How I Write for Myself Every Day
Writing for yourself every day is like going to the gym for your mind. It’s about showing up, sweating it out, and building a muscle that doesn’t flex immediately but transforms you over time. Here’s the thing: writing every day isn’t about inspiration striking like a bolt of lightning. It’s about discipline, ritual, and occasionally, a fair bit of masochism.
When I wake up, the first thing I grab isn’t my phone. (Okay, sometimes it’s my phone, but only to shut off the alarm.) What I mean is, before I let the chaos of the world invade my head, I carve out time to dump my thoughts onto the page. This isn’t Pulitzer material. Often, it’s a disjointed collection of rants, questions, and what I’d say to the guy who cut me off in traffic yesterday if I had five uninterrupted minutes and zero consequences.
But that’s the point. Writing for yourself isn’t about perfection — it’s about permission. Permission to be messy, honest, and occasionally ridiculous.
Every morning, I ask myself one simple question: What’s rattling around in my brain that needs to come out? Some days, it’s a critique of the latest leadership trend (“Why are we all obsessed with frameworks? Do we even know what that means?”). Other days, it’s a reflection on life — what’s working, what’s not, and what’s making me question my entire existence. And some days, it’s just a list: things I need to do, things I want to do, and things I’ll probably never do but like to imagine I could.
The magic of writing daily isn’t in the output. It’s in the clarity. Writing forces you to confront your own BS. You can’t hide from yourself when it’s all there in black and white. Writing is the mirror that doesn’t lie, the therapist you can’t dodge, and the accountability partner who doesn’t care about your excuses.
I write for myself because it’s the cheapest therapy on the market. It’s a way to process the noise, filter the nonsense, and occasionally stumble upon a nugget of wisdom worth sharing. But let’s not kid ourselves: 90% of what I write will never see the light of day. That’s not the point. The point is to write, not to publish.
When you write every day, you start noticing patterns.
What keeps showing up in your thoughts?
What are you avoiding?
What do you care about enough to rant about for five paragraphs without stopping?
That’s where the gold is.
So, how do you write for yourself every day? You just do it. You lower your expectations, set a timer, and start typing. Write badly. Write brilliantly. Write angrily. Just write.
Because writing for yourself is the ultimate investment. It’s how you figure out who you are, what you think, and where you’re going. And if that’s not worth 15 minutes a day, then what is?
Brian Fink is the author of Talk Tech To Me. He takes on the stress and strain of complex technology concepts and simplifies them for the modern recruiter. Fink’s impassioned wit and humor tackle the highs and lows of technical recruiting with a unique perspective — a perspective intended to help you find, engage, and partner with professionals.
