05th Dec 2006
Attention deficits
So I am sitting in this workshop on scholarly writing and writing for grants. What is interesting to me is thinking about writing again like as a student — the things that help us write and how to ease the process. Writing often is a block to me, rather than a tool, as in I focus too much on the results and how well the end piece turns out when what I am really doing is learning a process that extends and enriches my thinking. What this needs is sustained attention and time where I focus only on the writing and the thinking, though, and I am always running short of that. Yet I think I choose to run short of time, sometimes, worried that I can’t write well or what I want to do won’t work, or that I don’t have anything to contribute. It’s easier to focus on the short-term things I can do more easily than the big ambiguous things that put some part of me or my professional life on the line.
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