I think it’s time that I seriously consider the possibility that my existing frames aren’t very helpful to me and it’s time for me to revisit everything I’m doing, to try and find some fresh perspective. I’ve been repeating myself that my main goal is to write a bunch of good essays. Why? Well, I believe that a single excellent essay can make a real, meaningful, lasting difference to people in a positive way. I think of myself as an essayist. I’d like to be good at the the thing that I’ve identified myself as. And maybe there’s a bit of a trap here, maybe I would have an easier time if I weren’t so fixated on it.
I feel like it became clear to me again that good writing doesn’t quite happen on-demand. I have to approach it obliquely. I often come up with my best ideas not while trying to have good ideas, but while trying to talk about something else. And lately I’ve been fixated on trying to have and express good ideas. I think it can be useful to think about it for a while, and I’ve probably exhausted the productive utility of that line of thought. So it’s time for fresh, new lines of thought.
I’ll probably be more helpful to people if I stop trying so hard to be helpful to people and focus on helping myself. So, Visa, what do you need help with? Oh god, I’m glad you asked. I’m utterly overwhelmed by my body of work. There’s so much stuff everywhere, and so much of it feels like noise. A part of me fantasizes about witnessing it be re-ordered in a simple, beautiful, elegant way. Another part of me feels that that’s unrealistic. What do you think? I think… it’s good to have ideals, and it’s okay to be a bit unrealistic, as long as you’re simultaneously sensitive to what is happening moment to moment. And I think if I’m honest with myself, I haven’t been all that sensitive lately. I’ve been trying to overpower myself, which is a kind of self-tyranny. (And I noticed this, which is why I wrote “I don’t wanna!”, in defiance of that tyranny.) But simply rejecting tyranny isn’t enough, we know this. We have to focus on the alternatives. The idea is to be playful, silly, cheerful, joyous. I’m reminded again of the anecdote of Richard Feynman being frustrated and burnt out with his work, and then switching modes to piddling with plates, pursuing silly interests that didn’t seem important. Yeah, I think we’re on to something here. I have been frustrating myself trying to do “important work”. So how about we… give ourselves a break from that? No important work allowed. I’m playing a 50 year long game, and it won’t do if I burn myself out in the early stages of it. To keep myself interested, I have to prioritize my own sense of fun. And wow, it’s been a while since I’ve really had fun with my writing, hasn’t it?
What would be fun for me right now? How can I be silly and subversive in a way that I find entertaining? And let’s keep in mind the sense of being overwhelmed. I remember scrolling through a bunch of my own tweets that have “2006” in them, wouldn’t it be kinda fun to write an essay about a specific year? I’ve been wanting to do specific decades, but that seems overwhelming. Remember, bill wurtz did “history of japan” before he did “history of the entire world, i guess”. My mistake has been that I’ve been trying to do the latter without doing the former first. So maybe let’s try that, a random substack essay that’s just about the year 2006….
… okay, I tried that, it was fairly fun to get it all out, but then I got tired. But I’m glad I got it out! There’s some project management to think about here. I feel like I’ve known for a long time that progress means baby steps in little containers. I can’t keep hoping and praying for some sort of mega burst of magic manic productivity. But at the same time I do want to pay attention to my feelings as I go. It’s late now, I should wrap this up and go to bed. Tomorrow I am meeting a dear internet friend, and I’m looking forward to that. And, I’d also like to continue feeling like I’m making progress… while actually making progress, of course, I don’t mean that I want to delude myself into the feeling. The question then is “what does progress look like”? I think it’s time I start drawing up some charts. I remember feeling a sense of satisfaction when I took a piece of paper and drew up some boxes. I do miss the satisfaction of simple todo lists, which I haven’t done in a while. Maybe it’s time to get back into that habit. Well, what would be the first few tasks I’d put on my todo list? There’s stuff like “clean my desk”, “throw out junk”, yes, but what about tasks that drive me forward on my main quest, which is to write 100 essays? To finish these word vomits? I could put “write wordvomit” and scratch that off when it’s done, sure… that doesn’t seem like the right resolution.
There’s something I’m sometimes good at, that I don’t always do, and that is to “triangulate” to the correct frame, correct angle, correct position. Which is to say, there’s likely a todo list item that’s something other than “write wordvomit” that would lead to me accomplishing the goal of “write wordvomit”. For some people it might be something like “write one sentence”, which can function as a little baby step – it’s easy to get started, and then it’s easy to keep going – but I don’t need that, I don’t have problems writing sentences. What do I have problems with? I have problems winning over my own interest. But “win over your own interest” is too abstract to be a useful prompt. There’s something in between “write one sentence” and “win over your own interest” that would be a compelling task to give, and it takes some amount of thinking for me to figure out what that task would be. What would be interesting? It takes more questions. What’s on my mind? What does my body say? What’s going on right now? I keep freestyling.
What if I did the opposite – what would it be to lose my own interest? How could I piss myself off so much that I don’t feel like writing at all? Ha, I laugh, I must be doing this already all the time, lol! I’m reminded of the… CIA field guide to sabotaging organizations, where you have to do things like ask lots of pointless questions. Haaaa hahaha. Yeah. I’ve told people before to write bad songs on purpose. I don’t know if I’m going to necessarily write bad essays on purpose, maybe I’ll do it on here – but I do feel relief just laughing at myself thinking about how I have been putting myself off of writing. Answer the question directly– how am I pissing myself off?
Well, I’m subjecting myself to a mis-scoped, unstructured, chaotic, unreadable, overwhelming amount of noise. I’m subjecting myself to high expectations and discouraging myself from experimenting, discouraging myself from just pouring out what I got because that would be “wasteful”. My relationship with my writing at any given moment is always a remarkably accurate snapshot of my relationship with myself. And I’ve been holding myself so tight. I need to get loosy goosy about it, just mess around for a bit, god visa lighten the fuck up!!! it’s not your fucken job to save the world! enjoy yourself! help yourself with your problems! hang out with your friends! and as ogilvy said, all the best ideas come as jokes, so make your thinking as funny as possible. good night