Blog #1 Shitty First Drafts

Before writing this sentence, I typed and deleted different phrases about 10 times. I felt like I needed to have a flawless start to my first blog post to make Mat proud. However, I soon realized that I was working completely opposite to everything that I had literally just read two minutes earlier. Instead of letting my thoughts just flow onto paper, I was trying to write something that I would never have to edit or look at again. It was entirely counterproductive, and I thought to myself, “What am I doing wrong?” A few seconds later I realized I was going through the EXACT situation that I had just read about in Lamott’s excerpt. And now I’m here, at this sentence. And getting to this point (just writing what I’m thinking) has taken a fraction of the time that I was spending trying to craft the perfect introductory sentence.

And now I’m stuck again.200-500 words isn’t long at all, right? But now my mind has gone off track. I’m thinking more about how much I have to write instead of just writing. Which once again, is completely counterproductive. So it’s time to focus. But I can’t focus too hard, because then I’ll over think and never finish a sentence.

Now that I’m just focused enough, I’m going to start typing things that pop into my mind related to the article (in a fairly disorganized and incoherent way).

It seems like Lamott’s process of writing is extremely hectic, which in many ways scares me but in other ways excites me. I typically think in a very structured and safe manner, so trying to push myself to be spontaneously expressive and creative is a challenge. Even writing the above section of this blog post was nerve wracking because I’m not really sure whether the class will love it or hate it. After all, part of what Lamott said was that a writer should not be afraid of their first draft because nobody will see it. But this is my first draft, and my English professor is going to see it, and so will my class, because I’m not going to edit it. I guess all of this can be summarized into me saying that I think it’s okay to take the risk. The first draft is supposed to be a mess, and if I’m going to accurately explain what I’m thinking about after reading “Shitty First Drafts,” I might as well keep my response as a first draft itself. So here it is, please forgive the confusing structure and lack of sophisticated grammar. After all, this is my shitty first draft.