I want to write regularly, but I struggle with it.
James Clear is clear about the key to building lasting habits. It has to start with the identity. Stephen King says identity is not sufficient; you need to show up and write daily. Seth Godin encourages you to publish (blog) daily. And if you ever feel like an impostor with nothing to offer, Austin Kleon tells us to think of ourselves as sceniuses.
I know all of the above, and I still struggle to write. As I stared at the empty screen not sure what to write about, my mind wondered if there was a "Knowing-Doing" gap. I could feel my curiosity build up along with the urge to open another tab and google it. I battled with my identity as a writer for about 90 seconds (it seemed like 10 minutes), before I convinced my writer self that if there is something called the Knowing-Doing gap, I could quickly read up on it, get to the root causes, and just weed them out of my life.
Lo and behold, the Knowing-Doing gap is a well-researched problem. Looking at the number of search results, I am convinced that I must have read the term at some point in my life. There is also a book by the name written by Stanford Professor Jeffrey Pfeffer. I am a fan of Professor Pfeffer's work and have enjoyed reading his books on Power and Leadership. One of the search results points to Professor Pfeffer's article on the Knowing-Doing gap.
I was getting excited to dig into his article, when the writer in me kicked in and reminded me of everything I already knew about writing. Will this article really plug the Knowing-Doing gap or was my google search precisely an example of me widening that gap in my life? I badly wanted to read the article, yet I also wanted to stop being distracted and write. As the battle raged in my head, none other than (Google) AI came to my rescue. The first result on the search result page was the AI overview. I clicked on the Show more button and skimmed the AI overview until I found strategies to close the gap. The very first one was focusing on action. I jumped back to the tab I was writing in and started writing this blog.
I did it - I chose doing over knowing more. Hitting publish now. Professor Pfeffer's article has waited 25 years. It can wait a few more hours for me.