Writing Is Hard, But It Doesn't Have To Be

(This is also published on Substack, but I'm sharing it with y'all here)

Writing for an audience is one of the most challenging things for me to do, which is at odds with the reality that writing has always come naturally to me.

When nobody is watching, that’s when the magic happens. The words flow from mind to pen to paper. Sometimes it all pours out clearly with pinpoint precision; however, to be frank, most of the time it’s a frenzy of short, disjointed tangents. Thought scribbles about this or that. One moment, I’m gaining insight into how my mind works: how my perfectionist qualities combined with “all or nothing” thinking hold me back from exploring different avenues.

The next moment: blank.

If I’m onto something, like really onto something, I’ll ruminate on a particular scribble or line of thinking; breaking it apart, breaking it down, digging for greater revelations after the initial eureka moment - hoping to find the solution to get myself permanently unstuck from these thought patterns I frequently fall into.

“Once I can solve for ‘x’ - where ‘x’ = ‘myself’, then it will all click into place, and I can move on to more important matters”.

Oh shit, my mind’s gone blank again … uh… sure is hot outside. Yup. Look at how the steam rises from my coffee. I sure do love coffee. The look of it, the taste of it, the smell of it.

“The look of it?” What are you even saying? It’s a brown liquid!

I’ve lost the plot completely. But this is normal, I think. Sometimes ideas naturally run their course, and there’s nothing more there. Part of the fun is the game I play, trying to string thoughts together into a coherent package - something that makes sense.

On a micro-level, this is creating sentences: choosing which words to conjure up from the ether and arranging them in order. Dictating the rhythm. The pacing. Thinking of different ways to express an idea through language without repeating myself. Making every word matter. Or occasionally, some added fluff because why bother creating sentences or choosing what words to play with if you can’t have fun with it, right? Repetition is fun. Repetition is fun.1

On a macro-level, these are the concepts or ideas and their underlying logic. Does one idea follow the next? Does this idea make sense ‘over here’, or would this be better suited ‘over there’? Is the point clear? What is the point? The whole process of writing can sometimes feel like assembling a big puzzle, sometimes a large and difficult puzzle, where you bang your metaphorical head against a wall until something comes out of you in a way that pleases you, releasing all that internal tension because you have finally solved for ‘x’.2

The beauty of writing for yourself is the freedom. There is no real “end goal”; rather, the activity is enjoyed for its own sake. There are no expectations, no word counts, no deadlines - just you and the page. You and yourself. An audience of one. The tool, the skill, and the craft are in service for you and nobody else. It doesn’t need to have a point or make a point; it doesn’t even have to be good! It just has to be - and all you have to do is participate in the game.

I have thoughts in my head. I want to get those thoughts onto the page. I enjoy the process of doing so.

In elementary school, I spent my recesses writing short stories about Power Rangers and Star Wars. In high school, I had notebooks littered with philosophy and my love of hockey. In university, I could bang out two-thousand-word essays in a night. I like journaling. I like morning pages. I like doing this.

Then why is writing for an audience so difficult?

Seriously.

I have spent the past few hours writing and rewriting this opening, trying to map out different avenues or lines of thought to follow. Once the perception of an audience creeps into the back of my mind, my thoughts begin screaming,

“THIS ISN’T GOOD ENOUGH!”, “THIS IS SHIT!”, “THIS IS PRETENTIOUS AND SELF-ABSORBED!”, “NOBODY CARES ABOUT WHAT YOU ARE GOING THROUGH SO LONG AS THEY CAN PROJECT THEMSELVES INTO THE SITUATION AND GAIN VALUE FROM IT!” “YOU ARE WASTING YOUR TIME!”, “YOU WRITE LIKE A FOURTH GRADER!”, “THIS IS CLICHÉD AND STUPID!”

You are stupid! You are stupid! And don’t forget. YOU ARE STUPID!

The main culprits rear their ugly heads: self-doubt and overthinking. I don’t know if I am a good writer per se, or if I’m being too hard on myself as usual by underestimating my capabilities. On a micro-level, the words bore me - the prose feels stale. I’m uncertain if this is my natural speaking voice or if there is a better way of expressing myself. On a macro-level, I’m self-aware and “thinking about thinking”, stunlocked into paralysis - trying to use the very thing keeping me trapped to help me escape the trap. I know that I’ve been here before, and the realization hits: holy shit, is my life just going to be me learning the same lessons over and over until I die? When do I get to be a fully actualized person?? Do I already intuitively know what I need to do, but lack the conviction to do it? BANG BANG BANG.3

One of the more frustrating things about this process is that it is a process - and sure enough, after banging my metaphorical head against a wall all afternoon, I’m finally able to break through the wall, connecting these thoughts into something that makes sense. I solved for ‘x”. Alexa, play “Celebration” by Kool and the Gang.

I don’t know if a writing process that feels like I’m pulling teeth is sustainable for me in the long run. My brain is completely fried after long stretches in these writing trenches. Unless I am mistaken, I don’t think that writing should be that difficult, even if it’s for an audience4, which is why I’ve lately been questioning the distinction between writing for an audience of one vs. writing for an audience.

When it’s the latter, I try way too hard - manifesting “all or nothing” thinking, keeping me stifled, frustrated, and tortured. When there’s a project on the table or something I’m working towards, I feel obliged to see it through. So much so that I’m completely ensnared in its grasp until I can get it out and get it done. Resilience is a good quality. "Never give up, never surrender!" But holy shit - when the “main thing” is there, it sucks up all the oxygen in the room. Constantly on my mind. All-encompassing. An obsession. And from this perspective, you can’t simply do it half-assed. If I care about something, I can’t do it half-assed. It’s a stupid binary - ones and zeros. On and off. All effort or none at all.

There’s a sick, twisted part of me that enjoys the challenge. It’s the reason why I walk up stairs after a heavy leg day in the gym. Because I want to prove to myself that I can do it. Because it does feel great when you’ve crawled through dirt and shit, only to come out the other side having accomplished something difficult that no one else could have done.5

But there’s another part of me that senses that this shouldn’t be that challenging. I shouldn’t be struggling to articulate my thoughts. What am I even trying to say here?

It’s all in fragments. Divided. Disconnected threads. Over here and over there. Scattered across the Notes app, the bottom of this Substack draft, in written notebooks, and transcribed voice memos. Wait an hour, and another tangent pops into being. Go out for a walk and two more are born. Sleep on it for a night, and the ending is changed completely. I’m sure if I keep chopping off heads, eventually they’ll stop growing back.6

Is this the effect of years of social media?7 Reddit comments. Tweets. News articles. YouTube videos. TikToks. Instagram stories. Small pockets of random thoughts and experiences from various strangers, all in proximity. Different identities on different platforms. Different hats and different roles. Personal and professional. Online and offline. An exhausting balancing act of twenty-first-century adult life.

All these parts should encompass a whole, yet I struggle to connect everything and haven’t been able to build a foundation from which I’m able to just be. Instead, there’s a muddying of purpose. What is the goal here? Why am I doing this? Should I be doing something else instead? What is the ‘correct’ amount of effort? Am I doing this right?

Writing has always been a useful tool for both personal guidance and as a creative outlet. If thoughts go nowhere, that’s fine. If I ramble on in circles for hours, that’s fine. Whether I write for two minutes or two hours. Two sentences or two thousand words. When I find myself incapable of finding the right words to express an idea. It’s fine. It’s all fine. It’s my time and I’ll spend it how I want to. I have nothing to prove.

An audience? Now there has to be a point. Now there has to be a topic other people care about. Now the words and structure must be precise. Communicated in a way that is engaging and understandable. It has to mean something. It has to have a point. It can’t simply exist for its own sake. Feedback. Reception. Metrics. Outcomes. A footprint in digital sand. Another attempted shout into the void. Another chance for a forgotten memory. Lost blogs and webpages. Half-empty notebooks. A to-do list abandoned after two weeks. A stain on my permanent record.

It’s not about the critical response. It’s never been about the critical response. It’s about consistency, creation, and flow. It’s about the frustration of going through an agonizing writing process that burns you out. This shouldn’t be that difficult - I write all the time! I’m a human. Humans write! All you have to do to be a writer is to write!

There is no badge of honor for making this any more difficult than it needs to be. The reader doesn’t care if you meticulously crafted every word while being prodded by hot rods or if you farted it out in an afternoon. All they see is the final product. A piece of writing doesn’t have to be 10,000 words of meticulously crafted brilliance to be interesting or worthwhile. It can be messy. Silly. Fun. Even horseshit! Yet, I keep demanding more from myself. Think about using story and visual metaphors. Y’know, I’ve never really been able to visualize things using descriptive language. Everything exists very matter-of-factly … there’s this theme about “fragmenting my identity” … maybe I should elaborate on that … I have some notes over here … but wait, how is that going to fit in over here? Plus, I still have these other points to get to. Perhaps I could change the …

I keep trying to pile on more shit!

It’s “all or nothing” thinking. The stupid binary. I give it my “all” or I give it “nothing”. And when I give it my “all”, I stray further away from the point, whilst trying to get back to the point, doing the same thing that flung me away from the point in the first place. Writing for an audience causes me to overthink each micro- and macro-detail. But especially the macro-details.

Does this idea make sense ‘over here’, or would this be better suited ‘over there’? Is the point clear? What is the point? What is the point?? Where is the point??? Who is the point? Am I the point?

Back and forth. Over and over. Ping-ponging inside my skull, white smoke billowing from my ears, signalling the arrival of the first Jewish pope.

No wonder I get burnt out. If writing is this laborious every single time, then should I be doing something else instead? What is the ‘correct’ amount of effort? Am I doing this right?

I agree, Han.

It’s similar when I’m editing my YouTube videos. Everything else falls by the wayside as my entire mental and creative focus goes solely towards the project. I don’t write anymore. I don’t perform in front of the camera. I just sit in front of a timeline and work my way from beginning to end. Cut down to usable clips. Rough cut. Main edit. Graphics. Animation. Fix animation. Sound effects. Music. Copyright check. Sound mix. Mentos credits. Thumbnail. Description. Upload. Do a little dance. Analytics. Read comments. More analytics. Get overwhelmed with comments. Analytics. Get bored with analytics. Start the process over again.

A visual demonstration of a typical timeline for my videos

Everything takes a little bit longer than expected. Life happens. Friends. Family. Events. Plus, I only have so much energy in a day. But when I’m in it, all the oxygen in the room is sucked up. No escape until it’s complete.

Yet, writing has always felt like the most important part to me. It’s foundational to the video. Without the script, there is no blueprint for the project. Everything has to be clean and tidy to save yourself from headaches later on down the line. The order of sentences and ideas, their rhythm and flow - subtle variations create different effects in the viewer’s mind. But more importantly: EDITING. DOWN. YOUR. WRITING. Holy shit. Nothing bothers me more than when I’m watching a video and the creator is taking three minutes to explain something that could’ve taken thirty seconds. It’s like looking for a tutorial about how to use a specific effect in Davinci Resolve, only to be greeted by, “Hey guys! Welcome back to the channel. Today, we’re looking at a cool effect in Davinci Resolve called “Video Exporting”. A lot of you have been requesting that I cover this effect, and we’ll do so today. If you’re new here, be sure to click the subscribe button and notification bell. We recently hit 10,000 subscribers, which is a huge milestone for the channel, so thanks for the support. Anyways, let’s get into the video. GENERIC ELECTRONIC BEAT AND LOGO. So what you’re first going to do is turn on the computer. After turning on the computer, you’re going to want to open the Davinci Resolve application. As you can see here, we’re on the Edit page. Now, since the edit page is used for editing video, this isn’t the tab we want to be on for exporting videos.8 So what you’re going to do is hover your mouse over to the bottom of the page to the little icon that says, “Deliver”. It looks like a rocket ship. Did you know that the first successful launch of a liquid-fueled rocket was on March 16, 1926, by Robert H. Goddard? Wow, you learn something new every day! What you’re going to do next is make your brain send signals down your forearm into your index finger to click on the left mouse button. Not the right mouse button. Some people make the mistake of clicking the wrong mouse button. We don’t want to make mistakes. Anyways, if you are enjoying the informational content of this video, be sure to give it a like and click the subscribe button. What you’re going to do next is make your brain send signals down your forearm into your index finger…

You catch my drift. I don’t mind a good yap session now and then; however, my experiences writing essays in post-secondary have made me acutely aware of when creators are meandering or padding for time with unnecessary fluff.9

Be entertaining, but please get to the point. Or a point. Something. Anything!

That’s how my brain works: structure, design, “big picture thinking” - it’s why I just can’t “write words” when trying to make a point. The words comprise the parts of the larger whole, which is making a point. They must be ordered. They must be precise. They must engage.

Video editing is not as problematic despite the obsessiveness. The projects are located inside the computer.10 I can close the laptop, walk away, and am unable to make any changes. Sure, I’m thinking about the project, but I’m not actively working on it. When I’m editing, all the material is right there to work off of. Finite. Point A to Point B. Introduction to the Mentos credits sequence. It doesn’t matter what comes; fresh goes better in life.

Writing is more challenging in this sense because it’s always at the forefront of my mind. I can’t turn my brain off - I’m always thinking. And the thinking aspect is inextricably tied to the work because it’s easier to do. As it turns out, both the English language and the Notes app on my phone are more accessible than a Davinci Resolve timeline.

Live footage from my Notes app

Thus, I’m always tinkering, adding, changing - becoming overwhelmed. Infinite branching variations of infinite branching ideas. Always on my mind. More heads to cut off than I know what to do with.

The work gets done … eventually. Finishing creative projects isn’t the issue for me. It’s all the in-between stuff. The hyper-focusing, trying too hard, lack of clarity, burning out, and the anxiety associated with it.

Ideally, I want to balance my creative work, whether that’s writing or making YouTube videos, with other parts of my life without feeling completely brain-fried after doing it. Writing currently feels adversarial to me, like it’s this thing I have to conquer or overcome, rather than being an expression of what I want to say. I don’t think that’s healthy for a long-term relationship. I don’t have the mental fortitude to do this every time. I don’t have the energy to fragment my identity. I need to simplify and live.

Fortunately, going through any process lets you iterate on the process because you’re learning as you’re doing it. If something isn’t working properly or giving the desired outcome, you change it. Duh. Usually, there’s some area in your life you can draw on where the process is working, take lessons from that, and apply it to the other thing.

So in typical male fashion, I want to talk about the gym.

“I work out” - LMFAO

I’ve been working out constantly for the past seventeen years - since 2008. Barack Obama became president of the United States around that time, and I wanted to impress him.

While I dig the benefits of being fit and healthy, I think there are key elements that have maintained my consistency in both diet and exercise over the decades, beyond merely “enjoying the process” or “looking jacked and getting compliments on my physique”11. Mainly: structure, measured goals, and deadlines.

Patrick Bateman voice

The gym is simple. It’s all planned and logged in my exercise app.12 I work out four times a week. Upper Day (Chest/Back/Biceps/Triceps), Lower Day (Legs/Shoulders), Rest Day, Repeat. Rest on Weekends. 8 exercises each workout session - hitting each muscle group twice (Legs/Shoulders get four each) for 3-4 sets in a specific order with specific exercises at a specific time of the day for a specific duration in the gym.13

My diet is logged in MyFitnessPal - three main meals a day (with healthy snacks) - aiming for macronutrient and caloric goals. To be honest, I’m at a point now where I don’t need to log my food intake because I’m familiar with the nutritional information of what I eat regularly. However, looking at data is fun! Sometimes I do cardio, but I just bike/walk around the city a lot. Also, I prioritize sleep. Sleep is good.14

It’s an automatic system, plugging in the variables and executing the plan. I don’t have to exert any mental energy. All the mechanics and motions are straightforward; it just takes some physical energy. Repetition over time, adjusting along the way with small, manageable changes, coupled with the right amount of positive and negative reinforcement15. The result is me being a lifelong gym enthusiast. “A Progressive Mind in a MAGA Body.”16

If you’re familiar with Charles Duhigg's habit loop of “Cue, Routine, Reward”, you’ll recognize aspects of that present here. It’s the basic foundation for creating habits that will stick! But I want to zero in here on the “routine” aspect of it. Everything I do is aimed towards the process of working out, rather than outcomes.

There’s a clear structure: at this time of day17, I go and perform a specific workout routine for a specific amount of time, until it’s complete.

There’s a clear, measured goal: aiming for a specific rep range for each exercise based on the previous workout, completing each exercise, which results in completing the workout. It’s all “written down”, logged on an app on my phone. No other distractions.

There’s a clear deadline: The workout lasts about ninety minutes to two hours maximum, because I have other things to do with my life besides being in the gym all day.

However, the crucial element that has made the routine stick is that it’s challenging without feeling impossible to accomplish. The exercise choices are ones I find the most enjoyable/tolerable without being excruciating. The workload is manageable with flexibility to go even further beyond if I’m up for up, while knowing that so long as I put in an honest effort, that’s good enough. If exerting maximum effort and going for personal records on every lift were my goal every workout, I’d burn out in a flash. The same goes for my diet. Any sort of strict “keto”, “low-carb”, “carnivore”, “intermittent fasting” or “whatever-the-hell” diet plan is not sustainable for me long-term, so instead I have a range of foods in my diet that I eat regularly, with the flexibility to enjoy a pizza or eat out every once in a while.

Food is arbitrary. Just get a protein element. Some carbs. And some fats. All within a caloric and macronutrient range. Make it taste good enough. Seasoning. Salt and Pepper. Fruits and Vegetables. 80/20. Potato principle. Works for me.

The dirty little secret about “getting in shape” or “becoming jacked” is that making progress towards your ideal physique is the cool part, not the actual “being jacked”. Week to week, month to month, you can see and feel all the changes. You look at yourself in the morning and notice new muscle definition. You’re making gains on all your lifts. You feel more energetic and enthused throughout the day. You feel amazing! Then one day, you hit your ideal physique. Congratulations! Your biceps look like mountains, your abs are cut, and your booty is serving more cake than an all-you-can-eat buffet. You are the muscles! But now what? You can’t keep making gains forever. Your lifts stagnate, and you don’t notice any real changes in the mirror anymore. This is your new normal. This is your baseline now. This is probably as good as you’re going to be - and that’s great - except now instead of working towards the goal of “becoming jacked”, you’re just working. You have to keep doing the same things you were doing before just to maintain all you’ve achieved. If you’ve dragged yourself through hell just to get eight percent body fat, you’re still in hell. Most people aren’t high-level athletes looking to push themselves to the peak of their chosen sport. They aren’t being paid for this. Their job isn’t the gym. I suppose it’s fine if your goal is: “I want to get into the best shape of my life for two seconds”, as if to say, “I did a thing. I climbed a mountain. I went to the Louvre. I made a two-hour YouTube video”, but staying in shape long-term; that’s the hardest part about “being jacked”.18

It’s why I have more admiration for a 40-year old parent of three, with a spouse and a full-time job, who can stay in good shape, rather than the 20-something uber jacked fitness influencer who’s making their bread by selling supplements, posing in perfect lighting, and is “totally natural trust me yup definitely not on gear no way sir one hundred percent natty definitely no financial incentives to lie about that”.

Life wears you down in one way or another. It’s a lonnnnggg game.

The fact that I’ve been able to remain consistent with the gym for so long, but not writing, bothers me. The blueprint is right there! I can maintain good habits! Why is this other area so difficult?!

The simple answer is: you’re putting your writing on a pedestal. You’ve attached your ego to it and made it this gigantic monster of convoluted mind-fuck because you feel like it won’t be good enough for an audience. Like you won’t be good enough. And the only way to prove yourself worthy is to overcome the convoluted mind-fuck and turn it into something readable. You’re making this harder than it needs to be because, for some reason, you believe that will make the end product worthwhile. And when it’s over and done, you’ll feel amazing. After all that tension had built up for days and days. The long hours in front of the screen. Arranging and re-arranging. Scribbling down and erasing different ideas. Iterating and re-iterating. Crafting. Perfecting. Until it’s done. You’ve made your point. It’s over. The ring is destroyed. You’re finally free from the burden. But you’re still in hell because you know that to get back here again, you must go through that whole ordeal … again … and again … and again …

And you know you’re a stubborn bastard who will see it through. The work will get done … eventually. One way or another.

The blank page is not intimidating. Writer’s block is a foreign concept. Everything that you need is right there. You have everything. You just don’t believe it should be that easy.

So you lose the plot.19

There’s no structure. No purpose. No deadlines. I write about whatever, whenever, without any clear destination or purpose for an indefinite amount of time. I see where it goes, and it gets finished when it gets finished. TBD. I’ve always had an aversion to deadlines. Commitment issues. I think this is why I’ve been losing my intellectual curiosity for casual interests. Seems like a lot of effort for what might amount to nothing.

Why write an article for Substack when you could be writing for YouTube? Why are you wasting your time? Plus, you know you like to try so hard at stuff to the point where you’re brain fried. So why are you going to try hard at something that’ll be a huge waste of time AND burn you out?

This outcome-oriented thinking is stifling me. I’m avoiding any commitment because either 1) I think it’ll have no value or 2) once I do, it’s all gas, no breaks.

Nothing feels in sync. Always divided between the two. I need to find a happy medium. Like the gym.

The gym works for me because it’s not a Godzilla ego-sized mind-fuck monster. It’s challenging enough to be worth my time, but not so hard that I dread stepping in there. You’re not spending four hours straight at the gym grinding yourself into the dirt doing every exercise imaginable. I feel like I have nothing to prove. The process speaks for itself. With writing, I just need to do the same thing. I need to start doing that now. Ease off the gas.

There are so many concepts I was working with while drafting this article. Trying to fit every little thing, explain every little thread, and tie it all together in a neat little package - but that kept me stuck. Ease off the gas.

The simple answer is: you haven’t done it enough. You’ve only written for an audience a handful of times. Your process is rusty.20 By doing it more consistently, you’ll get better at it. Don’t kill your brain by trying too hard, though! You’ll always feel like you could be doing more, tweaking and editing into oblivion, but intuitively you understand that the mere act of doing this is what makes this good enough. Ease off the gas.

Getting one thing out of the way frees up your mind to do the other things. Sometimes it ends up going nowhere. That’s fine. You’re right where you need to be. Intuitively, you know what to do.

It’s the same feeling when I made my first YouTube video after spending years thinking about it. This is what I want to do, so I’m going to do it.

It’s the same feeling now, making this post. A few days and a couple of thousand words. Learning about the process. Making a thing. “The Substack Right of Passage”.21

FOOTNOTES

1 Repetition is fun!

2 It’s the sports equivalent of swishing a three-pointer. Or when I played goaltender in hockey: the glove save. Robbing someone on a breakaway with a glove save and having a crowd go “OHHHH” is exhilarating in a way that rivals moist chocolate cake or sex. Nothing comes close.

3 Visual representation

4 I make freaking YouTube videos for crying out loud!

5 I think most people can walk up stairs, though.

6 And that’s the gospel truth.

7 Sort of. I’ve always kept notebooks of scribbled thoughts and ideas - even before the scrolling era of the internet.

8 Technically, there is a “Quick Export” feature on the Edit page.

9 Basically every video essay ever

10 They’re in the computer!

11 Yes, this has happened. Yes, they were all strangers. Yes, they were all men.

12 Strong on iOS.

13 There is some flexibility in the order/exercises depending on what gym equipment is available. Also, rest time between sets is usually around two minutes (I use the stopwatch on my phone).

14 Yes, I have a sleep tracking app: Sleep Cycle. Similar to MyFitnessPal, I don’t need it. I just like data.

15 If I don’t work out for a while, I feel like shit. Plus, after I work out, I get a tuna sandwich.

16 Here’s a reference for all you terminally online folks.

17 Technically, this is a “cue”.

18 It does get easier…

19 I spent another hour trying to add a tangent about essay writing in university. About how writing in an academic setting, procrastinating on assignments, all-nighters, and the assembly-line nature of getting grades from overworked TAs feels alienating. Writing that doesn’t feel like your own. The effect compounds when your results (“grades”) are consistently good regardless of the effort put in. “There’s no way it’s supposed to be that easy”. This creates a “process” of sorts that gives you an outcome, so you keep procrastinating and pulling all-nighters, because leaving it to the last minute still pays dividends (despite all the mental anguish of that one night).

20 I just need to pick a time of day, sit down and write, take breaks, and create deadlines. I’m going to start using a pomodoro timer. The problem isn’t focusing on the task - the problem is hyperfocusing and forgetting to take breaks. This includes taking “mental breaks”, so I’m not tweaking/editing in my head all the time.

21 The first post has to be about writing!