I’m not sure when it started - probably like most bad habits in an early primary grade. I have a somewhat inhibiting fear of writing. I simply just don’t think I’m good at it.
Early on this was fine - I channeled my energy until building. Coding, creating, breaking, just building things was what mattered most to me. Earlier in life I didn’t think you needed to write to create - however, I was entirely wrong. I could be forgiven to think that with the advent of the internet writing would become less crucial. Engineering seemed on the cusp to overtake liberal arts. However, the opposite happened.
It became so easy to communicate we became more governed by good writing. Internal documentation, emails, product plans govern any technical company. As an engineer we spend more time writing up product plans and documentation than we do coding - as a manager this multiplies, as a founder even more. I have confidence in my ability to build products but I don’t have confidence in my ability to tell their story, to build that narrative on paper.
So why am I writing? I’m writing to get over this fear. Julia Cameron talks about it well in the Artist’s Way.
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I’m writing to write - I’m writing because I hope with enough repetition the fear will go away or be numb enough not to notice it. This isn’t my way to pontificate on the internet or write down some novel philosophy - its not for you, its for me.