Wayne Moses Burke

I’ve been having a hard time recently, but I think I’ve figured it out.

I’ve been having a terrible case of writer’s block, and even research block, to coin a term, and I think it’s due to the nature of the subject that I’m working on. As I referred to in a previous post, I feel like this project is moving a feeling that I’ve always carried, forwards towards fruition.

I don’t really know what that means. I mean, I understand the words, but how is this going to come about? How is this notion that I’ve carried, bolstered by knowledge and experience, actually going to get tied down to reality? How is it going to play out? How am I going to make a living while doing it? In the more immediate term, how am I going to write about it convincingly to make it understandable and consequently viable?

I have the research skills. I’ve done rather well in that department, if you judge by the responses from professors. I’ve built tools and knowledge and the abilities to find, gather, assimilate, and re-present data in a cohesive way.

I have the idea. I have the theory. I have the background understanding. I’m not just making it up as I go along. I can see it as reality in the future, but I can’t  quite make out how to get from here to there. But that’s the problem I’m working on, so that’s not really a surprise.

I have a great team that I’m working with. I mean, you can always FIND things to bitch about if you’re looking, but at the end of the day, we all get it, and we all want it to be right. Even more so, we all demand that it be right.

So what’s the problem, you may ask (for I am)? I think the problem is me. Not the totality of me, but certainly from within me. Perhaps fear is the right word. Fear of doing. Fear of being out there. Fear of having my innermost thoughts, ideas, and viewpoints scrutinized. It is certainly easier to criticize than to do, and if I never do, I don’t have to worry about being criticized.

Well, this must certainly be amongst the oldest and lamest reasons for stagnation in human history. Simultaneously, I would have said that it really doesn’t seem like me. I’ve never much concerned myself with what other people thought, quite the opposite in fact. Peer pressure always worked on me in the opposite fashion: “so this is what the cool kids are doing? that sucks!”

“I have my own view of the world and I’m going to live by it,” would more nearly sum up my life, or so I’d like to believe. That’s not to say I don’t take other’s viewpoints into account, it’s just that there aren’t that many areas of my life where I’m concerned about whether they will agree or disagree with me. I’m open to the debate, but not constrained by it. I try to live by the belief that, “part of what I’m doing is probably wrong, but that doesn’t differentiate me from anyone else, and when I realize what’s wrong about it, I’ll just change it.”

I guess I’ve found an area where I’m a little more sensitive. And why not? If I see this as my contribution to the world at large, I guess it’s acceptable that I’m a little concerned about how it will go over. After all, if it goes poorly, does that mean that my innermost views are wrong? That everything I’ve based my life around is a lie? To say it that way makes it sound ridiculous, but I guess fear is like that sometimes.

So if that’s what’s going on, the big question is: what am I going to do about it?

Well, this acknowledgement seems to have helped. I can see the legitimacy of my concerns, but at the same time, I do have a life to lead. I have a thesis to finish, I have ideas to convey, I have a livelihood to find, I have a contribution to make.

And time keeps passing me by…

I guess I better get back to work, trust in the legitimacy of the ideas, support and convey them properly, and take the next step towards being the change I want to see in the world. (Gandhi)

Ya’ know what? I just want to say that that’s not good enough. “Taking the next step” is part of the eternal procrastination that maintains the world as it is today. If I’m going to quote Gandhi, I should not be reducing the impact of his words. Therefore, I amend that final paragraph with the following sentiment:

I am the change I want to see in the world and I will take the next step towards disseminating that change.

It’s gonna be a good life!
Wayne

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