When in Doubt, Always Write About Something at the Last Minute.
Oh, God… I really have been running out of ideas lately. And it doesn’t help that I’ve been busy with work-related articles and family outings, so that means I’ve had much time coming up with ideas for this blog. That’s nice to hear.
Another thing that hasn’t been helping me is coming up with arbitrary deadlines for this blog. I used to publish once a month on either the 17th or the 18th. Now… I publish three times a month- the 8th, 18th, and 28th. Well, it’s the 28th of February today, and I’ve just now started writing an article about something.
And believe it or not, this isn’t the first time I’ve done this. Nope, I did this with the last article, and I even did it with some song lyrics I randomly came up with just one day before my publishing schedule. I was originally going to defend some offensive stereotypes (Trust me, it won’t be as bad as you think it’ll be.), but I just couldn’t come up with any ideas about it or any motivation.
That’s the biggest problem with being a writer. I know I’ve written about this in a previous article here, but I just have to say it again.
Writing is hard!
And it’s not just the actual activity of writing that’s hard, either. It’s coming up with ideas that’s the most difficult. And there’s also proofreading that needs to be done, too. I never realized how many spelling, vocabulary, and grammar errors I have made until I listened to the audio versions of my previous articles. And dear God, were there a lot of them! I guess that’s what happens when you get too excited and focused on all the research when writing one of these bad boys, but Jesus! How can I even call myself a writer after finding out about all of these easily-preventable errors?! There’s gotta be at least one person who’s read those articles; they had to have known about those errors, and they were probably wondering how I could call myself a writer!
“So, what’s with the title then?” you might be asking. And that’s a good point. You should always give it your all when doing any activity, especially an activity like writing. That means reading over your work to find any errors before submitting it. But here’s the thing. When it comes to deadlines (specifically arbitrary deadlines I’ve come up with), you might not have all the time in the world to proofread. That’s why, since I don’t have any actual ideas for an article right now, I’m rambling on about something completely random that’s popped into my head at the last minute.
Oh, who am I kidding? Maybe all my inspiration is permanently running dry, and I’m just not meant for this whole writing business. Maybe I should try and get into comics. I did a little… comic-ish thing last year, and it was kind of fun to make. Look at the picture above; it was a bit of a pain to draw, but it was fun. And I’ve even had several ideas for comics, as well. Then again, making comics requires me to be good at two things- writing and drawing, and they take way longer than writing articles. So, this might not work out as much…
Look, writing’s hard, and it’s especially hard to consistently come up with ideas for an arbitrary deadline you’ve set up for yourself. So, when in doubt, always write about something at the last minute. Or… maybe don’t set up arbitrary deadlines for yourself and publish an article whenever you feel like it, especially if you’re not getting paid for writing these babies for medium.com.
