Lookym

It’s very easy to start writing. All you need is to decide — enough, it’s time — and begin.

It’s easy to imagine yourself in something wildly stylish, typing away on a laptop by the window. And once your latest masterpiece is done, you meet your friends at a café on the corner, then go off to buy your hundredth — anniversary — pair of shoes. Over coffee, one of your friends suddenly suggests flying to Abu Dhabi, and of course, for a writer it’s the easiest thing in the world to say yes — you can write anywhere…

Want to know how it actually is? Maybe you’ll have the window, the friends, the laptop. But in reality, you’ll only have time for the laptop. Because writing isn’t just sitting down to write — it’s sitting there, sifting through all the reasons why you’re worthless and incapable. Trying to cancel everything, get sick, postpone it.

Only after you fully grasp the depth of inevitability do you sit in front of the blank page and realize: you’re afraid. Afraid of that blinking cursor. Afraid of repeating yourself, of not being good enough, not interesting, not needed. Afraid of clichés, of writing without inspiration, without a big idea, in a style that feels too light.

And then, eventually, you type a couple of sentences, promising yourself you’ll faint if anything goes wrong. It will. Perfectionists don’t have a paradise — only the endless road toward its mirage, in worn-out, anxiety-beaten sandals.

Very often, a person who writes needs support. Many people forget how to believe in themselves, because those closest to them (or their own inner voice) raise skeptical eyebrows and throw out rhetorical questions — why do you need this, nothing will come of it, you should get a proper job instead. But what really needs to be said is simple: you have to try. Even if it doesn’t work, you still have to try.

And here’s the strange thing — it works both ways: when someone believes in you, you begin to believe in yourself.

That’s why Hard one to Write! is the best book on writing I’ve come across. It’s honest, deeply friendly, genuinely useful, and inspiring.

It’s full of great exercises and examples that remind you your first draft should be bad — even if you’re Tolstoy.

I think a lot of people have been missing a book like this — creative ones, observant ones, those who invent, doubt, fear, type and delete, dream… sitting by the window with a laptop.