There is freedom in knowing what to do, what to write, or where to go. You don't need to think, or make choices, or really do anything beyond drone recitation, monkey work, or putting one foot in front of another. For my entire life, I've been told what to do and how to do it, and I was free.
Run a mile. Sure, but I can think whatever I wish while I'm doing it.
Write that paper. Sure, but I can hold on to my own principles and just write what you want to hear.
File these. Make this. Hold that. Sure, sure, and sure. None of this will define me in the end, and (usually) you are paying me to do it.
The world changes when you are seriously asked, "Well, what do you think about?" The answer is always scary, and really, really hard to come up with. Not because you don't have an answer, but because like everything you've been conditioned to think up until that point, you believe that there is actually a right answer. A right way of doing things. A right way of thinking.
I'm sitting here, almost ready to tackle and write my sixth and final paper before I begin my PhD thesis, which will take me three years to write. This paper has been given a few months to complete, and it is much longer than anything I've written before. I know what I want to say, I'm not quite sure how to say it yet (though I'm close), and at the end of this process I should be ready to begin writing a piece of work that could very well define me.
I knew this was coming.
I even know a few things I didn't know a year ago:
1) A paper will either flow out of you because you feel comfortable enough to push your thoughts onto a piece of academic work, or it will be a word-by-word-minute-by-minute-struggle to try and put down something worthy of your professors/peers/anyoneelsebutyou actually spending time to read your drivel.
2) Not everything you've ever wanted to read about has been written/ qualified/ or thought about before. When someone tells you that everything has already been written, they are lying either to themselves, to you, or both.
3) Always take an hour or two a day to talk out your thoughts. It doesn't just help. It works. It will clarify your thinking beyond your own scattered brain-stem. Talk to anybody you can that you don't mind sounding stupid to. Preferably, someone that will challenge your ability to make them understand, because...
4) Every great idea you've ever had, can and should be understandable to the world you live in. If you can't explain it simply, easily, and in layman's terms, you are not yet clear enough on what it is you are talking about.
Enjoy the moments where your brain doesn't work. Cos' if you're like me, those are the rarest moments of the day. There is no right way of thinking. Just your way. I prefer your way.
There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so. -- Hamlet (II.ii)
Year 1, Day 309: Words Written - 1376 Crappy Words.
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