This will be the last post for a while, besides my weekly investment log, because I am adjusting my writing plan on a monthly basis, and tomorrow will be the start of the next phase. Though I still have no idea what the next phase will be, I have decided to go back to my usual writing place (the WeChat Official Account, written in Chinese) and start a new project which should be designed to be able to last a really long time. And since I don't have much time writing everywhere, this blog will not be prioritized, and will be used according to my reflections on this month's writing.
So, what have I learned from it?
First thing is, and this is quite predictable, that I have overcome my fear of writing to some degree. Yes, I do fear writing, probably less than most but I still fear the moment that I have to sit down and write something which will be seen in public. The fear died down partly because I know only a few people (I don't really know who else apart from a friend of mine) would read my posts and most likely strangers. I never shared it on the Internet, and I find no signs of Blogger promoting posts whatsoever. I want it to be just so, as the title of a music album I like very much, just to "keep it like a secret".
Private writing has never been a problem as long as I am quite sure that no one will see it. I kept a diary for nearly 5 years from high school to college, sometimes the writing of the diary took up 3-4 hours of the day, to the extent that I felt the speed of the recording of my life would never catch up with my actual living. And surprisingly I didn't even think about the danger or the harm such life might do to me. At some point I stopped it completely. Tried several times to pick it up again, failed every time. This time, since the start of year 2026 roughly, I start to keep a diary again, and hopefully will hold on to it all through my life. I changed my way of writing diary completely. Before I would write down even the most trivial thought in my mind, my further thoughts on this thought, and guesses on other people's thoughts, and so on. Now I focus on what's happened, and write down my important thoughts and feelings only.
So much for my private writing. The task of public writing is a whole different thing. It gives me a lot of social pressure, because I'm such an introvert, and also because I value my writing so much, because my writing self is very close to the core of my ego. There is no right or wrong which self you cherish and which not. But there is a particular danger in it, namely the danger of not wanting to change that self of yours, of over-protecting it. Unconsciously, my writings became longer and longer (the longer it goes, the less attentions and attacks it may receive), and my update became slower and slower. Basically I set myself a writing task of, say, 3k words per day, and when I have to do some research on the subject, I let myself read books and converse with ChatGPT for days before I start writing. Up until the task becomes unbearable, I break the circle by starting a new project, just like what I am doing right now.
So what I've been doing is quite simple. I set a task of 500 words per day, no subject restrictions, no comment or feedback pressure, just finish the 500 words and I can walk away and do whatever I want. The only restriction is that, I don't talk about my private life. I assume people would not want to know, although I do have some stories to tell, and I do think I can tell some good stories based on my life, but I shall not indulge myself that way. This blog is supposed to be my "thinking device", similar to what I called my previous writing place my "learning device". I want to see how 500 words each day, without much technical support (like books, papers or ChatGPT) can produce for my understandings of the world. I don't expect it, don't even want it to be 100% correct. It's a training of my thinking, and the material can be any topic in the world, anything that interests me.
Second thing is about the 500 word limit. I used to write 6-10k words (in Chinese, roughly equals 4~7k words in English) a day, if I have nothing else to do that day. 500 is really a simple task for me. I don't feel the pressure to "exhaust" the topic. I can even split the topic into 2-3 posts and dig around it casually. This way I happen to be training my mind to focus on a topic loosely but over a longer period of time. The focus should be like a net cast over as large an area of life as possible, and the net focus per topic would of necessity be thin. How deep you get with such thin focus depends not on your intensity but on your capability of integration of the whole net, which requires that you keep the focus on as many spots on the net as possible, not letting go of these seemingly trivial issues. The connection comes out later, when you think you've forgotten these things totally, and all of a sudden it all comes back and becomes meaningful, understandable to you, together.
Third, writing in English is quite a challenge to me. I have never really tried writing in English, except those fake writings required by the education system. That is to say, I have never seriously tried thinking in English. I read a lot in English, but I tend to translate into Chinese, either in my mind or on the screen, and then understand the Chinese instead of the English. Sometimes I do read and understand in English, but I have never turned these understandings into my own thinking, that is, my own writing. This blog is a whole new experience for me. I know I make a lot of mistakes, be it grammar or lexicon or just some implicit rules of the language, and I know I write less fluently than I do in Chinese, but I am practicing, and that's enough for me for now.
Probably, in the near future, I will be back, with some new insights or prejudices (it really depends on your viewpoint). See you soon!
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