Writing as a form of therapy, I tried it. Therapy sounds a bit serious, though. It’s more a ritual that helps me to bring order into my thoughts. A sort of morning ritual, but one that is different from meditating or doing sports. I read interisting ideas about writing from authors like Julia Cameron or Doris Dörrie. The latter is a german script writer, and I like one approach she suggested. I’m applying it while I’m writing this. It says that you just write for 10 minutes without thinking too much. Because we all have this habit to create something perfect, and especially when writing, this can get in the way. I find it fascinating that every human has their very own perception of the world. That means that everyone is carrying unique stories with them, which are worthwhile to be told. It doesn’t matter what you do. Even everyday life things can have many interesting aspects. You just have to start and write without thinking too much.
Now, what about this Ken platform here, that my friend Michael founded? I find the description “a place to express, not impress” sums it up very well. And it’s suitable for the form of writing I was describing above.
One question that I asked myself though was if I actually want to publish my writing. Because I don’t want to think about things like: Who will read this, and what will the internet do with my thoughts? But then I thought about social media platforms. Why do I post on Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook etc.? I have to say though, that I don’t post a lot on those platforms, because I’m a bit afraid of it. I always think way too much about what somebody else will think about what I said. I have this belief that humility is an important value, but at the same time I have the need to express myself. I want to find interesting topics when I talk with other people. Often people will reference something that I posted on the internet, but if I don’t post anything it may be hard for them to find topics to talk about with me. And I will find less people with whom I can talk about things that I care about and that I’m thinking about a lot. That’s why I sometimes think I should post more often. Also from a professional point of view, since I’m working in advertisement and entertainment. Helping other people to position themselves is easier for me than position myself.
Well that was a bit far-fetched, but that’s always the case when you just start writing, I guess. And I can always shorten things afterwards. Maybe Ken can be a place where I drop my thoughts. I could just write about topics that are on my mind regularly. I could see a story on Ken like an Instagram post, just with more depth to it. So that I can later talk with people about it. Because what I value the most are conversations that go deep, about topics that I have thoroughly thought about, and also took the time to write something about. Maybe Ken could be a more thoughtful social media platform. A place where you can share your views with people and allow them to talk about things that are much deeper than usual social media smalltalk. Maybe you even get to know people who are similar to yourself.
Okay, that was my first attempt at writing a post here. And I wrote it within 10 minutes, and I’m already thinking about what to write next… Maybe I will do this more often…
On Ken, we're trying to figure out how the world works — through written conversations with depth and substance.
