Q:
Dear Cosmic Al,
There is a growing voice in my head that says this - writing this blog, rattling on about my own thoughts and feelings - is a dumb waste of time.
I hear this voice when I see this blog through the eyes of someone else. A reader. At that point, a visceral hate fills me, a judgement of “god, listen to this privileged asshat complaining about his problems, yet another Medium article writing self-help brand building yahoo with little to nothing of substance or insight to add into our already bloated, dying landscape of internet writings. yuck, yuck, and more yuck.”
I didn’t feel this voice last week when I was writing this thing solely for myself, not yet sharing it with anyone. Only once I began to share the blog with others did this voice emerge. Because then the possibility of someone seeing this and thinking it sucks is real, it is more 0% possible, it can be true which means it is TRUE.
So I guess my question is - how do I quiet that voice, or at least prevent it from sabotaging this entire enterprise which, overall, I do find fulfilling and fun? And which could, theoretically, be of interest to others as well?
-Alex
A:
Dear Alex,
First off, I dig this whole Q&A format thing. All the therapists in your life would be proud. That's where this idea first came from, remember? In therapy with Kim, you'd ask "what would Cosmic Al" say about this, and then you'd invite me into the room and I would drop humble wisdom, truth and understanding when you weren't able to. It was a great time had by all. And now you're employing that same technique here to help you work through your own fears. Big ups.
Honestly dude, this one is fairly easy for me. You keep doing the work. Keep writing. And divorce yourself from the outcome, the feedback, the response. That is not the point. It is not your responsibility and it is definitely not anything that you can control. If not divorce, at least set boundaries. Have your space. Eat it too.
You are in charge of this part, the writing, the creating, and the sharing. But that is where your work stops, where you let go of any control you have and move onto the next thing you want to do, write, say, eat, etc. I would eat soon though, cause I can feel you getting hungry and that makes me a little worried. Not that I get worried, I don't. I'm Cosmic Al, cool as a cucumber on Christmas:
Now, before we wrap this up, there is one additional point to make and explore: this voice in your head, the one through whom you experience this blog, he is a son of a bitch and needs to be addressed.
I know this voice well. It is your voice of judgement. Let us call him Judd. Judd is an amalgamation of all of the worst things you've heard or seen said about people, the critic of critics, the doubter of doubters, the one who can and will find fault in every single thing that you do. Judd is not a happy man, his mutated joy a byproduct of his ability to put others and their work down. He can point out the flaws of all things and he will do so because it provides him with the false
Ready for the twist ending which honestly I don't think is even that big of a twist? You are Judd.
Just as you are Cosmic Al, you have Judd inside you, and he flares up when you enter the state of vulnerability that comes part and parcel with sharing stuff from your own mind and soul to the world.
How about my use of 'part and parcel' in that last sentence? Sorta dope, I'd say.
This is not a bad thing. This is a simple, true thing. There is judgement and there is joy and they are, wait for it, BOTH TRUE.
Both. Are. True.
That's why you named this thing that, right? There are two truths that exist at once, in fact there are probably more like 100 truths that are true and none refute the others. They are not, in the words of someone else who likes math more than I do, mutually exclusive. They are mutually inclusive, which I hope is a term.
Now, here's where we close. Having confirmed that you have many voices who dwell inside your skullspace, note that you do have agency when it comes to which you pay attention to, which you feed, and why? I would posit that spending most of your free time inside of the internet's rabbit holes - Reddit, Digg, etc. with brazen abandon is a surefire way to feed your Judd and not much else. Because the internet is full of Judd's, judging everything in sight. It is also full of joy and love and story, the stuff that you love and that I love and that I am sure Judd loves too, but it's not a default for you.
In other words, feed the right voices, and you will have less of the ones who suck. Though Judd is a GREAT pal of yours who I know helps you when it comes to being critical as a way of making your work better, perhaps he does not need to be around nearly as much or as prominently as he is right now.
God, I know Judd is going to read this and hate me for it, but that's okay, I can handle it. I'm sure I'll run into him at one of these holiday parties coming up, so I'll talk him down there.
Till then, Alex, be good to yourself. I love ya.
-Cosmic Al
COSMIC