Writing for enjoyment is the salvation I too often forget. When life is complicated and professional and personal issues are pressing the first item jettisoned from my routine is writing.
In corporate life I am an adept keyboard warrior slicing through a slew of inbound requests while producing slide decks at a prodigious enough rate to give a McKinsey consultant pause. But when life asks more of me I always forget just how relaxing I find writing even if it is only for myself.
I am not sure why I like to write but I find sentence structure and the challenge to articulate a thought with clarity but brevity strangely carthartic. That’s not to say I find it easy but on occasions such as tonight there is a direct channel from brain to finger tips that requires little conscious effort.
Great writing is inherently beautiful, there is an elegant satisfaction in reading a tightly constructed piece of prose. I think the test of good writing is to read your own work years later and get a pang of satisfaction and almost disbelief at whether you actually wrote the piece. Let’s be clear though I don’t experience that often!
I am saddened that quality writing amongst the general population is on the wane (at least in my corporate personal bubble). At work I often am the brunt of light hearted ribbing for my word selection. The criticism being I use words that are too “big”. While it is good natured with no malice intended what makes me chuckle is that the vocabulary in question is actually simple. That a word as mundane as ‘palpable’ elicits criticism from my peers is sad.
Much like a painter with a broad pallet of colours can create a beautiful vista so too can a broad vocabulary articulate a richer tapestry of meaning.
So while this post has taken only a few minutes as I sit here in a nice flow state with a quiet house late at night I feel immeasurably more relaxed.
Because of this I will post again tomorrow night and try and remember how important it is for me to write.
Stay Strong
Thomo
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