Posted in Writing

I'm in a strange place when it comes to typing at the moment. I am currently in the process of learning to do ten-finger typing, and it has gone rather well so far, however there is a small thing that is bothering me a bit about it. There was a small remark in the program when starting it, noting that one shouldn't revert to the old way of typing, even if one needs to type fast for something temporarily, and the problem is I seem to have taken this into heart a bit too much. It's gotten to the point where I think I'm avoiding typing to a certain degree, because I'm worried about making mistakes, and instead resorting to using the mouse for things where I'd previously typed a search.

Now this fear is obviously hampering both my ability to learn and my ability to do things since it takes me longer, yet I persevere, for some to me unknown reason. I still, even while writing this post, am doing my best to keep up with the skills I've learned, taking my time, and thinking the actions through I need to take in order to get my thoughts on paper as it were. It feels really strange, typing in this way, especially since it gives me a heightened awarenes of any mistakes I make, which again isn't exactly motivating.

Despite all of that negativity I've just written, there is also a sense of accomplishment to the whole thing, having taken something new and learned it in a relatively short time, a week or so. I am still far from perfect at it, and make what feels like a ton of mistakes especially when I try to go faster for once, but all of that is part of learning something new, I have to remind myself.

It feels a bit strange, but the biggest change really seems to be the lack of confidence I have in my skills now, that is holding me back from performing better. This lack of confidence however, is a good thing to a certain degree, since by going slowly I am better able to notice when I try to take shortcuts an accidentally revert to my old way of doing things. I then at the same time tend to notice why I shouldn't be doing things the old way, since I spot inefficiencies and conflicts in the way my fingers are moving. I try to correct myself when I notice that, erasing what I've written and writing it again correctly, and that again feels good and like learning is taking place—even if it is a bit annoying since it does hamper my speed even further.

I'm also noticing my strange dependance on glancing at the keyboard, which again makes me slower since it makes me all the more aware of what I'm doing. At the same time, I don't really have problem with writing with my eyes closed and that to a certain degree seems to actually even be easier since I can concentrate on what I'm doing better. Maybe that really is the way for me to learn the best, writing with my eyes closed, though there is only so much I have to say at one time and it tends to get kind of repetitive. So back to practising for me then.

Earlier this year, I stopped my habit of writing something in my diary daily. I'm not quite sure why, it just happened, one day I didn't write anything and the next day just kind of followed from there. It might partially have been just that, missing out on one day leading to a demotivational spiral, where it didn't feel like something I could do or perhaps needed to do. On reflection, I am also noticing a certain trend in the writing I did, where I had kind of hit a pattern of seemingly writing the same thing with different words and not really taking the time to actually reflect and write what was meaningful about that day.

Now, certainly, days that don't necessarily have anything meanginful to them—at least on a personal level—do exist, but the lack of actually having the habit and taking the time to reflect on the day also definitely lead to me not writing about the days that did have something important in them and consequently not reflecting and perhaps remembering that.

I think the more important part might be, rather than forcing myself to write something, anything, to take the time and think if there is anything I would like to write that day if I haven't done so already, or perhaps catching up the following day if anything comes to mind while lying about to sleep. The self-empathy of not punishing myself for missing out on recording something when there isn't anything to record is important, as is I think recording it when it was meaningful to me that day. What's meaningful might change with space and time, but that doesn't lessen its importance in the moment, so thinking about it and actually processing it instead of supressing it is a good start.

So the last week or so—could be longer, could be shorter, it's hard to keep track of time for me—I have actually been writing pretty much on the daily again. There were some difficulties and perhaps more boring entries during the start, though even then I did have thing to record from the previous weeks that I had neglected before so I actually ended up surprising myself with the amount of writing I had to do. It's a strange feeling sometimes, of only actually realizing what I have been thinking about and feeling when I need to put it into words and write it down, since before that time it has merely been an unacknowledged ambigious feeling, the process of writing it down makes it all more concrete. It doesn't always yield all of the answers, but it is a helpful tool on the way there.

I am not quite where I would like to be with the process yet, since it is perhaps too frequent occurrence that I don't yet take the time to do this reflection and end up doing it in bed before sleeping instead, making both falling asleep as well as actually recording it accurately more difficult than it needs to be—I tend to do it the following day so as to not make falling asleep even more difficult—but this is a learning experience for me, and making mistakes and not being perfect from the start are allowed.

It's a curious thing really, since this blog has become sort of another diary for me, chronicling my thoughts and feelings, but due to the different audiences and levels of privacy, the content is quite different. At the same time, despite those differences, both mediums help me process my thoughts and feelings and are a valuable tools in doing so.