Why we hate to write

We are born communicating. As babies we cry, laugh and fuss our way through life. As we get older, we learn to use talking and body language to communicate. Then we find out this isn’t good enough, so we must now learn how to listen, read, spell, write and even do our math.

Through this process we find out that life is full of things we must do in order to survive, and eventually thrive.

Let’s face it when it comes to communicating, talking (or if you’re a teenager grunting) is the easiest way to communicate. Speaking is natural. We open our mouth to express ourselves through language, laughter, song and other vocal expressions.

Our mouths are great at multitasking. Think about it, we go out with our favorite people, and then proceed to put food in our mouth and talk at the same time. Now this isn’t so polite in certain cultures, but eating and talking are probably the most enjoyable form of communication.

We all know that writing is downright troublesome. To write we need special devices. We must remember our grammar and syntax. We must use our hands and fingers. We must take time to think, compose, edit and fix our mistakes.

Now after all this, we must get our message out through email, postal services, online submissions, publishers, texting etc.

When compared to talking, writing seems more effort than it’s worth.However when it comes to writing, I think grammar is the largest hurdle to most people.

No one wants to be embarrassed and look the fool. When your sentences are muddled and your grammar is horrible, it doesn’t reflect well on you, or your intellect (this is why most people fear public speaking as well).

Yet in all its complexities, writing has more positive benefits than not.

Why we should do it anyway….

Writing helps us professionally

• It allows us to craft the exact message we want to get out into the world.
• Writing and being published helps establish us as professional in our fields.
• It’s an investment in us and your co-workers. We don’t live in a vacuum, and your success can make provide a beneficial influence on those around you.
• Helps keep us on track, because our minds forget but paper does not.
• It helps identify targets we want to reach, create a detailed plan of action and a means to measure our progress. Like the old saying goes, people don’t plan to fail, they fail to plan.
• Writing is legally binding and is vital to record important events, projects and contracts.

Writing can help our emotions and deal with stress

• It’s a great way to reduce stress and free your mind.
• When we write things down we can stop thinking about all the things you have to do, and spend time focusing on providing solutions and accomplishing what we have to do.
• It’s a simple and non-confrontational way to vent our emotions
• Writing helps connect cause to effect. It allows us to comprehend how various parts of your life interact with each other and why we do what we do.

Writing can help establish and strengthen our relationships

• When we take time to write what we want to say, we don’t have to take back what we didn’t want to say.
• Sometimes, in the beginning, writing someone is easier than meeting them in person.
• Writing is the best way to reach a wider range of people, because our communications can be duplicated we cannot.
• If the relationship relies totally on information, than writing is better because it relies totally on the message and not the messenger.

Writing helps us set and reach goals

• It helps us focus and clarify your wants, dreams and desires.
• Writing our goals is like a written contract with ourselves and provides a means to keep us accountable.
• It helps us work through what’s important, and provides a means of visualizing the things that need to be done in our life. Aristotle once said, Man is a goal setting being, and their life only had meaning if they were reaching out and striving for their goals.

Writing helps us mentally

• It helps us use and exercise parts of our minds that are not stimulated during regular daily life.
• It helps tap into the creative side of your mind allowing us to see solutions, and unique ways of solving problems that the analytical side may not be able to reach.
• Helps us prioritize our values so we can focus on what’s important which helps us develop good decision-making abilities.
• Writing reveals our thinking processes, by giving the clues we need to understand our organizational skills, time management ability, channels of intuition, and our ability to identify and solve problems.
• One of the best ways to expand our mind is to read, but there would be no reading without writing.

Writing helps us live on even after our death

• If there were no writings or records, we would have no history.
• Writing can record our thoughts, feelings and actions and then disseminated them into the generations of others.
• Writing is by far the best way to encapsulate our lives and our message.
• Writing is the record of choice around the world. That is why written wills, contracts, documents and references are legally binding.