No Degree

Sometimes, writing a blog feels weird. Not because writing is weird or even sharing a bit of yourself online. It’s usually the last little portion of the blog. That, I learned something, portion. It’s not always there, but when it is, you suddenly feel like a teacher of sorts. You’re giving your advice to whomever decides to read. To be fair, what you’ve learned is profound to you, but there’s always that little voice in the back of your head wondering what qualifies you to give anyone else advice.

I wrote an entire blog on how difficult it is to come up with a good ending to a spray of thoughts. A lot of that is tied into the idea of “final lesson” moments. When you have this journey of writing, at the end of the road, you want to wrap up your lesson with a nice bow. Do you really want to give other people the same lesson? What if you’re the only idiot who hasn’t figured it out yet? Those last words you want to be impactful, but you also don’t want to come across as too philosophical.

Maybe you do want to be philosophical, but for me, whenever I start to fall into that philosophical zone, I say to myself. “What authority do I have to say this”. Maybe that’s a strange idea to some people, the idea of being concerned with authority to speak. I mean, honestly, it’s a personal blog where I can say whatever I want. Words mean something to people, though, and I’m careful to make sure my words impact people positively. I wrote a blog about how a moment can change your life. Well, can’t words do the same? How many people have been changed because of words on a page? Everyone at some point?

The thing is, all the lessons I learned. Any inspiration that might appear as such is just a personal awakening to a new idea. It’s all for my own growth, and writing about it just allows that lesson to be locked in. Not only does it let my mind expand on the lesson, but it also allows it to be etched in (digital?) stone to review. Lessons that might only last a moment can last much longer, knowing I can look back and see the moment of inspiration.

So I may not have anything that qualifies me to give advice. I don’t have a fancy degree that says “listen to me!”. I’m not writing to try and inspire in anything more than that someone might chase a dream because I’m working on mine. If my words inspire you, I’m grateful we can connect on that point. If not, I’m not claiming to be a philosopher with overwhelming knowledge of every subject I write. I’m just me.