I may ask some AI to help me formulate a few words, but all of the texts are written by me. I have a great deal of experience as a writer, it’s just natural to me, to write.
Instruments#
I like to write. I’ve been writing things down for as long as I can remember, since my early childhood.
- Before I had my computer, I had been doing my writings with pen and paper. Some of my notebooks are still with me, even despite I’ve migrated homes many times during my life.
- These days, I write only in with my notebook, meaning laptop.
I had been searching for the perfect digital typing machine for many years, follow this ‘typing machine’ tag, if you’re interested in exploring this journey with me.
Motivation#
This process of writing, it’s just natural to me. It helps me to clean my head. Hence, I need no AI for writing, it takes the pleasure from me. I like this effect writing practice has on me. After a couple of days of extensive writings, I feel lighter. On the other hand, when I do not write for extensive periods, I feel like my head clogs with thoughts. In a way, for me it’s my personal most effective meditation practice.
To be able to write things down, I read a lot. I read not only books, but mostly blogs of others. Usually, they are also people like me. This internet crowd of redditors, lobsterers, hacker-newsers, and other computer geeks like me.
Process#
I write in cycles.
- First, I quickly note things down. Everything that I have in my head, as much as I can.
- Then I come back to my laptop and re-write most of what I wrote. Sometimes I add new things that I forgot, but most times I ruthlessly shorten and simplify my thoughts.
- Sometimes, upon this first re-write session, I struggle to understand what I meant. That’s normal. It’s difficult to make things right from your first attempt.
- Then I read what I wrote. I do that from different device. It’s usually one my iPads or my smartphone. Long before, I used to use my Kindle for that, but it’s not too convenient. Different devices are of a tremendous help. Each time I grab some new device, it all looks so different to me, that I see new mistakes in my texts very easily.
- These iterations usually take days. Then, I take some break, and come back to my writing months later. Sometimes years later. The frequency depends on whether I consider the written piece worthy of revisiting. If at all.
As my step zero, before the very first step of a quick note, I can have things said either through our voice-communication platform, Monoolooog. Or discussed things in person with someone. Or in a chat, email, whatever else. It all depends on the topic.
Rules#
Considering my website, I have one special rule that may make it aside from others. My website is targeted at new visitors, not the reccuring visitors.
What does that mean? That I edit some texts without any hesitance, I rewrite my history, in a way. If I see the text could be improved, I improve it. Sometimes, over time, there’s new perspective that can make some old text much better. I take this opportunity and re-write it without hesitance. A recurring visitor may miss all these edits, but a new visitor would read the improved version of the text.
I’m doing my best to keep my website a single solid piece of work, not some long-forgotten texts of the past that are present here. Following that logic, I may remove some story if I feel it’s out of place and no longer needed.
I do all that without hesitation and notifying anyone, because … well, it’s my website in the first place. And it’s not my job, it’s my hobby. I’m not gathering readership, not entertaining them here (still, I’m doing my best at keeping things interesting to read).
To some degree, looks like I try to follow this Zettelkasten method unintentionally.
I believe that helps me re-visit some old thoughts and think of them again. When I kept my diary in my physical notebooks (meaning, books of paper), I struggled to keep this re-visiting habit. I didn’t want to come back to my notes. In a form of a website, it’s much more interesting.
Magazine#
The practice of making these notes more visually appealing helps too. For that, I add illustrations and featured images to my stories. Expand them and aim at making each post a refined story. I see my blog as a journal, a magazine.
I expect, in a time, it’ll become captivating to explore. And some random visitor would read it as a magazine, lying on their sofa with their iPad Pro 12.9 (or whatever bigger size Apple may come up with in the future). I do exactly that, sometimes I take my iPad Pro, lie on my sofa and take 15 minutes to read some random stories from my own blog.
I hope you’ll like it too. Have a great time here.
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