Merlin Mann tells himself to slow down and pay more attention to his work.
A lot of good bloggers write a post like this. Is it a midlife crisis? No, I’ve done it too, and I’ve barely had a quarterlife. Vimeo founder Jakob Lodwick had one after he got wrapped up in the attention Gawker paid him as a microcelebrity rather than a creator of good things (and as flawed as Jakob may be, he did create the healthiest video sharing community I’ve ever used and so far has signed two very fun bands to his new music startup).
So. Creative people on the web often stop and think “I’m not living up to my potential.” So they write a blog post about it. This is good, this gets a discussion going and it’s a way to articulate thoughts born out of a headswarm of confusion and frustration.
And it should lead to further action. Merlin Mann, of course, is known for turning intentions into plans and actions. He makes his living talking about it. So I hope he keeps his readers updated, because he’s a role model for many of us (especially those who like him are writers without a boss who thus must pay extra attention to the audience feedback loop).
But my strongest reaction is, “Merlin, write a book.” This is what the great writers did with existential angst! They spread it out to a hundred pages and published it. And isn’t a long-form work the logical end of what you wrote here?
Maybe I just want everyone to write books or screenplays because that’s what I want to write. But Merlin seems so primed, so able and so willing that I can’t relax unless I pretend that he’s already working on a philosophical treatise or a heavily themed novella.
Aaaaand now I’ll go write some three-minute comedy sketches for the web. But they’ll be art, I swear.
