I write more than most people. I accept that, even though it makes me sad. I remain convinced that writing is a critical component of thinking. So critical, in fact, that our opinions and ideas are less well-formed than we’d care to admit. I had to write for awhile to even realize that. And it made me far more humble about most of my opinions. Even people that write a lot can’t write about everything, which means most of my ideas will remain cracked and half-built. And that’s totally fine. Optionality, I am learning, is a first-world curse; a thing that looks great but can actually can ruin a lot.
So the decision to write anything is meaningful. For anybody. It means they care enough to put their thoughts on paper and to churn through the fear and loathing and confusion that happens when they realize that their thoughts aren’t quite as complete as they originally thought. Kudos to anybody that pushes through that and develops their thought and puts it out in the world.
I just got a really awesome email from one of my best friends. We had been talking about some stuff and it was stuff I had thought about before and had put my thoughts together into some writing. So instead of trying to regurgitate it, I sent him the links. Here’s how his email started:
I read both of your articles twice.
Oh my god that sentence was so satisfying. The pleasure of someone you care about reading something you put time into is scary and kind of wild.
I came up with a new rule. Anytime someone I know writes something longer than 3 pages (or just publishes anything somewhere), I’m going to read it. We all binge each other’s social media and photos and tweets. They should get this attention too.
I started this by saying that I write more than most people. This is not a call for anyone to read my shit more (although if you are reading this, that’s doubly ironic, har). It’s intended more as a general observation. Writing something is rare enough to be meaningful for almost anyone except a professional writer. If someone you know writes something longer than a tweet or photo caption or paragraph on Facebook, you should totally read it.