projects are play
6:25 again on the dot with 🐱. i’m always amazed at how quickly they get into a routine down to the minute. also amazed by their overwhelming existential dread triggered by empty food bowls despite the reliability of those routines.
although when i put it like that, relatable!
/
i’m getting… uncomfortable again with the distance between the topics i write about and the types of projects i like to work on. this is something that starts to feel really sticky every couple of months, but it’s hard for me to articulate –
my writing, learning, all of my ‧₊˚✧ inner world ✧˚₊‧ stuff / expression is very flowery and organic and curious. but i so prefer technical / structural / type-a approaches to almost everything else. the disparity itself isn’t quite what’s bothering me, but that i haven’t found a satisfying link to bridge the forms, functions, and themes i like to work with in both areas.
por qué no los dos? :(
on the one hand, i have these huge, cloudy ideas about identity, the web, time; on the other hand, i enjoy the tedious build-up of a spreadsheet or database over hours, developing some structure or scaffolding where there isn’t any, and i enjoy teaching people how to do the same.
and i suppose it could feel like a break for my brain to go from one to the other, but it doesn’t feel like that, it feels like i’m missing something. and it’s getting worse now that i’m finding it necessary to remove so much structure from my own life. where do all these fun toys fit in if i don’t actually need them? (and, frankly, what do i sell if i don’t think other people need them either?)
is it that i’ve been considering those projects work and my writing play, when it should be the other way around?
maybe they are toys. maybe it is play.
hmmmmmm.
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you know, i was just reading something yesterday – this article by cory doctorow, where he mentions this article by jonathan stray, which i haven’t read in full. stray’s advice for refuting a lie is to affirm, not deny.
“i did not lie” versus “i told the truth”
they’re writing about much, much, much higher stakes stuff, but after reading the quote in doctorow’s article i immediately noticed it in my inner monologue. although i’m speaking kindly to myself, it still feels like i’m denying an accusation – “i am not weak” versus “i am strong”.
maybe that’s a thing i do – focus on the negative space.
ah – affirmations. affirm. i get it now 👍