The sweet agony of writing

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Welcome to WorldWise, a newsletter to help discerning readers get truly global insight where current affairs meet humanity, written by Anita Makri.

This is the twice-monthly Work with the Media edition, with opportunities to develop communication skills and journalism projects.

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Photo by Daniel Álvasd on Unsplash

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It’s all-consuming.

I’ve always been a writer in some form. But before turning more solidly to writing in my professional life, it was less central to my various roles as an editor or environmental health scientist-slash-epidemiologist-slash-risk analyst.

The truth is that editing comes easy. It’s a bit like sculpture to me—usually I can look at a block of words and see pretty quickly where to finesse and chip away. The energy of the work is pretty light.

But writing is different. It consumes me, without fail. It’s almost impossible to bring a solid piece into being without living it, dreaming it, struggling through it. New turns of phrase appear suddenly while I’m on the train, or washing dishes (lockdown version). I agonise over commas and the choice of words and the length of sentences.

Is it the same for you?

Maybe there’s something about the act of bringing something new into being. Maybe it will always be more demanding than the act of abstracting.

There’s no rest until it’s out in the world, the best it can be.