      Hmm, I’m not sure what my equivalent of burning money would be.  Unfortunately (in this context), I tend towards the existential – nothing ultimately matters – perspective, so ritual might not be the right thing to get me reoriented or motivated.

      Usually I just need to think it through, to whatever extent necessary to get that feeling of weight off my shoulders.  I am getting there now, processing new material, moving in some new directions, experimenting with work habits…chipping away.

  • http://www.recordedviews.com Stefan King

    With me, nothing comes out unless I commit to getting something down. Before I can commit, I need a basic idea that looks interesting and worthy of sharing. 

    For example, me observing that people have different lifestyles, but being unsatisfied with the boring, encyclopedic way they have been classified by others. I commit to doing better, no matter how many hours of sweat it will take. Or something simpler, like convincing the reader that Baltasar Gracian is cool.

    • http://OnTheSpiral.com/ GregoryJRader

      Hey Stefan, that is part of it for me but I also feel the need to find a compelling framing that conveys the reason I thought something worth writing in the first place.  Recently I have found myself getting started on a post, then hitting a wall a thousand words in, and then finally completely restructuring the piece in a way that allows me to finish it.  When I hit that wall it always because the idea in my head doesn’t seem nearly as compelling after I get it out on paper or pixels.  I have to go back and ask myself why I thought this was worth writing in the first place…

  • Anonymous

    Are you being paid for your writing? Nothing motivates (me) more than a deadline and bills to pay. (Talking about the economics of value….)

    • http://OnTheSpiral.com/ GregoryJRader

      I am not being compensated directly, though everything I am currently being paid for came about in one way or another through this blog…

      • Anonymous

        If not money and bills, there is another perfect motivator
        and a cure for the writer’s block — strong opinions. I see from your other
        response, that you tend “towards the existential – nothing ultimately
        matters – perspective.” No good; that’s the source of your blockage (if I
        may).

        Nothing incites (me, at least) more than my own opinion about someone else’s
        strong opinion, no matter if right or wrong. When I read my morning newspaper
        or open online newsfeed, I just can’t wait to fire back. Then I start
        organizing my arguments, do some research, imagine others’ counterarguments,
        and here it is: another post or article.

        Even when “nothing matters,” there is always something 180
        degree opposite to it. Try to read a fundamentalist’s blog or buy a book on the
        “great future of the world,” and you might find a lot of inspiration and
        passion to claim just the opposite.

        But anyway,

        • http://OnTheSpiral.com/ GregoryJRader

          Quite perceptive.  Yes, nearly all my blockages of nearly any type ultimately stem from some sort of existential angst.  But that adds a complication to the “fire back” methodology.  Sometimes the blockage is itself a lack of motivation to fire back…feeling that I have addressed X or Y too many times previously, or feeling that a given topic simply isn’t worth addressing.  

          Regardless of that subtlety though, your suggestion is the right one.  When everything feels stale it is time to get out of the usual comfort zone and venture into some green fields.  Not everything will be worth responding to, but at least it lights up some recently-vacant areas of the connectome.  

  • Matslats

    You are not obliged to write or blog if you don’t have anything to say. You are more obliged to do the work which is on your heart. Sounds like you have created fictional obligations for yourself. Be free.

    • http://OnTheSpiral.com/ GregoryJRader

      Fictional in the absolute sense but intentionally chosen.  There is a balance to be struck between doing what comes naturally and doing that thing well.  I agree that too much obligation tips the balance in an unfavorable direction…

  • Gene Linetsky

    I don’t like this post either.

    • http://OnTheSpiral.com/ GregoryJRader

      Thanks Gene ;)

  • Skunk1980
    • http://OnTheSpiral.com/ GregoryJRader

      The snowflake method is actually almost the exact opposite of my writing process.  Most of my thinking eventually ends up taking on that sort of self-referential form but I work from the outside in rather than from the inside out.  Identifying the initial seed requires finding the common theme in all the individual branches which develop first.  Frustration sets in when I can’t identify that common theme and therefore the seed, or fundamental idea, remains obscure.