I first started writing when I was quite young, and I wrote my fair share of short stories in high school as well. I was never really consistent, always drifting between inspiration and a lack of it, like most creatives do. For the last 6 years though, I didn’t write anything at all. I thought that I had a dry spell, maybe one that would last a lifetime. I thought I might’ve been a one hit wonder, only without ever producing that one hit. I wanted to write, that’s for sure, but I always lacked the why, and what. Everytime I sat down in front of the computer, I merely typed, and it always sucked. I couldn’t get more than a few subpar sentences out.
Fast forward to the last summer, and I found an intriguing challenge called Alphabet Superset. The main idea is this: although creative freedom is nice, it doesn’t bring any results by itself. It’s actually the creative constraint and the limitations that you set on yourself, which will bring tangible results. It makes sense, if you think about it. If you’re standing in front of an empty canvas, you can do anything an empty canvas (and your tools, and skillset, etc.) allows, which is virtually everything. You can wait for inspiration for hours and days on end, but sometimes it just won’t come, and then what? As soon as you set some constraints for yourself, and you stick to them, you can start creating. At this point, you don’t need to think about what you are going to do, because you already have that figured out. You only have to show up. The challenge sets some boundaries for you, and makes you create one thing every week for 6 months straight. Each week, there’s a different topic – starting with a different letter of the alphabet. This seemed like a good enough thing to try.
The main constraint I set for myself is that I write about my travel adventures and experiences. Posting the first one was almost painful, and I can’t say it’s getting better, to be honest. But I’m getting used to it. I’m on the letter N now, which means that I showed up for 14 weeks in a row, quite the achievement. I’m more than halfway there, yet the rest of the alphabet still seems menacing. The last few weekes were a constant fight with myself to sit down in front of the computer, write, edit, read, edit again… Although it feels good to check off one letter each week, it’s more of a chore than a pastime. I guess that’s a part of the process though, and if I want to achieve anything more than mediocrity, I have to push myself. Needless to say, I’m getting tired.
The last two topics didn’t feel quite right, so I changed them as I started writing. I guess that’s a part of the process. And like that, this article isn’t about traveling at all. It’s about pushing myself, but not pushing myself so hard that I would break.
I’m lucky enough to have 2 weeks of rest ahead of me. These are a part of the schedule, and they couldn’t have come at a better time. I really need to reflect on the past three months, gather energy for the upcoming weeks, and try to get ahead of the game by writing some drafts. We’ll see how this goes.
In the second part of the challenge, I want to experiment a little bit with different formats, which I think could be interesting, especially for some of the more recent stories. You can look forward to a trip report from Northern Macedonia, honest look at Marrakech and Moroccan tourist traps, some humbling experiences of a 18 year old adventure virgin in Belgium, and of course more drug fueled adventures. See y’all there!