When Your Ideas Are Too Abstract
And your writing doesn’t give value
I recently had a friend give feedback on why a piece of my writing didn’t do well. The feedback was this:
Your ideas are too abstract, out of touch, and not grounded in reality.
There was no actionable examples or advice, just a wrestling of spiritual ideas. My abstract ideas didn’t add value to my reader. It was too theoretical. The writing was nice, but there was nothing new and no takeaways for the reader.
Needless to say, the feedback didn’t feel very good.
The Merriam-Webster dictionary does not define “abstract” in a positive light, with definitions like “insufficiently factual” and “difficult to understand”. One definition even defines abstract as having “little or no attempt at pictorial representation or narrative content.”
For example, think about relationship advice. Too often isn’t actionable. Buzzwords like “trust’ and “communication” are thrown around like they’re the holy grail, and it’s not like they’re not important words of advice, but everyone’s heard them before. What do trust and communication look like in different contexts? What are actionable ways to build trust and communication?
