Yesterday, the last article I’d write under my own name for a client was published. It’s the third part of a blog series on “Generative AI: How to Use It To Be Productive…But Not Lose Your Soul” from Freedom Matters. This blog series is now a cornerstone project for my freelance writing portfolio–a fitting ending…
Scared of Being Okay
One thing scares the living daylights out of my soul as a creator, and that’s being okay. Or having my work described as “average”, or “nice”, or with such other platitudes. It might as well be unimportant, insignificant, worthless. It might as well be discarded—or better yet, never been made—if it isn’t something another soul…
Order and Originality
A month or so ago, I came across a quote by Gustave Faubert, which goes like this: “Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work.” I’m not sure if this correlation between one’s approach to regular life and approach to creation is true for all…
Writers Don’t Know Anything About What They’re Writing
It’s funny how instinctively people reading something would assume that the writer knows what they’re writing about. It’s as if they believe that they’ve got to have figured out what they were going to write before they actually wrote the tweet, blog post, book, or what-have-you. It’s as if they trust the writer to know…
The Creative Process
It’s an elusive thing, isn’t it, what we call the “creative process”. Sometimes it eludes us altogether, and we don’t create as we should, as much as we should, or create at all. A while ago I came across three simple points that, to me, lay out a fair starting point for any creative process.…
Brilliant Ideas
I’m not the only one who holds on to ideas I think are brilliant, waiting for the right moment or place to do something with them. I fear letting them go from the safety of my mind, thinking there’s always a better way to bring the idea to life, there’s going to be a better…
Write Stuck
Sometimes the words come easy. Sometimes they don’t. That’s not an excuse to stop writing. Athletes don’t just play when the sun is shining, when their body is in perfect condition, when they feel like playing, and when they’re at the top of their game. They play because they must. They play even when the…
Doubt
Doubt never leaves the persistent writer. Always the questions come and linger painfully, tauntingly. Sometimes for hours, weeks, years, a lifetime. They may suck the life out of one’s work, out of one’s existence, out of one’s joy and fulfilment in the act of creation. Am I doing what I’m supposed to? Is this any…
Contemplation
Somewhere amidst the hectic and heady digital world lies the calm and contemplative Analog Sea. An “offline publisher of printed books,” its one-page website has but a logo, a total of forty-one words, and two mailing addresses. No other information is offered—not social media links, no contact form, no email address. At a time when…
A Solitary Activity
Writing is, by very nature, a solitary activity. We may be writing with others within the same room, or even collaborating on a project with other writers; but when we put the pen to paper or our fingers to the keyboard, we are alone. Completely and horribly alone with our thoughts, our emotions, the empty…