Ok, 750 words. Not likely. I should talk about the creative benefits of writing. I feel that the mind does need an outlet to be creative. Too many times I believe a lot of people are trapped in what I would call the "mind template"; where we would continually take upon what we've done and said in the past that was considered acceptable to others and then use that as a template and customize that with no real creative start or conclusion. Say for instance, in an email to a colleague at work, I automatically resorted to looking for a prior email or an email similar to the point that I wanted to get across. When I found that email, who was addressed to someone else, I customized it and found the wording or structure that I wanted to relate to the colleague that I was currently writing to. Now, that I look back, I can obviously see that I used that email as a crutch. Do I regret it? No, I feel that the crutch was what gave me the confidence to send the email. The time I would have used to create the email from scratch, I used instead to copy and paste and move on to the next task. However, what I do feel is that lack of the creative process that I couldn't utilized to create something different, something new and hopefully, better than the email that I sent that I believe was acceptable and uniform. Too often I am lost by uniformity. I feel that five years in a corporate environment and being told what to say, how to say and who to say to, has committed me to being more unsure if I am expressing myself correctly. My inner editor is astounded that I could express anything independently to anyone, thus resulting in my ever present and frequent need to use my crutch aka "mind template." It's wonderful to challenge yourself and start from a blank slate. Just because you made a great success writing once from scratch shouldn't mean that the slate is filled and to continue to change and customize the same slate for repeated use. Working in corporate, has really wreaked a toll on my creative mind. I can look at a blank slate for hours, or for a few minutes before I look elsewhere because working from scratch has now become more of a chore than I wanted and really it shouldn't have to be that way. Challenges should make you learn and grow and stimulate your mind for new and better ideas. While all I can think about is conform. Conform to what was used, what has worked and use continuously. In essence, doesn't that promote plagiarism? Do we not only tell people to read something and force them to write what it was that they read but in their own words but then judge them harshly because their own words were not as good or never as good enough. So to live up to the overall standards presented, we conform or in most cases we plagiarize. A lot of creative things are time consuming. We aren't given the time necessary to be creative. Or even is there ever enough time to creative? That email I sent took me no more than a simple 20 minutes. While I can type something creative and mull over it for hours, doubting myself if what I said was clear, focused, entertain or was it relevant. What can I say about a solution? Is there really any solution? I can only think of hope. Hope that folks will continue to seek within themselves for that creativity. Hope that people those who try to get their 750 words will focus on not falling in to the "mind template;" to continuously challenge themselves and seek for new words and phrases. Perhaps hope the time is enough for anyone needing to focus and create is available. Its all too easy to fall back into the safety crutch of using the template. So many easy distracts cry out for attention. Again another means of not being creative. Distractions. Do you that lots we are raised to be distracted and then told not to be. Even so far as to be medicated to "help" with being distracted. So many creative enemies. Even procrastination. How was I ever able to finish my 750 word allocation today? Definitely harder than I imagined but I'm all the more proud of myself for it.