“It’s about what you write, not how well you write it.”
Like a dagger to the heart, those words from a new email newsletter client pierced my writer’s soul and made me question the purpose of my very existence. Why am I here if not to take the mundane and spin it into something interesting?
I find it hard to write when I get discouraged. At a time when businesses are crumbling, the rate of small-business closings has tripled, and people are making drastic lifestyle decisions, I have let my writing time be consumed with thinking. Way too much thinking, to be honest.
I just erased an entire blog post that was intended for this spot. I had an interesting anecdote to start things out and tied it to an important business principle, but when I read it back it bored me. It did not pass the “So What?” test, so I ditched it and started over.
I have developed somewhat of a bad habit at home. I don’t necessarily think it’s bad, but based on some recent body language I have received, I may need to rethink my position on it. Every once in a blue moon, I may correct someone on the way they are using a word or phrase. Not in an obnoxious way, of course, but more in the saying back the correct word in a childlike tone as if asking if that is what they really meant to say way.
See, I told you it wasn’t obnoxious.
As a longtime editor and reader of intern-penned articles, I often was faced with explaining why their papers were overwhelmed with red ink. My opening line was usually, “It’s not as bad as it looks.” Although, usually it was.
