I discovered that, as I was writing yesterday’s post, two main imaginary barriers kept me from wanting to publish it in the first place:

First, I didn’t get to say everything I wanted to say. Some pertinent details include my working full time at Lifehacker, being honest about the shame I experienced working as a content marketer (shilling, feeling like a hack, like I wasn’t a “real” writer), as well as other dreams of mine that, I felt, doubling down on writing would require me to let go of. Without discussing those things, the piece felt incomplete. And yet, it was scheduled to go live and it did, so the first version is complete in its own first version way. Now it exists on the internet for you to read. In the next edit, I plan on updating the draft to include more of that context. I didn’t say everything this time around, but I said enough.

Second, because it took so much energy for me to write and it felt so personal to me, I felt a reflex to make a frontlist moment out of it. In other words, it was worth promoting, more clearly editing, and putting more energy into in an infinite number of ways. I still think there is something to this; I lived an interesting life in my 20s, and it’s worth crafting into at least a short book.*

When I write about preciousness, these are the types of imaginary barriers I’m describing.

Still, while the piece may not have met my expectations, it’s at least in the same neighborhood. I feel a modicum of pride that I finally published the piece, and that I found a way to work on it. I couldn’t have done a post like this just a few years ago; in fact, as I mention in the afterword, I had an outline somewhere in my docs with exactly the same sequence.

This time, I largely wrote it in my spare time—a few 30 minute chunks, and several 10 minute rounds of polish—over the course of three days or so. I didn’t consciously adjust my schedule to accommodate this piece. After each session, my brain kept coming up with new things to add or rephrase. It felt, to a small degree, like writing a book. Where my usual blog posts feel light, this one felt moderately heavy.

*That’s all good and well, but can you imagine if you asked a writer, who just worked overtime, to work even more overtime to promote their work the same day? They would not be happy, and I want to be happy. I have new posts to write, like this one you just read.