Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Writing

I've been told by people in the past that I write well.  Generally, when one hears this sort of thing they either go one of two ways:
1) Accept the praise, continue writing and assume that because you are an excellent writer (you've got proof!), and believe that every word you put down on paper is pure gold.  There's no shortage of writers like this, a quick google search is all you need to find plety of sub-par bloggers filled with page after page of poor writing with zero-substance.
2) Minimize the praise, continue writing and continue making an honest effort to make your work better.  That is my intention at least in part with this blog.  I've got lots of thoughts, some original, some completely asinine, some are just internal commentaries on other's work.  Most won't see the light of day.  But hopefully for the ones that do, I am hoping it is interesting to at least a few people, and that my quality will increase as time goes on.

Oftentimes I have several lines of thought on one subject, all of equal importance, but all seem to need to come first.  I will often spend a great amount of time attempting to put it in an order that makes sense to the reader and ensuring all the necessary points are made, while simultaneously ensuring that it isn't too drawn out and I exclude anything unnecessary.  I often fail and end up deleting the whole thing.  It happens a lot.

Another thing I often do is to pose hypotheticals, that I have thought on, but haven't fully grokked the full consequences of completing the theoretical line of action.  Seeing it on paper helps show me the weak spots in my argument, and further discussion will fill in any blind spots I may have.  There are many things in life I am quite sure of, and a few things I am still trying to work out.  I may play devil's advocate in my work and it may not be obvious unless it is in direct opposition to previously held sentiments.  In short: nothing can prevent me from contradicting myself in this blog.  I will attempt to abstain from doing so within individual posts.  Feel free to call me on it, just be polite.

Eating and Exercise

I just got done doing something I haven't done in a long time.  I ran 1.5 miles [Edit: 1.73 miles on the Garmin, I just learned].  I've always hated running.  I'm not all that athletic to begin with.  I'm tall and thin, but my legs are kind of short for my height.  Not freakishly short, but short enough that my height doesn't really give me an advantage for speed.  My lung capacity isn't all that great either, despite relatively good health, I have a hard time breathing while running, or swimming, or any other high intensity activity.  So last night when a coworker asked me if I wanted to go running with him today I surprised myself when I agreed to go. 

Why did I agree?  Because I've been itching to go for the last year, I just didn't realize it.  A year and a half ago I started eating Paleo, and it seems every day I have increased vitality, and my body wants to do more and more.  I've slowly built up more and more free weights.  I put in a make-shift pull up bar in the garage.  When I take my son to school and pick him up, we run most of the way.  We chase each other in the park.  The list goes on.  I've more or less unconsciously increased my activity by orders of magnitude since I've started eating better.  I've never said "I'm going to go out and run", it just happens when I'm already out.  Naturally, it's a positive feedback cycle.  Better diet => more vitality => I have more energy to go out and do more => I get the exercise I need => more vitality.