Until today I had never given much thought as to, why I write? Getting Desk.pm and enrolling in John’s 10 Days to a better blog, made me think about the why(s). I took my notebook and my trusty new pen and started writing bullet points as John has suggested here. Initially when I started writing down the points, I couldn’t, for the life of me, come across any reasons. I was blank. Then I read John’s reasons as to his Whys, and I started rolling. Seems like I just needed a push. Thank you John.
Why I Write? Why I have committed to writing everyday?
- To better learn my thought process & maybe, transcend it, better it: I always have had the difficultly of expressing myself with spoken words, but writing how I feel is something I cherish, I understand and that’s how I evaluate my feelings, that’s how I get in touch with my Adult ego-state, if I may. An example of this.
- To note down Ideas, share them sometimes even, in one form or another: I get the weirdest ideas at the most weirdest of times. It can hit me anytime, and my ideas are something I love, because they somewhat (may be more than somewhat) define what my subconscious self is trying to convey. At first, the word “idea” was somehow related to products/business models that would put some money in pockets. But as time has gone by, that’s no longer the case. Now the word defines more than just business logic, it’s become spiritual. Because this one words leads to creation (next point). And my ideas can be anything, related to anything, be it a tattoo, be it poem, be it a sketch, be it something more tangible. I never discard them, I always note them down and when I feel I am available to work on them, I do. I note them down to validate them.
- To note down and share my creation(s) with the world: I am in love with the whole construct of creation. I love something I thought of taking shape. I love sharing it, using it, wearing it on my person as a flag. It’s become a religion. The whole process of a thought (idea) taking shape and then you working on it to get it, welcome it into reality has become what I do. And I write about it and I write about it because it makes me look back. And that inspires me to create more.
- To validate my own existence: I came across two questions, stumbled upon them rather, in a funny manner. How do I know I exist? and If I do exist then Why? The Why has always been there I might add, but never in the context of How do I know that I exist? and the answer is simple, I exist because I can share so much with so many. And the so many validate it. I share, most often than not, via my writings. Because that’s the only way I know how to express. This validates my existence. As to the why I exist and who am I, click here.
- To better myself as a person: How? by accepting criticism, by helping, by sharing my thoughts, ideas and creations. By sticking to commitments, If I write it down anywhere, I need to answer to that writ. Even if I fail, I still have to answer to that writ. Because that was/is me when I wrote/write it down.
- To improve my language skills: This one’s simple enough. My grammar and spelling sucks. No, that is the truth and writing/reading helps me better it.
- To create value for people who actually spend the time reading my writings: If someone is spending time reading something I wrote, they deserve my truth. The truth as I perceive and comprehend it. Sure it can be otherwise, but I owe it to you if you are reading a post/article/poem/anything I have written it should be honest, earnest. Share what I create with you, most often than not, for free. This makes me happy. Sure I did like to sell it to you, but for now it’s yours. I made it for me you see, and maybe what I ever I created may help you too. A very recent example of this is Minelienda.
- To put to use what I have learnt/experienced: Again this falls under sharing. Anything that I have learnt I put it to use, in form or another. And I write about it, my experience, the result, etc. And if this helps anyone out there, that’s a good thing according to me. Nothing is as precious as sharing one’s experience with everyone who’s interested. And writing lets me do that exactly. Like this post for example or Johns post on why he writes, that really set into motion my thoughts on the question he posed.
- To share a piece of me: The ideas, the creations, the experiences, all those feelings that I write down and post publicly are a piece of me. And I love sharing it with you.
- To strike up conversations and to meet like minded individuals: I may be an introvert but I love meeting new people. My introvercy is limited to social outings, where a lot of unknowns gather and ask personal questions right away. But meeting and striking conversations one on one feels more comfortable to me and I love doing that. Some of you out there may communicate with me, converse and who knows we may meet one day because of something that I wrote and shared.
- To boost my creativity: Like I said, I have this compulsive need to write down my ideas, lest I forget a thought. And this takes my creativity juices to the brim. Writing helps me motivate myself. I follow this ritual of morning pages, and that has single handedly made me more productive and reduced my what ifs to why nots? While writing something, even if its a quote from a book I am reading, I get ideas, it’s become a very powerful tool, if I may, for my creativity to flow.
- For the love writing and sharing stories: As I mentioned above, I love creation and creating things, virtual or tangible. What is writing? It’s a form of creation. The first step to your idea becoming something more tangible, becoming reality. And thus I love writing. I write fiction too, and hopefully some day I will be sharing what I have written there (its not there yet), but creating worlds out of words, my God! Who would’ve thought? I am pretty sure you have at the least seen the movies, if not read J. R. R. Tolkien’s works. Just imagine the scale of world building involved by a single mind. That astounds me, makes me stand in one place in sheer awe of it all. Then there’s Steven Ericsson, 10 books of the series - Malazan book of the Fallen, but the world building and history here, far exceeds that of Middle Earth. So yea, love of writing, may it be mine or yours, doesn’t matter.
- To connect with my obsessions in a way I can understand them and their hunger: A straight forward example here is the same question I am still writing the answer to here. Why I write? Why do I want a tattoo on me? Why do I want that tattoo on me? Why do I choose to photograph and love cameras? All these are answered for me when I take the pen to the paper.
- To get inspired, moved even & to inspire others & myself: Again, if What I write and share can help someone, anyone in any way than thank you for letting me do that for you. I get inspired with words, because, more often than I not, I notice the emotions behind them, and this is one of the reasons I love writing and reading poems and poets.
- To share the daily awareness around me: As I mentioned above, sharing my experiences is precious to me. This falls in the same category, being aware of all around me, noticing small things about people and places, and then writing about those. That’s why I write. E.g. for this coming up soon.
- To communicate with myself: Have you ever had a written chat with yourself? As in take a sheet of paper or a notebook and have a live chat with yourself. It’s the damnedness thing of all. It’s hilarious, sad, happy, confusing, clarifying, etc. all at the same time. It’s fun!
- To get some “me” time: This has been a recent change. I take my laptop, goto a cafe late at night. Sit and write a post every day. And within two days of doing this, this has become routine of me time. Time for myself and my thougths to go public on one of my blogs.
- To become a better programmer/coder: I have read, quite often on many places online, that consistent writing leads to better coding. I understand this as follows: Writing code, any code is a two form communication. One, you are communicating with a machine. Two, you are communicating to user(s) via your code. And if you can write better, communicate yourself better in plain language then it stands to argue that you will be able to better communicate with your user(s) too. It also helps while refactoring :P, I know John said not to edit, but as I mentioned up above, I suck at grammar and spellings, so I just edit those. But where code is concerned bugs are bound to be abound and refactoring is the way to go :)
- To balance my brain hemispheres: I recently asked a friend about setting up routines for me. She asked me to get a brain hemisphere balanace test done (forgot what exactly this is called). So I did, and I more creative than logical. So to balance myself I need to set routines and constraints where timely stuff is due. And writing consistently, at a particular time in a day is me starting to build some routines for me. If you did like check your brain balance you can use this or/and this.
- To stay the course: Every once in a while, I open up a notebook full of my notes, ideas, thoughts and scribles or look back on a blog post. This helps me to check my course and correct it. Focus more, if I may.
- To gather more experiences and get uncomfortable: Well unless I experience things, new things, interesting things, meet interesting people around, get uncomfortable, what am to write about?
- To be open to opportunities when and if they arrive: Opportunities come in all forms and sizes they said. So why close the door on them if I get one through my writings, right?
- To get carpal tunnel syndrome: Lol, the speed I am using my keyboard at and the time I have spend in front of a computer screen, I think I am getting there.
Now that the Why has been answered. I usually just ask Why not?
Oh and thanks for all the fish too!
