---
title: "Write as you are"
date: 2023-11-23T09:28:59+01:00
slug: write-as-you-are
draft: false
---

I started 2 blogs previously. I started each time with a general topic that I was interested in, then wrote articles related to said topic. Over time, I realized that I was less and less motivated to write, to a point where the experience became tedious and dreadful, and I was forcing myself to artificially find new ideas. Both blogs are now archived.

This is my 3rd attempt at writing a blog. And I will try a different approach, a bottom-up one. I read Henrik Karlsson's [A blog post is a very long and complex search query [...]](https://www.henrikkarlsson.xyz/p/search-query), and it motivated me to start writing again, on new terms.

Following below are my terms.

## Write whenever, whatever I feel like

The first change is that this blog doesn't have a clear topic. I'm currently interested in a bunch of topics, so I'll write about a bunch of topics. I think writing about aha moments should be a good start, as proposed by Henrik:

> You ask yourself: What would have made me jump off my chair if I had read it six months ago (or a week ago, or however fast you write)? If you have figured out something that made you ecstatic, this is what you should write.

Obviously, don't expect these ecstatic moments to happen at regular intervals.

## Focus on writing, not on being read

The author continues by saying that my blog will probably be boring to a huge majority of the internet.

> You will write essays that almost no one likes... Luckily, almost no one multiplied by the entire population of the internet is plenty if you can only find them.

While I totally welcome meaningful relationships created on the internet with random strangers that share my unique set of interests, and I'm happy the author managed to forge some, I also have even lower expectations than him. I'm hoping that just _forming the words_ helps me shape myself, regardless of whether it involves other people.

## Change my "mental audience"

In my previous blogs, I noticed I was aiming to reach a broad audience. Probably I thought that it would result in my blog getting popular. In the writing process, since this imaginary audience didn't have all the context, I would try to explain myself a lot. It resulted in the essays being long, shallow, and/or generic.

> If you, like me, have been stuck writing and it’s slow and ends up bland, I can recommend just changing the mental “audience”. Just assume you’re talking to someone who really gets you – perhaps your younger self or a nerdy friend. Don’t be defensive, trying to convince a hypothetical, hyper-intelligent skeptic. - [HN commenter](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38140716)

This time, I'll just write the exact words that go through my mind, with little context-setting. My audience will be my own self 6 months ago, as proposed by Henrik:

> And you do not dumb it down, because you were not stupid six months ago, you just knew less.

Let's see how this goes.