Srinivas Rao blogs about personal development at his blog The Skool of Life. I’ve appreciated his insights both on his website and the myriad sites where he has guest blogged. Recently Srini was kind enough to post a short article here at Unready and Willing. I hope you enjoy it.
Persuasiveness, goal setting and accomplishment have always been of strong interest to me as a blogger. I rarely have any trouble coming up with ideas for blog posts and I can usually just sit down and hammer out posts with minimal effort.
Today after I came back from my afternoon surf, I was thinking about what I was going to write about and nothing came to me. I really had no idea what to write about. So, then I decided to write a post about having no idea what to write about. If you sit down at the computer and find that nothing is coming to you, then don’t write. It’s really that simple. Let’s face it: one of the things that we actually do produce through force is human excrement (i.e. crap). I know that is a really disgusting example, but the perfect analogy to showcase why force is not a useful strategy in writing.
If you are forcing your writing, it’s likely that what you are going to produce is going be crap in comparison to things you write when you are inspired. So, don’t force it. Look for inspiration and you’ll probably find it.
Photo by: Rennett Stowe
Nice post Srini,
Too true. Sometimes letting go of writing is the best way to find inspiration. Too often there’s an emphasis on producing content without any concern about the quality of the content. If there isn’t any quality, then what is the point of producing–as you so eloquently put it–crap?
Thanks again for the guest post.
Hey Kenji,
Thanks for giving me the opportunity to guest post here. I really think it’s a struggle for people because they feel this need to publish content. I wonder sometimes how much of my content is good. But the one thing I know is anything I write that’s forced is just not the quality of things that get me inspired.
.-= Srinivas Rao´s last blog ..The side of sucess that you don’t see =-.
Yeah, it’s almost as though it’s a race, like the only blogs that matter are those updated three times a week. It doesn’t mean that you can’t produce quality content at that rate, but you shouldn’t beat yourself up if you can’t. Some of my favorite blogs are updated just once or twice a month, but the content is well thought out, well written, and well researched.
Being a blogger I am also faced with this situation. Still, I know that its only temporary and your advice here is the best. We should never force it. Let us release it for a while and you’ll be surprised, it will come back with a vengeance. 🙂
@Walter,
I hear you on the “coming back with a vengeance” Just make sure you have a pen, paper or voice recorder on you or you’ll never forgive yourself!