Tag: achievements

What makes a good writer?

Posted on by philipdodson

Well, that is of course, subjective and all an opinion. There are no good or bad writers as with anything else in life. It is only our mind, or the collective mind, that makes anything good or bad.

However, like all things that we do, the more we do it, the more we get even better at it. That does not mean that each time we write it will be utterly amazing, more often, it will not be that great. That is the point though, we have to do some less than brilliant work in order to hone our skills and get to the work that is the best we can do. 

If we think about what to write then it does not come from our true essence, not from our heart and soul, but from the mind. We start to guess what others might like to read…an act of complete futility, no one can guess what others want, they often do not even know themselves. As Henry Ford famously said, “if I’d asked my customers what they had wanted they would have said ‘faster horses'”.

Therefore, the way to get better at writing is to keep writing no matter what, to keep putting the words down and to just let the words flow and not think it but do it. That means that eventually, the best words will come from the authentic you.

Just keep writing and writing and writing. Much of it will never be shared but the very best will be and that is how we become better writers.

Write for you not them.

The excuse factory

Posted on by philipdodson

There are 3 steps to starting anything in life…1,2,3 GO!

Or we can, of course, complicate it, the mind is a top-level specialist at over-complication, along with perfection, it is one of its top weapons to prevent showing up and taking any risk. It is the excuse factory that will create reasons not to do something, the more levels of complication, the more thought and the more reasons to put off.

Simple small steps are easy, we can just start them…1,2,3 go.

If we break down any goal, plan, task, or action into small baby steps, that if done and repeated frequently, will over a given time period propel us to our goals.

As we are doing the tiny steps, the mind is silent as there is no perceived risk, it goes under the ‘fear’ radar undetected, and we get to our goals because guess what? we are actually doing something regularly. The journey of a thousand miles starts with just one step…as the saying goes.

It requires focus, commitment and a willingness to build a habit and, of course, patience. Like all things, when we do them frequently, they become easier and there is a compound effect that we see much greater achievement than we imagined if we do them often enough and for a long enough time.

Short-term quick ‘wins’ that require huge amounts of effort and overcoming the fear of starting mammoth tasks, always fail as we never get out of the starting blocks. There are no shortcuts and the mind’s psychological fears of any large daunting tasks are impossible to overcome without just focusing on the small step that can be done now.

Keep things simple, do them often, stay focussed in the moment that is now and don’t think beyond that. The excuse factory can be closed forever, it just takes one small step.