You do not know where to start because you are overthinking. Thinking paralyzes you. It is the writer’s dilemma: Your job is to think (a lot) in order to write magnificent pieces but not not end up in a thinking loop that cripples you which is why you do not even start writing.
You are thinking too big. In your mental world you are already in a place where it will take months and years for reality to catch up. This discourages you — but you have only fantasized and not written even a single word.
Keep the big picture in you head, but start small. You do not run 0 to 100 meters in no time. The same goes for writing. I will show you to start at point 0 (with no word written) to point 100 (with providing full value). This is an easy process that I call CIKE (pronounced as „psych“ in psychic).
Although it can seem hard for you to know what to write about (longing to express yourself), knowing it is key. With nothing to write about you have nothing to say. Really? I show you how you always will have something to write about and provide the best value you can.
Overcome writer’s block with CIKE, your psychic side-kick
If you want to overcome your writer’s block start sharing everything you know and provide 100 % value by using the four essential elements of value creation:
- Curiosity
- Interest
- Knowledge
- Experience
= CIKE.
When you have curiosity + interest + knowledge + experience, you can talk about a topic. Ok, you can talk/write about anything at any stage but if you want to provide full value from the beginning on „CIKE“ will make sure you do.
You are open and willing to receive: Curiosity
In order to know what to write about you need the willingness to learn about something (anything). This is the absolute basis. If you do not have the general drive to add a new thing to your pool of wisdom, stop reading. This text is not for you then. Bye bye.
If you, however, like the challenge and pain of going through the learning process, welcome to Creation Culture Land™.
Curiosity is the first step. As a child you are curious, as an adult less. You abandoned curiosity because you are a grown-up. I am talking about Average Joe who has an average life with an average job, a marriage with Average Joelina, an average income and average excitement. His adult life has become dull. Even if your life has become boring for you, you can keep your child-like curiosity — it is an asset and a super power. In your leisure time do not binge-watch, do not follow your “old man’s routine“.
Turn your leisure time into an playful space in which you create excitement for the little sensations — every day. At first, this will feel artificial to play like a child. It will feel foreign to you.
It is as if you started smiling into the mirror in the morning (which I recommend as part of your morning routine to start with a positive attitude and aura) although you only knew yourself as „Mr. serious poker-face guy“ who is too cool to smile. When you still have curiosity, good for you. There is nothing you need to do. Continue with step 2.
You pay focussed attention to a particular thing: Interest
Interest is the second step. You have an affection for let us say clothes. You like to dress well because it feels good and you can invent yourself by wearing different clothes. Now you heard you can make clothes yourself. Well, you knew it before but now you saw someone or met someone who is doing clothes. You can meet him (even if online). He is your informal teacher, you are the student.
In the hard times when what you learned frustrates you and you are likely to give up, curiosity will be your safety net. The more you nourished your child-like curiosity and the more intrigued you are by that thing (interest), the easier you will be able to handle a failure in your learning process. This brings us to step 3.
See the strings behind holding it all together: Knowledge
When you are curios, interested and knowledgeable about the theory of things you have a foundation. You studied a topic and eventually wrote about it so it can serve as a mirror that reflects your theoretical knowledge: either for yourself, your teacher or learning diary/blog). Knowledge is, however, only one half of the medal.
Practice first-hand and hands-on: Experience
No theory without practice (step 4). If you are curious and interested in a topic you bought the material but there is no dress yet. When you have the theoretical knowledge you have drawings of the dress on paper and maybe some miniature version of it. Heck, with your theoretical knowledge you could have a conceptual prototype of the dress but no finished dress yet.
With experience (learning by doing) you get in touch with the material, the existing tools and processes. After dedicated time of deliberate practice you will come up with your own tools and processes because your own style will evolve. You will naturally develop your way of doing things.
The fifth element
During my research I thought of earth, water, air and fire that are considered the four essentials explaining the complexity of nature and matter, as developed in ancient cultures. I believe with curiosity, interest, knowledge and experience (CIKE) you have similarly important essentials — but in the context of creating value.
I hear you saying:
Analogies to nature are nice, but cut the crap. What is this fifth element?
Aether, that is also considered the „void“, or called „quintessence“, a „material that fills the region of the universe above the terrestrial sphere“.
If you consider the nothing a thing then you need to consider your not created value a thing and your existing value a thing. I was thinking how to name this thing properly and I found out that „yesno“ or simply a „bit“ would be appropriate.
So, you have two things:
- Created value
- Non-created value
Your value is either there or not. The yesno exists when you have not created anything because it serves as the quintessence for CIKE. The yesno also exists when you have created something through the CIKE process. The yesno is always there, only its status changes.
That is a big mind shift because saying „there is nothing out there“ is no longer true: Before a (value) creation there is already the yesno outside. Its state is just „no“.
PS: I hope you do not mind I did not use the four classic elements as you may have thought I would. It was a good headline though.
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This was episode 23 of the #weekendpunchline 👊. Every Saturday and Sunday.
Also published on Medium.