Why is Writing so Difficult?

A worthwhile pursuit

There’s no doubt writing is worthwhile. One of my favorite theologians says “I write to think.”. In an article “Pipers Six-Stage Process for Writing Books” Piper explains this about the writing process:

The very act of trying to make something clear brings deeper and clearer insight into the reality. This is why it would be a mistake, a deadly mistake, to wait until you have clarity on everything before you start writing. The sight comes through the writing.

John Piper

In another article by Piper titled “Great Reality Inspires Great Writing” he exhorts writers to “See truly and savor duly the reality you intend to show through writing.” And in that spirit, I would add this to the benefits of writing – that you might seek to see the world around you more clearly, and understand God’s truths more deeply.

But it’s Difficult

Writing is hard. No doubt about it. It’s not only difficult from a technical standpoint, it’s also emotionally difficult. Here I want to explore those difficulties.

It’s emotionally vulnerable

No matter how stoic you are, the second you put a piece of thought into words, you’re allowing other people into your world. You may be blunt, or unabashed. But you’re letting people in. And that can be incredibly scary, especially for those who aren’t confident, blunt and unaffected.

Not only are you letting people in, you’re risking looking like a fool to all of the imaginary or real people you have in your head who may know more, express thought better, or have better insights.

It’s intellectually risky

When I’m talking about writing, I’m using John Piper’s definition in the article mentioned earlier:

By authentic, I mean writing that sincerely intends to carry the mind and heart of the writer, and that aims to communicate some reality that is more than mere self-expression — even if it is fiction or a playful note for your children.

John Piper

And so, when attempting sincerely to communicate some reality, you risk that you may not understand it well enough yourself, or that you may not have adequate words to communicate it to your readers.

Feelings are hard to inspire

I think one of the reasons writing is hard is because it’s hard to inspire someone to feel something. Often the urge to write comes when you have an idea you feel inspired to say something about, and you want to share that inspiration.

Non technical writing is an art form. Art is often about communicating about something you feel. That often comes through communicating a sense of beauty and awe about something beautiful in the world. You highlight the features that led you to feel something. You take some things away; you abstract some things, and other things you magnify. In the end your work of art expresses your perception of something that has inspired you to feel.

When you’re trying to inspire feeling through writing, there’s a whole bunch of context and supporting ideas that need to be expressed. You need to get your reader to a certain level of knowledge about the thing. Even this background is hard to mix right. Not too much, not too little. Narrate the facts as a story that leads your reader to feel.

The problem is that you won’t be done until the writing inspires the same kind of inspiration, wonder, conviction, or whatever feeling you’re feeling about it. That’s what’s important about what we write. And that’s often why we write. Out of passion for something. Because we care.

The problem is that most (non-technical) writing needs both the thought framework – the background and supporting information, and also some prose that leads your reader to feel the same thing. In essence, it’s about communicating. Blend that together with the fact that most of us are way worse at communicating than we think and it’s a recipe for feeling like a failure.

In fact, the better you think you are at communicating, the worse you probably are. We come to the page feeling something, and the first thing that happens is you realize it doesn’t read like you feel. And that’s a hard moment.

In fact, the better you think you are at communicating, the worse you probably are.

Our thoughts seem linear, but writing feels messy

The process of writing for a budding writer often involves a brain dump of all the things they’ve been thinking on a topic, followed up by a few rounds of rearranging, removing, rewording, etc.

The results of the initial brain dump can be very discouraging when the writer sees a messy jumble of points, supporting thoughts, references, etc.

Writing is supposed to take your well formulated thoughts on a topic and reveal their excellencies to the world.

Ha! Turns out our thoughts are not as linear or well formed as we would want.

The initial pride we feel of having something new to say, or something beautiful to point out can be the very point of our literary undoing. It’s just not that clear of a process. It’s messy. It’s subjective. There are a million ways to say things. Often we don’t have the words to fit our thoughts, or the words we thought would fit actually carry a myriad of meanings that could lead your reader down an unintended thought process.

This is especially hard, the more you trend towards a fixed mindset. The idea of a fixed mindset describes the tendency to feel like your skills and capabilities are a finite set of things you have to discover by trying things out. Every failure in a fixed mindset represents a hard pass on that skill. This can be paralyzing. Every attempt at something new can mean a terrifying moment discovering whether or it you’re good at it.

(Side note: you are not fixed! And even if that’s your tendency, you can adopt a growth mindset!)

Thoughts are fleeting

Often writing is about chasing a thought you have on a topic.

One TED speaker talks about “creative genius” as if it’s something that visits you, that you must attend to while it’s there.

Sometimes writing is hard because we have this brilliant thought and we have to hurry and write it out before it’s gone.

Losing a thought before you can write it down is a sad feeling, like waking up from a dream where you unravel the meaning of the universe, but you can’t quite remember what it was.

Writing is a skill worth cultivating

I want to commend you to keep writing. It will come. Keep trying. Keep failing and trying and failing better. Keep asking your family and friends to read your writing. Take their feedback with grace. If you don’t inspire them, or they don’t feel what you feel, keep trying. Keep revising. Keep looking for ways to say things different and better and watch for signs your readers are being inspired.