My friend told me I write well when I have good content. "Business" and "e-commerce" wasn't good content. Those topics, at least when I had written about them, didn't have heart.

Touche.

I thought I'd set the stage for my writing practice by defining the kind of writing I aspire to craft.

Here are examples of writing that have changed the course of my life:

1. "It occurred to him that he had not spent his life as he should have done. It occurred to him that his scarcely perceptible attempts to struggle against what was considered good by the most highly placed people, those scarcely noticeable impulses which he had immediately suppressed, might have been the real thing, and all the rest false." — Leo Tolstoy, The Death of Ivan Llynch

2. One could have the hope that he would become more real by reducing expectations, shrink to a hard, reliable core and thus be immune to the pain of disappointment. But how would it be to lead a life that banished every long, bold expectation, a life where there were only banal expectations like "the bus is coming"?”
   ― Pascal Mercier, Night Train to Lisbon

3. “ There is perhaps only one thing to say to this infant.. The message is simple:

   When you come to one of the many moments in life where you must give an account of yourself, provide a ledger of what you have been, and done, and meant to the world, do not, I pray, discount that you filled a dying man’s days with a sated joy, a joy unknown to me in all my prior years, a joy that does not hunger for more and more but rests, satisfied. " — Paul Kalanithi, When Breath Becomes Air

4. "For the happy man prayer is only a jumble of words, until the day when sorrow comes to explain to him the sublime language by means of which he speaks to God." — Alexandre Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo

5. "Whenever you're feeling lonely or sad, try going to the loft on a beautiful day and looking outside. Not at the houses or the rooftops, but at the sky. As long as you can look fearlessly at the sky, you'll know you're pure within and will find happiness once more." — Anne Frank, Diary of a Young Girl

6. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet." — Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

These quotes have changed me: Made me choose one path over another, gave me a drip of hope on a black day, and woken me the fuck up from my self deceit.

But the quotes don't stand alone. The rest of the author's writing prepped my mind to take in those few sentences, which hit me at once. Some unpredictable synergy between the author's selection of words and my exact conditions at the time of reading led to understanding. The author, of course, had never known me. So how did they share those impactful words?

The writing I seek is honest, economical, and accurate. Teaching a "life lesson" is a fine endeavor —although it quickly treads the line of self congratulatory, overdone, and annoying— and not what I want to do. (This will be hard to execute, I know).

I think good writing doesn't seek to teach, but to express something within oneself honestly. It may notice what we're going through in our lives, like Slyvia Plath's capturing that unique combinations of emotions when deciding one path over all others (referring to quote #6 above).

Here's an example of a particular human experience well said:

But she could not do it; she could not say it. Then, knowing that he was watching her, instead of saying anything she turned, holding her stocking, and looked at him. And as she looked at him she began to smile, for though she had not said a word, he knew, of course he knew, that she loved him. He could not deny it. And smiling she looked out of the window and said (thinking to herself, Nothing on earth can equal this happiness)—

“Yes, you were right. It’s going to be wet tomorrow.” She had not said it, but he knew it. And she looked at him smiling. For she had triumphed again.”

— Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse

Whatever I end up writing about, I endeavor to bare the truth in a skillful manner. I do not want to teach anyone anything. Rather, I want to get out the pent-up stuff inside me.

My friend told me I write well when I have good content. "Business" and "e-commerce" wasn't good content. Those topics, at least when I had written about them, didn't have heart.

Touche.

I thought I'd set the stage for my writing practice by defining the kind of writing I aspire to craft.

Here are examples of writing that have changed the course of my life:

1. "It occurred to him that he had not spent his life as he should have done. It occurred to him that his scarcely perceptible attempts to struggle against what was considered good by the most highly placed people, those scarcely noticeable impulses which he had immediately suppressed, might have been the real thing, and all the rest false." — Leo Tolstoy, The Death of Ivan Llynch

2. One could have the hope that he would become more real by reducing expectations, shrink to a hard, reliable core and thus be immune to the pain of disappointment. But how would it be to lead a life that banished every long, bold expectation, a life where there were only banal expectations like "the bus is coming"?”
   ― Pascal Mercier, Night Train to Lisbon

3. “ There is perhaps only one thing to say to this infant.. The message is simple:

   When you come to one of the many moments in life where you must give an account of yourself, provide a ledger of what you have been, and done, and meant to the world, do not, I pray, discount that you filled a dying man’s days with a sated joy, a joy unknown to me in all my prior years, a joy that does not hunger for more and more but rests, satisfied. " — Paul Kalanithi, When Breath Becomes Air

4. "For the happy man prayer is only a jumble of words, until the day when sorrow comes to explain to him the sublime language by means of which he speaks to God." — Alexandre Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo

5. "Whenever you're feeling lonely or sad, try going to the loft on a beautiful day and looking outside. Not at the houses or the rooftops, but at the sky. As long as you can look fearlessly at the sky, you'll know you're pure within and will find happiness once more." — Anne Frank, Diary of a Young Girl

6. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet." — Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

These quotes have changed me: Made me choose one path over another, gave me a drip of hope on a black day, and woken me the fuck up from my self deceit.

But the quotes don't stand alone. The rest of the author's writing prepped my mind to take in those few sentences, which hit me at once. Some unpredictable synergy between the author's selection of words and my exact conditions at the time of reading led to understanding. The author, of course, had never known me. So how did they share those impactful words?

The writing I seek is honest, economical, and accurate. Teaching a "life lesson" is a fine endeavor —although it quickly treads the line of self congratulatory, overdone, and annoying— and not what I want to do. (This will be hard to execute, I know).

I think good writing doesn't seek to teach, but to express something within oneself honestly. It may notice what we're going through in our lives, like Slyvia Plath's capturing that unique combinations of emotions when deciding one path over all others (referring to quote #6 above).

Here's an example of a particular human experience well said:

But she could not do it; she could not say it. Then, knowing that he was watching her, instead of saying anything she turned, holding her stocking, and looked at him. And as she looked at him she began to smile, for though she had not said a word, he knew, of course he knew, that she loved him. He could not deny it. And smiling she looked out of the window and said (thinking to herself, Nothing on earth can equal this happiness)—

“Yes, you were right. It’s going to be wet tomorrow.” She had not said it, but he knew it. And she looked at him smiling. For she had triumphed again.”

— Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse

Whatever I end up writing about, I endeavor to bare the truth in a skillful manner. I do not want to teach anyone anything. Rather, I want to get out the pent-up stuff inside me.