What is Stopping You From Writing?
Tackling the Age-Old Questions: What Can I Offer? What is in the Way, and What do I Want to Say?
Plenty. Surely. There’s an old saying that every person has a book inside of them, so I must have at least a few articles.
I’ve always had a romanticized image of what it would be to be a writer. I like the idea. I could wear a cardigan and sit at a nice desk all day, letting my thoughts and feelings fly off into the world to join the giant ongoing conversation that is humanity. Or at least make a couple of people think twice.
So, when I ask myself the question “what can I write about”, I feel the need to surmise a neat three things that set me apart. I’ll tell you a little about what I think I have to offer. Then some things that have held me, and perhaps you, back from starting to write. Finally I’ll put forward some of my ideas so far.
Why Me?
First, I, like everyone else, have a unique voice that is my own and hopefully endearing to some people. To that end, it’s important that I write authentically, without merely trying to imitate what is popular. Always saying what I truly think, and truly feel about things.
I believe that most people have a good sense of what is real and what is insincere. We all respond well to honesty. So even if something isn’t incredibly well written, or it’s not an opinion you agree with, I can at least be proud of knowing that it was genuine.
The second is that I’m a British guy in Japan. My friend Jüst Ølî, who is my inspiration for joining Medium, is in the same position. It’s something that seems normal to us now, but other people out in the world might be interested in that perspective.
Whilst I always have a problem with travel writing that focuses too heavily on the writer and not enough on the travel, it’s inevitable that our own cultural background can lend itself to unique insights and comparisons that others might miss. Just the same as our life experiences have an impact too.
Finally, I want the opportunity to explore my love of sociology. It was my favourite subject at A-Level, and I studied it at undergraduate and post graduate level at university. Since graduating I feel like my knowledge in, and love for, this subject has been stored away in my head, with no decent outlet.
Other than rambling debates and discussions with friends, I haven’t really had the opportunity to put it to good use, or to discover the gaps in my knowledge and understanding. It’s about time I let some of it out on to the page, as incomplete as it may be.
I’ve enjoyed reading articles and getting to know Medium for the last few months, and seeing others getting involved has given me the inspiration and confidence to dip my toes in the pool.
So, what has stopped me thus far?
Fear of Starting.
As I’m sure is commonly the case for many people, my desire to do creative projects is often paralyzing. Daydreaming about perfect outcomes can sometimes be a bit like headlights for rabbits. But, ultimately, I’ve found the best way to get things done is to stop caring about either success or failure and just try doing things for their own sake.
In fact, a good friend once gave me some excellent advice on such matters. Back when I was planning my trip that lead me to coming to Japan in the first place — A story for another time, perhaps. I was procrastinating and prevaricating for weeks. Until my friend, in his wisdom, recommended booking one small part of the trip, just to get the ball rolling. Once in motion, I’d have some obligation, no matter how small, to actually get on with it and do everything else involved. So I booked a bus in Poland.
It wouldn’t matter if I missed the bus, it wasn’t expensive, a long distance or particularly important. It was low stakes, but doing it was exciting. This article is my Polish bus in the world of writing.
So, what better way to start off than by writing this meandering mini-essay pondering the purpose of me writing in the first place that, in all likelihood, will go pretty much unread. If I can write this and not care that it isn’t read by anyone, then why would I care about subsequent ones?
Though it seems counterintuitive, caring less is actually, hopefully, a good way to overcome the fear that leads to procrastination.
When writing in school, or university, knowing that perhaps only a single teacher will ever read your work and it wouldn’t be graded, was really enjoyable as an act in itself.
However, writing something like a dissertation was the most terrifying thing. The only way I could really force myself to do it was to go to the library for hours on end. There, the simple power of the possibility of being observed, caught out wasting time, was enough to make me get at least something done. Although it’s quite ridiculous really, as if anyone else would notice or care. That and, not allowing myself to leave until I had reached some sort of goal or deadline.
Whilst that worked before, now that I’m out in the world and I want to do this purely in a self motivated manner, those techniques aren’t so useful. I won’t fail or receive a bad grade if I don’t do it, and there are no people around who could judge me for being lazy. As nice environments as coffee shops are, people often go there just to relax, so they really genuinely don’t mind if you’re being productive or not.
Another technique to get stuff done is to use the thing you really want to do as procrastination for another task. At the moment, I need to tidy my kitchen and do some ironing before work tomorrow. So rather than that, I’ll sit down and do a bit of writing for fun. It’s tempting to do it the other way around sometimes, thinking “ahh if I get all my busy-work done, I’ll be able to completely relax and focus”.
In reality, the tiny jobs will always keep cropping up. so, you can be assured that they’ll always be there, as something to be usefully distracted from, rather being useful distractions for something you’d rather get done.
Another good example was some advice offered by another friend. For him, he likes to dress up smart, remove all distractions and inhabit the physical persona of the writer. He can only drop the role once he’s completed his writing goal for that day. First of all, this does sound quite fun. Secondly, it really seems to work for him.
But for me, I feel like it’s adding extra pressure. The lesson here is, seek out advice, heed it, but always be willing to try something else if it isn’t right for you. Including what I’m saying right now, but excluding the previous sentence, we don’t want to get ourselves trapped in any paradoxical loops — then we really will get nothing done.
Another great piece of advice is from a book I once read called Writing for Social Scientists by Howard Becker. There’s so much in there that is worth commenting on, it could be an entire review in itself, but a really good piece of advice was about free writing. Just sitting down and splurging. It gives you something to refine and work on later, when you’re feeling in a more reflective or tinkering mood.
That reminds me of a great analogy from another book , First You Write a Sentence by Joe Moran. He likened writing to the work of a stone mason or sculptor chiseling out of stone, chip by chip, word by word. You go from a block of marble to a well refined sentence, removing everything that’s unnecessary. If we were just to look at a before and after, it seems like a magical transformation. But if we just look at each little tiny act, breaking into smaller pieces, it doesn’t seem so gargantuan.
Ultimately there’s any number of different techniques that you could choose to use, but in the end, the best motivator is just seeing it as an end in itself. Write for the joy of it. Writers write.
And so, to that end, I’m just going to throw as much spaghetti at the wall as I can to get an idea of what might stick.
Ideas!
Perhaps personal stream of consciousness pieces such as this. Or maybe well researched in depth pieces about a side of Japan people don’t really know about. Maybe something entirely different. I’m going to read as much as possible, keep discovering writers I like and hopefully find publications that like what I do. Drawing inspiration from wherever I can.
So, why not mention some ideas I’ve had so far. One I’d like to start with is a roundup of the Japanese news. Whilst I meet many informed people all the time, a lot of people, especially foreigners don’t have the wherewithal, the motivation or the inclination to follow the news. Sometimes this surprises me, because I’m so used to checking it as a daily habit in the morning. Again, why not turn that procrastination into productivity.
I like the idea of keeping note of all the main stories from various news sources and creating an accessible and interesting summary at the end of the week.
One more notion I had recently is investigating niche museums around Tokyo. Recently, friends from elsewhere in Japan have come to visit Tokyo and when they ask for suggestions, or tell me what they’ve decided to do, I often find that they’ve already exhausted the main sights and museums. Living here myself, I don’t venture out to certain places as much as I would when I’m travelling. Some apparent gems that have been mentioned to me so far include the Tobacco and Salt museum, yes that’s a single museum, and the waterworks museum.
It got me wondering, how many of these museums are dotted around? I’ve always been tempted myself to stop in to the toy museum, which sounds like something out of a Roald Dahl novel. Within the confines of a day’s travel from my apartment, how many would I be able to track down and explore? That’s something I would like to read about myself, at the very least. The worst possible outcome is would be that I explore some museums. Nothing to loose.
Another area of Japanese life that is very perplexing, to both foreigners and Japanese people alike, is politics. People are notoriously disengaged with politics, a trend that seems to show no signs of abating. Similarly, there is tends to be little discussion of Japanese politics outside Japan. Yet, this is another area which I feel I have, at the very least, an interest if not extraordinary expertise.
Why not put this interest to good use, and use some of the more interesting parts to draw people in and hopefully push back against some of that understandable disengagement. There’s plenty of unusual things, scandals and intrigue to be found, if you scratch the surface a little.
As with all these ideas, rather than using it as a way to appear more knowledgeable than I am, it best to take people on an educational journey with me. Hopefully I can share what I learn with others, and perhaps even be lucky enough for others to want to engage with me and share their insights, and make corrections.
After all, that’s what the community of medium seems to be all about.
On that note, that is one of the best motivators for writing. It’s a bridge that goes both ways. Just like any good conversation, listening is just as important as speaking. Reading is just as important as writing. Hopefully others with a similar ideas would like to engage with me and give me some decent feedback.
And finally…
I’ve told you why I want to write, why I haven’t yet and what I’d like to write about.
Why not consider these questions yourself? If you do, or you like what I’ve put here, please check back in with me to see how it all goes.
Ultimately, I’m just going to put myself out there and see what happens!
