Writer's Block and Introspection

I've officially declared myself "blocked" as a writer. Declaring this will hopefully help pull me out of writer's-block-denial-land and help me get back on the path to developing these patterns into a publishable form.  I should say that my editor, Mary O'Brien, has been patient, understanding, and supportive through this process, particularly when I've been slow to respond (or unresponsive) to her inquiries.

I just spent a week offline and on holiday with my wife and children. It was an important and well-timed retreat and an opportunity to reflect on why I'm out of flow. Just before I left, Kevin Taylor, my business partner, handed me The Art of Learning (by Josh Waitzkin) just after he finished reading it. It's full of deep insights on learning and performance. It's also full of compelling auto-biographical stories from the chess champion who was the subject of the book and subsequent movie "Searching for Bobby Fischer", who went on to become a Tai Chi Push Hands world champion. The book is all about mastery, but digs deeper into the mechanics of elite performance and what separates the good from the great from the elite.

Two thoughts keep coming back to me as I read the book.

First, Josh has a lot of time on his hands. To be fair, he has exactly the same amount of time that I do.  He has 24 hours per day, in fact he has less time than I do since I'm older than he is. But when I read about him spending several hours a day refining his forms and literally taking hours to move his arms six inches, I realize that his days have very different structure than mine. I am a husband and father of three who tries to spend quality time with his wife and children every day. I am a software developer, team leader, mentor, and business owner who has projects, customers, teammates, and apprentices who need my time and attention. When I was describing Josh to my wife, I told her to imagine my focus on excellence and multiply it by 10. Despite the demands on my time, I have always carved out time to learn about and improve upon what I am currently focused on. For a long time that was American football, and then it was family systems and narrative therapy, and now it is software craftsmanship. I've also taken diversions into the martial art of Kenpo and explored Texas Hold'em poker. Like Josh, I love to learn, and I agree that it's an art. I appreciate that Josh has been able to structure his life in such a way that he can throw himself so fully into the art of learning and then benefit his readers with what he has discovered. But we all must strike a balance in our lives, and when we sacrifice our responsibilities for the sake of learning and mastery, we have slid into obsession.  That said, if I was neither a husband nor father nor business owner, it would be unlikely that I would be as disciplined as Josh to focus so much of my time on learning.  It's too easy to say, "well, he's a genius" or "he only has to worry about himself", but in reality, there are thousands of Josh's out there who lack the discipline to do what he does.

A second thought keeps coming back to me as Josh touches on the importance of allowing your personality to express itself in your craft. For Josh, this meant he played best when he could create chaos on the chessboard and then thrive in that chaos, just as he did in his normal life. When I read this, it was immediately obvious that over the last few years there has been an aspect of my life that is not congruent with who I am.  This incongruence between the various aspects of my life has caused various problems for me. I'm obviously not going into detail about what the incongruence is, but I feel comfortable writing about the effects of it in my professional life. The effects are simple but powerful: I'm off my game and out of flow. When you wear a lot of hats (father, team leader, consultant, husband, etc.) being out of flow feels exponential, as mistakes in one arena spill over into another, and another, and cascade into a mountain of disappointment. These mistakes can be technical, such as rushing through a software feature and choosing not to write tests for your code, or these mistakes can be relational, such as ignoring a customer's needs and missing out on an opportunity to innovate. Recognizing this incongruence was the first step toward correcting it. It is too easy to focus on the symptoms and problems caused by the incongruence, rather than dig down to the root cause and solve the fundamental problem. For example, if an alcoholic wants to overcome their addiction, they generally can't just focus on drinking less alcohol, they need to address the underlying issues that drove them toward alcohol abuse. Likewise I am in the process of digging deep to address my incongruence and turn things around.

This blog will get back on topic shortly! Please forgive my digression into self-improvement and introspection but it's an important step for me to overcome this blockage.