From the Hip #1

This begins a new series of posts, which I am dubbing "From the Hip," in which I post something brief on a regular basis—perhaps a few per week, I've yet to officially decide on that. It will be, as the title suggests, shot from the hip—a quick shot of whatever's on my mind, whatever I've been thinking about lately, what I've been trying, what I've been inspired by, questions I have, or answers that I think I've discovered that I will surely realize I was completely wrong about in a few months. It will generally be short, to the point, and without much of a filter. Some days may just be a sentence or two, others may snowball into something much bigger. But the point is, it'll be regular and it'll be from the hip. 

I'm doing this for two reasons:

1) For me. I tend to go through cycles of self-confidence and self-doubt in my own writing. By committing myself to posting something that I am acknowledging and defining up front as short, unfiltered, unrefined, and frequent will "force" me to sludge through my periods of self-doubt and keep producing content, and I recognize the immense importance of that.

2) Also for me. Writing makes me a better person. Writing will make you a better person (so do it, every day). The act of committing a thought to ink (or, in this case, pixels) compels us to think critically about things, to look inward, and to become more comfortable with ourselves. One of the hardest things about writing is looking back at things we wrote a long time ago. It's a snapshot of who we were at the time. Though others may not see it as clearly, between lines of text lie volumes about struggles you faced, doubts you had, triumphs you wanted to parade about, ideas you were focused on, changes you were chasing after; and if you're the type of person who is constantly pursuing positive change in your life (and you should be), looking back at who you were a year ago, two years ago, ten years ago can be hard. It can be downright painful—that red-in-the-face, hot cheeks and clammy hands, "my God, what sort of foolish monster was I?!" feeling of embarrassment. It's almost as bad as looking back at pictures from your freshman year of college when you had braces and grew your hair out and wore a faux-fur-lined denim jacket you bought at the thrift store (no, just me?). But it should really be looked at as a tool and as a privilege, not something painful or embarrassing. A tool to learn from yourself, past and present, to propel you forward faster and with more drive, a tool to learn to be okay with yourself, okay with who you were and who you are (because after all, when you're okay with yourself, looking back at an essay you wrote in high school is hilarious); and a privilege to see how you've grown, how much you've changed, and how much you look forward to changing and growing more. 

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Strong of heart, strong of mind, strong of swole.