Seven months ago, I made a commitment to post to this website every weekday for a year. It started with a spur of the moment post at almost midnight on February 1st.

“I’ve been meaning to start a blog for years. F*ck it. Let’s do it.”

That’s the text of the post in its entirety. Short, not so sweet, but a milestone. It was movement, momentum, action.

It was in the following day’s post I admitted I had no plan but that I had only one goal, to keep writing posts for a year.

That commitment was made because I wanted to become a better writer. Expressing oneself in writing, being, I believe, one of two, absolute, fundamental skills that anyone can benefit from improving. The other being expressing oneself verbally. It doesn’t matter what your job is or what you want to do, sharpening those two skills are what will put you ahead.

Posting less frequently would have allowed me to spend longer on each post but it would also have allowed me to spend more time procrastinating. By posting every weekday I’m forced into the act of writing more often. I’m forced to practice more.

Frequent posting brings its own issue. The issue isn’t getting it done. The issue is getting it done right.

Just getting it done poses no benefit. Simply clattering away at a keyboard does not improve anyone’s ability to write. It’s not just writing either, mindlessly working through any task will not bestow improvement.

In order to learn, there needs to be more levels to the process. One has to think through it. Consider angles. Consider options. Consider different ways of writing it. Look for the better way to do something. Make decisions. Make choices.

Banging on the keyboard and hitting publish as soon as possible does nothing to accomplish any of this. There’s no point in simply going through the motions. After all, what’s the point in posting all year and not getting any better?

But, like anyone else, I don’t have all day, so ‘done right’ doesn’t always happen.

Yesterday, I flip-flopped between several possible pieces, including this one. Struggling to get any to a stage where it could be published. After several hours, a new idea for a post popped into my head and I wrote and published that. Did it tick the ‘done right’ box though? I’m unconvinced.

The day before was similar. Again, I fought with several potential pieces. Then one took off and gave me what I needed to write it. I felt I didn’t merely tick the ‘done’ box, but ticked the ‘done right’ box too. I still wrestled with that article and spent too much time on it but it always felt like it was coming together. Even when I had to rewrite half of it. Twice.

Sometimes I hold off on publishing an article. I see potential for it to be better so don’t want to let it go. Those articles tend never to find the light of day.

And there are days where I’ve spent hours working on something worthwhile and before it’s finished time starts to run out. On those occasions there’s little choice but to write something quick to meet the deadline.

So, no it’s not always possible to tick the ‘done right’ box.

But it’s always possible to strive to.