Writing on Medium

Everybody is Just Winging it Here

You realize that, right?

When I was a school teacher, I’d wait until almost the end of the year to drop this nugget on my students:

“You don’t have to know what you are doing, you just need to make it look like you know what you are doing.”

“I’m giving you pearls here, kids”, I’d say. “Listen up.”

I don’t really know if saying something like that to impressionable teenagers ever did more harm than good. I didn’t mean it in the “fake it til you make it” / bullshit your way through life / get by on your privilege implication. But I wanted them to understand that it was ok to not know everything all the time, that you didn’t have to be perfect, and that sometimes a little bit of confidence in yourself would go a long way since it was impossible to have everything figured out all the time.

But that’s not what this article is about. The preceding paragraph was just a vehicle to make use of that quote and then relate it to writing on Medium.

I want you to know that most people here don’t know what we are doing, as much as we are trying to make it look like we do.

But hang on a minute. Don’t take this in any negative kind of way. I don’t mean it as a slight on anyone who is pouring themself into this. I have nothing but respect for anyone who has the guts to hit the “publish now” button and put themselves out there for all the world to ridicule or admire.

And I certainly don’t mean to say that I have any idea what I am doing.

I don’t.

And that to me, is the greatest part of this endeavor.

To get up in the morning, make coffee, pound out an article, polish it up, hit publish and sit back and watch it get automatically highlighted by your two most faithful and automatic highlighters, and then see what you thought was a can’t miss outpouring of your brilliant mind gain a grand total of 15 views in the next 24 hours and $0.12 in income come trickling your way, well, that takes some serious resolution.

And to do it again the next day, hoping for a different result, now we are in some Einsteinian Theory of Insanity territory.

It’s ok that it flopped. Really.

There are those among us who are better at all this than others. They are called professional writers and (probably) have an income to match this lofty title that has been bestowed upon them. We should read them and listen when they give out tips and pointers.

The rest of us are just putting it out there, doing our best, getting the hang of it, and scratching around in the dark while we try to cobble this into something meaningful and interesting that people will want to read.

Thinking of ideas, coming up with a routine, then changing that routine, feeding titles into the title machine until you get a number that’s good enough, reading others’ work, responding to it, responding to their responses to our work. Clapping, highlighting, checking stats.

And maybe, possibly, hopefully, please God, somehow seeing a few pennies per article float our way. Maybe occasionally, a little bit more.

That’s it. We look at people’s follower count and imagine that it’s so high because they have figured this thing out. And if we keep working at it the way they seem to have, we’ll get there too.

Maybe so. And maybe so.

And that, people, is the beauty of it. You can make this happen. You can turn this into whatever you want. Maybe something. Maybe nothing.

Natasha Nichole Lake wrote recently about sharing “Wisdom for Women in their 30s”. Though I am not a woman nor am I in my 30s, I know Natasha to be a really good writer and so I read the article anyway.

I commented that,

“I think we all could use a bit of realistic advice from time to time. Nobody has it all figured out!”

She responded,

“Nobody has it all figured out.” I feel like this is such an assuring way to help people understand that some of the people who claim to know it all know so little. We’re all winging it!”

And why not? So what if you are? It’s not Instagram — it doesn’t all have to be perfectly staged and curated and full of that “living my best life” bullshit that people used to say but don’t anymore. Most of us can’t possibly know what we are doing yet. Surely, it takes years and I tip my hat to anyone who has had the determination and dedication to put those years into this.

Sometimes an article will take off and ride a lightning bolt for a few days or weeks, without rhyme or reason. I think that’s called luck. Sometimes an article will fall on its face. Or worse, it will get no attention at all. I think that’s called a test of your own fortitude, put there to see if you are really serious about this or not.

Work hard at this, sure. But take it easy on yourself. Fall down, dust yourself off, etc. Remind yourself why you are doing this. If “because it’s fun and fulfilling” isn’t one of the first answers, it might be time for a little chat.

I really do hope that you like what you have just read. If you want unlimited access to thousands of writers, consider a subscription to Medium. It will set you back $5 a month and if you use this link, then I get a slice of that and I pledge that I will get to the necessary 10,000 hours required to be good at something.