Brian Willis

Cringe

The problem with any kind of creative work is that the only way to get better at it is with repeated practice. I want to become a better writer (among other things) so that means I’ve got to write, but that raises a problem for my future self.

I’ve been reading through some of the stuff I wrote a decade ago for various classes at school, and the thing that sticks out most is how totally oblivious I was about how bad I was at writing. Some of those essays are just god-awful. They’re riddled with quirky uses of grammar, badly constructed sentences, and half-baked ideas.

All of this has got me worrying. Some day, I’m going to look back at this early stuff and I’m going to react in the same way that I do now to my high school essays. I’ll roll my eyes at the thoughtless mistakes that seem obvious with hindsight. I’ll wonder what on Earth I was thinking when I wrote up that personal anecdote that really shouldn’t have been shared with the world. I’ll cringe at the mistakes I’m making right now without even noticing.

So to future me, I apologise.