Brilliant article, Alvaro. It reinforces a lot that I've learned over the decades. Writing for a newspaper forces a writer to "rite tite" (as my editor would say) and adhere to a deadline. Deadlines became my guidepost. When taking childhood development classes, we were told to put preschool activities on a tray. It gives the child a limited space in which to paint, draw, or even play with blocks, clay, etc. I use that with my grandson and it focuses his high energy. For substack, I set the goal of a long piece and a poem or flash fiction per week with an occasional Saturday Special. Speaking of flash fiction. Sharron Bassano inspired me to write, as she does often, stories with only 50 or 100 words. It's a blast!
Hi Sue! I see that you have already experimented quite a bit with this topic. It is very interesting to see how, although it may seem paradoxical, creativity is enhanced when we add certain limitations.
When we have too many options, it's hard to focus. I've experienced this when writing on Substack, just like you. I like to sit down and write with some restrictions, it makes me lose my fear of the blank page :)
Hi David, this is an idea I first saw in economics. The law of diminishing returns. At a certain point, trying to perfect your work becomes too time-consuming and resource-intensive. It's easy to achieve an excellent result, but practically impossible to achieve a perfect result. You have to be aware of that.
Brilliant article, Alvaro. It reinforces a lot that I've learned over the decades. Writing for a newspaper forces a writer to "rite tite" (as my editor would say) and adhere to a deadline. Deadlines became my guidepost. When taking childhood development classes, we were told to put preschool activities on a tray. It gives the child a limited space in which to paint, draw, or even play with blocks, clay, etc. I use that with my grandson and it focuses his high energy. For substack, I set the goal of a long piece and a poem or flash fiction per week with an occasional Saturday Special. Speaking of flash fiction. Sharron Bassano inspired me to write, as she does often, stories with only 50 or 100 words. It's a blast!
Hi Sue! I see that you have already experimented quite a bit with this topic. It is very interesting to see how, although it may seem paradoxical, creativity is enhanced when we add certain limitations.
When we have too many options, it's hard to focus. I've experienced this when writing on Substack, just like you. I like to sit down and write with some restrictions, it makes me lose my fear of the blank page :)
This article and the previous one on too many options go hand-in-hand.
You are right!
Great points. Perfection is the enemy of good!
Hi David, this is an idea I first saw in economics. The law of diminishing returns. At a certain point, trying to perfect your work becomes too time-consuming and resource-intensive. It's easy to achieve an excellent result, but practically impossible to achieve a perfect result. You have to be aware of that.
It’s why I try to limit how many edits I do on a post. Economics, exactly. We need to be economical. I like it.