Zen and the Art of Writing Part 6: Three Reasons Why You Don’t Want to Write too Well

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In the midst of North Korea crisis, our Prime minister has decided to dissolve the parliament and called an election.

 

Unbelievable.

 

He thinks he has a chance to win now since opposition parties are not ready. Abe is a typical person who is technique oriented and doesn’t have substance. Even if he managed to win, it is done based on his trick, not because people supported him. And yet, he doesn’t seem to care; he is happy as long as he wins, and it doesn’t matter how he wins.

 

Unfortunately, it is common among many politicians, and the media picks up this element, too; how skillful they are as politicians instead of looking into their visions for the country. Our whole society worships techniques, and I think it is to do with the spread of how to books overemphasizing performances.

 

It is one of the reasons why I would like to rewrite motivational success philosophies.

 

Anyway, let me get back to the topic of writing. I said that you didn’t want to write too well. This is, of course, depends on what you are writing. If you are writing travel essays or memoirs, the readers can appreciate good writing because they are probably reading them with their cup of coffee in a relaxed manner.

 

However, if you are writing a regular blog providing some information, the readers are not necessarily expecting literature, they just want information, and often simple expressions are easier to understand. These days, people don’t have time to enjoy your writing, they read your blog along with many other blogs or Facebook posts.

 

The second reason why you don’t want to write too well is that not every reader can understand your writing when you use difficult words no matter how cool they are.

 

It is said that 80% of the people who use English nowadays are non-native speakers, and for non-native speakers, it is a struggle to read a blog post, if we need to look up 10 words each time.

 

The last reason is that you don’t want to spend too much time writing your blog each day. You have to write it every day or 5 days a week, and you simply lose your life if you are completing a craft each time. The other day I met a craftsman in Kyoto, and he said something interesting. The difference between a craftsman and an artist is that the former has to make tons of products every day, but the latter can complete one piece of artwork per year.

 

For a blogger, the amount counts more than the quality, and a post containing appropriate keywords is considered better than a post containing some stunning expressions.