Writing every day for 365 days, I’ve learned that your first million words are the worst.

Not only I’ve struggled to start, to find the inspiration, to write the right amount of words in the right amount of time, I’ve also felt like I’ve produced the worst quality of my writing.

That happened in two exact moments: at the beginning of my year of writing, and every day, at the beginning of my writing session.

Creativity is a muscle. It needs to get stretched and exercised like any other muscle. Before any creative performance, you should warm up your creativity by writing, in the flow, with no constraints. That will make all the embarrassment, the doubts, the fears, and the insecurities disappear.

It’s difficult to start. After having reached a good writing pace, you can feel your hands on your keyboard becoming fluid. There is less friction, and you start to feel one with the screen. It’s not pixels. It’s your thoughts, visualized.

When you forget about yourself and your inner critic, that is the moment in which real deep thoughts start to form. That is the creative juice you need to collect. From that, you can only improve, refine, rewrite, and elaborate on something worthwhile.

Sometimes you need to scratch your performance. Forget about it; throw it away. Start from scratch. It can only be better.

Put in the repetitions, and your writing will improve.

This is Essay 3 of 30 in the my challenge One Year Writing: 30 Lessons Learned in 30 Days

1. The Journey is the Purpose (16 Nov 2020)
2. Writing is Thinking (17 Nov 2020)
3. Write a Lot to Write Well (18 Nov 2020)
4. Creative Loneliness (19 Nov 2020)
5. Be Less Ambitious, Be More Consistent (20 Nov 2020)
6. Writing builds your networks (21 Nov 2020)
7. Connect ideas now (22 Nov 2020)
8. Writing improves your memory (23 Nov 2020)
9. Writing makes you a better observer (24 Nov 2020)
10. Writing sets the focus on yourself (25 Nov 2020)
11. Dissolve your distractions (26 Nov 2020)
12. Writing reduces your jargon and slang (27 Nov 2020)
13. Walking generates ideas (28 Nov 2020)
14. Writing is like drinking coffee (29 Nov 2020)
15. Creativity makes you happy (30 Nov 2020)
16. Be smart, let it go (1 Dec 2020)
17. Writing is a process (2 Dec 2020)
18. Automate repetitive tasks (3 Dec 2020)
19. Publish text as digital text, not images (4 Dec 2020)
20. Why asking questions? (5 Dec 2020)
21. Facilitate growth by tracking habits (6 Dec 2020)
22. Type more, type faster, type better (7 Dec 2020)
23. Transcribe your thoughts to become an effective communicator (8 Dec 2020)
24. Write daily to become a better manager (9 Dec 2020)
25. Do it small to do it better (10 Dec 2020)
26. Don’t lose your mind. Back it up (11 Dec 2020)
27. Write daily to enhance your reality (12 Dec 2020)
28. If only I could be ten, again (13 Dec 2020)
29. Writing compounds despite everything (14 Dec 2020)
30. The habit of building habits (15 Dec 2020)