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At 8:15 on a Saturday night, I sat down to do today’s lesson. I’ll remind you that this could have been a rest day, but I’m locked in. Sometimes, feel compelled to do things at a certain time because God is trying to deliver a message to you. I’m pretty sure that’s what happened here. This was the first freewriting exercise of this endeavor. Tom spends about 10 minutes or so doling out writing advice before the clock starts, and today’s advice hit hard.

First, he said something along the lines of our brains having infinite content, and what’s responsible for pause or writer’s block is that you’re filtering for quality. There’s for sure a time and place to get rid of shit, but not at the expense of getting ideas out. I mean, you can’t get rid of shit if there’s nothing there. It hit me that this is true for more than just writing. How many times do you filter an idea or a dream or a goal before it’s even had a chance to become anything? It could be a perfectly reasonable thing to want to do, even what you’re supposed to do, but you convince yourself that it’s not possible. Why? If it fails, it fails. Whoop dee damn do. Plenty of things fail. Nobody cares. Don’t get rid of the filtering entirely. Just save it for later.

Secondly, he asked that we take risks during this exercise by not relying on humor. This is certainly something I’ve used as a crutch in real life, much to my detriment. Self-deprecating jokes do nothing but convince people that you believe those things about yourself. I’ve gotten a shit ton better at it, but I still have a ways to go. I need to show up as my full, confident self, no matter who it makes uncomfortable. And I need to embrace feelings that make me uncomfortable. Whether that’s full-blown confidence, sadness, grief, anxiety, whatever. Both in my writing and in life.

I’m very grateful to have gotten this message this evening. I would have heard it whenever I listened to the episode, but who knows if it would have hit the way it did tonight? So enjoy my free writing! Tom encouraged listeners to really lean into being vulnerable because nobody ever has to read it. Little does he know!