Embracing the Unreal

This is not writing. Well, not “real writing. According to some.

Whatever it is, I have been doing it for a complete decade as of today. Recently, life has indeed seemed a bit unreal. So it is hard to determine the ‘real’ from the ‘unreal’. With the override role of cognitive bias in the human condition, the only “real” answer is constant questioning. Especially self-questioning. And whatever this blog is, it does that.

Seth Godin penned in his own blog a fine defence for the “unreal” in his post Walking away from "real"

• “As in, ‘that’s not a real football team, they don’t play in Division 1’ or ‘That stock isn’t traded on a real exchange’ or ‘Your degree isn’t from a real school."’ Real contains all sorts of normative assumptions and implicit criticisms for those that don’t qualify. Real is just one way to reject the weird. My problem with the search for the badge of real is that it trades your goals and your happiness for someone else’s.”

Embracing failure often means debunking fallacies (ie. failure of knowledge) and this “real writing” arrogance does sort of wreak of the “Real Scotsman” fallacy (ie. a logical fallacy that occurs when: during argument, after their favored group has been criticized, someone re-defines the group in order to deflect uncomfortable counter-examples and thus makes the group entirely praiseworthy).

Blogs get poo-poo’d by the pros as not ‘real writing. But I have been in the fraternity of ‘professional writers’ both as an overseas correspondent in Africa and commissioning work in my role at Microsoft marketing. I can tell you right now that a very large majority of ‘professional’ (or ‘real’) writing is in no way real. Rehashed press releases, anodyne stringing together of buzzwords, pay-per-word padding. Echoing Seth’s sentiments, most of this material is also written to the lowest common denominator or normality and unexceptionality.

But it is in the printed world where the embrace of failure to secure a publisher is most interesting. My mother adapted my letters home when I was in Africa into a self-published book. At first, I thought it would be a book that ‘only a mother would love’, but it kept her busy in her new phase of retirement so it seemed harmless. The book hasn’t been a best-seller, but it has been a great way to share a part my experience with not just extended friends and family, but also with other people interested in the topic. My father self-published ‘Shorelines’ and it is in many ways a culmination of his life’s work as a clergyman. Our daughter, Isley, self-published a book of poetry after getting more and more popular on the poetry recital and spoken work circuit and having people ask for a copy of her work. Our son, Chase, self-produced a field recording album “Four Points” and it turned out that the British Library wanted a copy for its archive (being an creative acoustic illustration of the British Isles).

Amateurish? Get real.

Turning Adversity to Advantage

Chase Lynn, Edwin Lynn, Gapingvoid, Isley Lynn, Marj Lynn

November 16, 2016

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