Obsessive/Compulsive Writing
Rachel, your writing advice goes against 99.3% of all the writing advice in all the hundreds of thousands of writing advice articles on Medium. But I wholeheartedly agree with you!
All the writing advice experts on Medium say the same thing: Don’t ever stop writing, not even for a second! If you come against a brick wall, don’t see it as a sign to take a short break. Instead just keep writing harder and harder. Don’t stop! Keep writing and keep banging your head against that wall until your brain starts to bleed. Keep writing and writing and writing and writing. To go so much as half a day without writing is a sign of failure. It will cut short the quantity of output and in today’s world quantity is the sole measure of success. Quantity has become synonymous with quality.
When one goes to a symphony hall to experience a world-class symphony orchestra perform a classic symphony the notes of the symphony are in fact crucially important. But they are no more important than the silence between those notes. Music without silence is just noise. Speaking without pausing is just noise. Writing without taking a break is just a machine spewing out content.
But this is what 99.3% of all self-proclaimed writing experts on Medium call for. Write, write, write. Don’t stop for any reason whatsoever. The second you stop spewing forth content you are a failure. Wake up an hour earlier each day and get even more writing in for the day. Take the laptop to the bathroom with you. Eat while writing. Write while you drive. Write while you’re having sex. Don’t stop writing! EVER!
All the so-called writing experts on Medium are doing all of us a grave disservice by continually putting forth this advice. (Sometimes repeatedly in several articles a day.)
Your article, Rachel, was a breath of fresh air. It was a huge dose of common sense on a platform that has thrown common sense under the bus in favor of compulsive/obsessive concepts of art.
And that is why I loved your article so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you!
