When we only consume, we borrow other people’s interpretations. We see what they feel, but we never process what we feel. Everything becomes shallow and interchangeable.
Writing forces the opposite. When you sit down to write, you cannot escape your own thinking. You take a fact, turn it around, question it, connect it to your own experience. In that process, feeling attaches to it. That is when it becomes meaningful.
Just a very few classic personal essayists are not only Michel de Montaigne (fromt the 1500's) but also Charles Lamb and William Hazlitt from the 1800's.
Try looking for those authors a little bit on Standard Ebooks but also for low-cost e-book collections for them from Delphi Classics, or perhaps look on the Internet Archive, too.
Your letter brilliantly addresses the info chaos problem. I recently noticed that so many of us are losing our words. I and people around me can be looking at an object or midsentence completely lose the correct word. Even young people, newscasters, politicians and preachers. I know i am aging but this seems wrong. I have been trying to slow down my frantic scrolling for news and entertainment, trying to stop and respond internally. So now i see your solution, the dreaded write an essay.
Can’t agree with this more: “most people walk around with opinions they’ve never thought through. They feel like they believe something, but they’ve never tried to write it down in a way that would survive a smart reader’s scrutiny.” They hide behind the wall of illusion and hope that people would assume that they have something insightful to say. But anything that can be proven without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence. What can only be safely said is that they have nothing to say.
Just coming across the term, “The meaning economy”. Knowing how much I document my thoughts in pages of stacks of notebooks in my mid 20s, I’m in my mid 30s and I struggle to write consistently.
Dan, thanks to you, I finally decided to start a Substack! Still just a few months in, but I started it. The whole thing is incredibly interesting, informative and enjoyable.
Thank you for this! What a marvelous essay. I am a writer. Yeah, yeah, they all say that. However, I am, do......... in fact Penguin House approached me a few days ago. Wonderful discussion. My book had been referred to her, she set me up with a marvelous agent. Good reviews in GOODREADS, could have come from there. Anyway, I write and it's good, so many have said. They want to polish it. I fear I declined because I want the flaws and textures to be mine, not automated or programmed. I am approached constantly with AI marketplace offers to push my book into the midst of madness. So I love your essay on keeping on keeping on for me. Hey! I'm 81 years old and need to finish my I CHING interpretation. I cannot backtrack, I need to hail the future! Thanks again and keep up YOUR essays. They obviously strike those interested in self-knowledge and might just strike cords in the Zs coming up. Sheesh. What a lot!
Really enjoyed this essay, thank you!
I hadn't heard the term 'meaning economy' before, it's quite thought-provoking.
My newsletter, The Meaning Map, consists of essays about meaning. So, maybe I've accidentally positioned myself well for the new economy?
Feeling gives meaning to the facts.
When we only consume, we borrow other people’s interpretations. We see what they feel, but we never process what we feel. Everything becomes shallow and interchangeable.
Writing forces the opposite. When you sit down to write, you cannot escape your own thinking. You take a fact, turn it around, question it, connect it to your own experience. In that process, feeling attaches to it. That is when it becomes meaningful.
been thinking a lot about how to not become stupid in the AI era. Writing was one of the ways. This is gold.
No begging needed, Dan! I’ll write ✍️—otherwise, a neuron in my brain keels over.
Maybe we should start reading more essays first, Dan.
Essayist recommendations:
Just a very few classic personal essayists are not only Michel de Montaigne (fromt the 1500's) but also Charles Lamb and William Hazlitt from the 1800's.
Try looking for those authors a little bit on Standard Ebooks but also for low-cost e-book collections for them from Delphi Classics, or perhaps look on the Internet Archive, too.
Your letter brilliantly addresses the info chaos problem. I recently noticed that so many of us are losing our words. I and people around me can be looking at an object or midsentence completely lose the correct word. Even young people, newscasters, politicians and preachers. I know i am aging but this seems wrong. I have been trying to slow down my frantic scrolling for news and entertainment, trying to stop and respond internally. So now i see your solution, the dreaded write an essay.
Can’t agree with this more: “most people walk around with opinions they’ve never thought through. They feel like they believe something, but they’ve never tried to write it down in a way that would survive a smart reader’s scrutiny.” They hide behind the wall of illusion and hope that people would assume that they have something insightful to say. But anything that can be proven without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence. What can only be safely said is that they have nothing to say.
Just coming across the term, “The meaning economy”. Knowing how much I document my thoughts in pages of stacks of notebooks in my mid 20s, I’m in my mid 30s and I struggle to write consistently.
I guess I just have to restart.
Loved this!!! Best thing I’ve read in a long time.
Dan, thanks to you, I finally decided to start a Substack! Still just a few months in, but I started it. The whole thing is incredibly interesting, informative and enjoyable.
…now for 50k more followers…
Impeccably timed inspiration thank you.
@michael dean has a great Essay Architecture Substack for it.
Thank you for this! What a marvelous essay. I am a writer. Yeah, yeah, they all say that. However, I am, do......... in fact Penguin House approached me a few days ago. Wonderful discussion. My book had been referred to her, she set me up with a marvelous agent. Good reviews in GOODREADS, could have come from there. Anyway, I write and it's good, so many have said. They want to polish it. I fear I declined because I want the flaws and textures to be mine, not automated or programmed. I am approached constantly with AI marketplace offers to push my book into the midst of madness. So I love your essay on keeping on keeping on for me. Hey! I'm 81 years old and need to finish my I CHING interpretation. I cannot backtrack, I need to hail the future! Thanks again and keep up YOUR essays. They obviously strike those interested in self-knowledge and might just strike cords in the Zs coming up. Sheesh. What a lot!
I'd also add that a lot of people would refer to the kind of essays that Dan Coe recommends to us all as "personal essays."
You can feel this, too.
If you use A.I. too much, you feel your mind getting lazy (or dumber).
But reading, thinking and writing is hard. And that’s why it’s good. It’s probably also necessary to keep our minds sharp as we age.
Excellent essay :)