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The first rule of smart writing is you must recognise what smart writing is. Sounds simple enough but most people fail at this. Lots of smart writers get their good quotes ignored and their tepid quotes celebrated. This lowers everybodyâs standards. Orwell warmed about this
If you want to write well, I think you may need to spend more time identifying good writing than actually writing. At least at the start, but IMO, *always*. You need to develop your aesthetic taste re: what good *is*. No one else can do this for you https://t.co/RF8PfWrvQK
steve jobs said a bunch of really insightful things over the years, but it can be surprisingly tedious to find them because there's so much noise from people over-quoting the inspirational babble. I find myself thinking this a few times a year; probably worth making my own set
Now - the next thing you need to know is that *trying* to make smart writing is often counter-productive. Thereâs probably a simple reason for this. Smart writing often happens by accident when you accidentally take clever shortcuts when youâre focused on getting from A to B
List of egs https://t.co/wgaMk2mk2E
the cool thing about writing is that very often the coolest things you say are not the things you're trying to say, but the things you accidentally-peripherally invent on the fly to support you trying to say the thing you're trying to say in this case, "micro-rigorous" https://t.co/8RKpjrZfJO
So. Once you know what smart writing looks like, forget about it. Forget about trying to look or sound smart. It rarely happens when you want to. It happens peripherally when youâre trying very hard to communicate something else
Which brings us to dumb tweeting! All you have to do is to follow your nose (which hopefully has been honed over time from evaluating everything that comes your way). Thereâs almost always something interesting about everything if you find the right angle on it
The cool thing is, you donât actually need to find the smart angle! Writing is cheap, basically free. Write all the angles. Whatever comes to mind, whatever tickles your fancy. Write stupid, edit smart. By using your own taste to retrospectively identify whatâs good
Crucially- your concept of smart is very much informed by everything youâve already read. If youâre trying too hard to be smart, you will mostly just remix what youâve already read. You have to leave the comfort of smart & enter the frontiers of dumb to create *new* smart things
Ask dumb questions earnestly and chase down all the implications even if it feels stupid. Disregard the impulse to *appear* smart by writing in clichĂŠd tropes that signal status and authority. Everything we retroactively consider genius started out this way
If subsequently you want to dress up your ideas in smart language, go ahead. Sometimes you need to use the kingâs language to argue with the king. But beware falling into the trap of thinking that itâs the kingâs language that makes him smart, or that heâs smart because heâs king
If youâre moderately intelligent and have moderately decent taste, producing a stupidly large quantity of work and applying a modicum of taste when reviewing and editing it will precipitate smart writing. Because you are smarter than you know, or even dare to believe
You can end up producing smart work *entirely* by accident, and still own it because you recognized it. Itâs yours! Thatâs the gift that the creative process just gives you sometimes. You can then study and reverse-engineer this, and wow, you just got smarter as a result
1. Develop your taste 2. Produce a large volume of work, non-judgementally, with the intent of having fun and pursuing your curiosity rather than trying to be smart 3. Edit 2 based on 1 4. Congrats, now people think youâre smart 5. Donât let 4 get to your head!! Repeat 1-2-3
The public is generally really bad at dealing with people who make good work. They pedestalize them, worship them, or demonize them - everything short of engaging thoughtfully with the work. Which brings us back to https://t.co/hIeYVTuxX4
Donât worship people - youâre doing them a disservice, and youâre insulting + hamstringing the process that makes good work. If you *have* to worship something, worship the process https://t.co/g2RdWGFUGZ
Noob-minus: this is the worst thing I have ever read Noob-plus: this is the best thing I have ever read Friends: youâre on to something here! I really liked the part where you talked about X, it made me think about Y. I was kinda hoping for more about Z, but thatâs just my POV
When you worship your heroes, you distract them from the process that enables them to make great work. Encourage the process, participate in the process. Theyâre people too. Every creative mind is always yearning for more good minds to play with https://t.co/cIPxy1wz1s
Letâs circle back and address some FAQs âHow do I develop taste?â Well it shouldnât be something you force yourself to do. What do you already like? What are you already interested in? Explore that with a playful curiosity and ask yourself whatâs good, whatâs not good. Have fun
âHow do I produce a large body of work?â A house is built one brick at a time. Make a brick. Then make another brick. Then another. The secret is that you forget worrying about the house and enjoy making bricks. Itâs fun because you get to exercise and develop your taste
âI want to produce work but something is stopping meâ Itâs usually some form of fear or perfectionism. Your technical skill is not yet good enough to gratify your taste. Let go of the expectation that you have to gratify your taste *today* (or *ever*). Make Crappy Stuff!!
âIâve made a bunch of stuff but I still suckâ This is a feature, not a bug. Welcome to the creative life! Everybody struggled with this. Itâs what made them good. Keep making more stuff. When in doubt make more stuff
âMy stuff has gotten predictable and formulaic and I hate itâ Good! Discard it all! Itâs all tracings in the sand anyway. Find a new game! Watch different movies, travel somewhere different. Find new things and make new things. You have my permission to start all over again
âNothing I do is originalâ Nothing is! Renaissance paintings are bible fanart. The bible itself was probably compiled and remixed from existing stories. Everything has predecessors, everything is a remix. You canât make original things. But you can make interesting things
The iPhone was a remix of the Walkman and the Polaroid. Everything is a remix of other things. Creativity is connecting dots. Find interesting dots and play around with interesting connections https://t.co/DyAEG18GWA
âIâm afraid of being judgedâ Separate the creator-you from your personal identity. You are just the janitor, the custodian of the subconscious genie inside you. You deserve neither credit nor blame for the quality of the work. Your job is just to show up https://t.co/GQjtgRVVFE
I feel like it bears repeating that at the heart of all of this is a sincere love for whatever youâre playing with. If you donât love the work (movies, tweets, whatever) then everything downstream is going to seem off, and you might waste years trying to fix the wrong problem
So far Iâve talked about all of this at the individual level. It gets cooler: A lot of the fun of making stuff is playing with other people. A lot of my personal favorite tweets were written in response to friends mucking around
Nobody gives a shit about my best tweets except me and a small handful of close friends đ but thatâs fine!! If I can only satisfy one person in the world with my work, it has to be me https://t.co/e6nE1J5Yzb
Never be so busy trying to please other people that you forget to gratify yourself. You are the most important person to please with your own work https://t.co/d0HV2PQZFp
threadblogged: https://t.co/KY4QjUfr5I