After writing yesterday's post, I kept thinking about how I've actually managed to pull fifty posts out of thin air. I thought maybe sharing my workflow might be useful for others, so that's what I'm planning to do here. Note that this works for me, but that doesn't mean it will work for you, or even that it will work for future me! It's just what I'm doing right now.

I've mentioned a couple of times that I carry a little pocket notebook with me everywhere, and whenever I get an idea that seems interesting I jot it down. This notebook is full of post ideas that range from more philosophical things like "why is karma interpersonal", political like "the US is not America", or even silly things like "what kinds of spiderwebs are there". I just write whatever seems interesting at the time: something I have an opinion on, something I'm interested in dissecting, or something I'm just curious about.

Now, you may ask the excellent question of "how do you know when an idea is good, and when it's just an idea". Well, to be honest, I'm not entirely sure. Ideas that end up in that notebook have a je ne sais quoi attached to them, like a feeling of depth or boundlessness. It's hard to describe, and probably not something others should really be paying attention to. I've noticed that the more ideas I jot down, the more I open up to them, and the more that end up making their way up to my conscious level (and I notice).

Usually these ideas bubble up while I'm quietly observing, when my mind is at rest, though sometimes things around me happen that make such an idea pop up. For example, the other day I was talking about jewelry with my wife, and I immediately made the connection that (1) it would be interesting to know the history of jewelry and whether humans have always tended to adorn themselves with trinkets, and (2) I really don't like jewelry, and I'm interested in looking into that and how common it is (in my experience it's not common at all; when I tell people about my aversion they just think I'm crazy). Both of these are subconscious assumptions I've had all my life, and writing a post about them gives me the chance to reevaluate both my thoughts about them as well as my beliefs.

On a normal day, those thoughts might just have popped into my mind as "curiosities", and would've been gone just as fast. Building a habit of taking notes is an excellent way not only to capture these fleeting ideas but also a great motivator to look at the world with a more critical eye. Pay more attention to what's actually there, as you don't know what might spark a connection. I've also found this just plain fun. I like poking at things, especially at myself.

As a rule of thumb, I tend to write down everything that seems at least moderately interesting. It's very easy to think of something and then censor it with "nah, no one would like to read about that". If you catch yourself doing this, then STOP! Don't think about what others will like to read; think about what you would enjoy writing. Aim for things that interest you, that excite you1 in some way. Things that you care about2.

Now. Once you have the ideas, then what? Well, that's a bit harder to explain. At the very beginning, I used to read through my latest notes before sitting down to write, and if any one of them sort of "popped", then I would write about that. But often I just ended up not using any of them because I felt I was just not good enough. Or worse, I would end up using the 5th-best idea for fear of "wasting" the one I liked the most. Thankfully, I now seem to have accepted the fact that one is never at one's peak and should always go for the best idea possible3.

Lately, I've noticed that my "flow" has changed a bit. Now, I still go through the notebook every once in a while, but for the most part what happens is that at some point during the day an idea I know is there just "pops" into my mind, and I know that's the thing I will be writing about that day. Usually it happens in the early morning. I guess it makes sense mechanically; the ideas are there in my subconscious, and one of them always has more "energy" than the others. Since I've made it a habit to go and look for ideas, my mind has, nicely enough, started supplying them for me.

(Today's post was actually picked this way. I just had an inkling that I would be writing about "my workflow", and that's what I'm doing. It also honestly ties in very well with yesterday's post.)

Now, the ideas I pick this way are not always easy to write. Sometimes I find myself struggling with them, clashing against them, but they always end up being pertinent to what's going on around or inside me at the time. They're, in some ways, the thing I need to write about at the given moment.

I think all of this comes as a side effect of the notebook-keeping practice I described. It's like I'm slowly training my mind to do this, and it's becoming good at it. I still see things in my workflow changing mostly every day, from how I approach a new post to trying new brainstorming ideas to trying to find better moments to write, so I'm curious to see how things will evolve in the future. Looking forward to it, in fact 🤗

Footnotes

  1. Another suggestion: if an idea comes to mind but you're ashamed of sharing it, then that's your cue to look deeply at it. Why are you ashamed? What's your relation to it? That in itself would be an excellent post. ↩

  2. To be honest, I would much rather read something that the author really cared about rather than fluff made to cater to the masses. ↩

  3. Also, the best idea for one person or at a given moment might not be the best idea later on, so use them while you have the inspiration, which is, in fact, the hardest thing to come by! Ideas are cheap. You can also come back and revisit an idea in the future, so using it now doesn't really mean you've "wasted it". You're allowed to change your opinions on things, especially so when writing on a blog. ↩