My writing

I know that I have written about this before, but I want to include this issue with my series on the challenges of being me. In particular, I am going to discuss my issues with writing.

I went to school. I was trained to hate writing. There. That's it. That's the problem that I wanted to address.

I guess I should elaborate for those who don't understand the implications of hating to write. In many ways, this is the best option to share my thoughts, and there are some things that need to be said. My history with writing means that I will not spend too much time finding the best words. Writability is a higher priority for me than readability. I know my writing isn't the best. If I increased my standards, writing would become too much of a chore, and I would never be able to share anything.

There have been times when I thought that I wrote well enough to make my point just to have my words misinterpreted, and I think it's clear that I don't always interpret words the same way as everyone else. For example, I once quoted an article to point out an issue with wording. It mentioned the constitutionally mandated right to peacefully protest. I had a couple people mention the part about peaceful protests, but nobody else seemed to care about calling it "mandated."

There's another issue that I have mentioned before. If I'm going to force myself to write, I would prefer not to waste my effort on something that you can already read somewhere else. Obviously, this post is an exception. You can read these same concerns elsewhere on my blog. If I agree with enough people, it's likely that someone will have already written about it. This means my blogs are almost exclusively focused on areas in which I disagree with the mainstream.

The topics that I write about can provide people with a skewed perspective of who I am. I have no problems disagreeing with the mainstream, but I don't disagree for the sake of disagreement. I believe in mental independence. If I believe things just to be contrary to the mainstream, that would effectively mean that I am allowing the mainstream to manipulate my views.

What does all of this mean? My writing could convince some people that my views are more anti-mainstream than a unique perspective that I would like to share. My thoughts are much stronger than just, "It's mainstream so it must be wrong." It also means that my views aren't as far out there as they may seem.

The combination of my weak writing and my preferences for topics ensures that very few people will take me seriously. I'm making a lot of mistakes while going against what people want to think. In an era of mindless conformity, I don't think there's any question that anything outside of blind adherence to mainstream mentality has value. Unfortunately, nobody wants to hear or read anything that challenges widely held beliefs, thoughts, and opinions, especially for someone who struggles to write about these unwanted topics in an interesting way.