Channel the Whirlwind — Nick Sainato

Some years ago I came across @AlmostMedia’s daily writing habit. Even then I thought it would be a good practice, but through a combination of procrastination and self-consciousness, I never tried it.

Since then I’ve become at least a little more focused and consistent, plus a lot less worried about how I’d come across. Or whether anyone would care to read along. It’d be more for me than some supposed audience anyway.

Over the summer I read Several Short Sentences About Writing and was inspired again to try. But I was feeling the whirlwind of everything, and I wasn’t sure where I was headed or what I’d write about. Now, I thought, wouldn’t be the time to try either.

Then I saw @alexlmiller, the habit-maker’s husband (and recent ran-into-on-a-random-connecting-flight-through-DC founder friend), had started writing too, as he transitions into a new phase of his professional career. I’m settling into another one of my own. The whirlwind is still here, and it feels stronger than ever. But all of this is fresh enough in my context window that it feels like the universe is simply begging me to give it a go. Or something like that.

Well, you’ve got to start somewhere and somehow. And it better be before AI turns our brains to mush.

Even if next year that means using an agent to remind me what I blabbed about.

So I have decided to channel the whirlwind. I scroll through Twitter (sorry, X) and find myself equal parts anxious and wide-eyed. It feels as though 60 minutes a day of scrolling is the only way to stay on top of what is happening in tech. I won’t rule out that being cope for my social media addiction. Yet empirically it’s the primary origin of a decade of progress and growth for me.

This writing habit, if it sticks, would be no exception. Scratch that—will be no exception. You have to commit to the bit in everything you choose to do.

Today I will turn a page and change the channel. I will listen to what the universe is telling me. And in turn I will channel my way through the whirlwind.

See you tomorrow.