Deciding What to Write

If you are trying to get promotion or tenure, then the question of what to write should be simple: write peer-reviewed articles in your discipline. If you're still unsure what to research or write about in your discipline, then you probably aren't reading enough of those same sorts of articles.

Since I have tenure and have run out of promotions, peer-reviewed articles in my discipline no longer have the extrinsic value they had at the beginning of my career. Because they no longer serve as rungs on my professional ladder, the articles I write from here on out have to be valuable in themselves. It's like reaching a point of financial independence when you no longer have to work for money. Any decision to continue working would mean that you are willing to do the work for free. So what am I willing to write for free?

I spend a good deal of time agonizing over what to write or how I will pitch what I've written to an editor or agent. But what if, instead, I just wrote whatever it was that I had to write on that particular day without any sort of goal in mind? Maybe no such goal develops at all. Or maybe a goal develops that I hadn't expected. The point would be that I had been writing the whole time.

Crucially, whenever I do write towards some external goal, I inevitably speed along and try to accomplish the goal as quickly as I can. My writing suffers. I "write" a lot, but it is a chore to read.

There are a few things I do enjoy writing for themselves:

• Writing serious articles and being philosophical: doing good theoretical and philosophical work requires patience and diligence. I have to read widely, and then communicate clearly my contribution. I enjoy this process. It's slowness only bothers me when I'm in a rush to get publications.
• Writing anecdote-based nonfiction: This is quite the opposite of being philosophical. With diary-type anecdotes, I'm not trying to make any point. I'm just reflecting on my experiences--recording my humanity.
• Writing teaching and research manuals: I like writing these only when I perceive there is a need for them and I can do so in a fun and lighthearted way. It's all too easy, however, to fall back into the goal of writing as much as possible, getting publications, and making money.
• Writing instructional materials for class: It is imperative that I write these for my own benefit, because students will resent any reading they have to do (and the author who is responsible for it).

What is my purpose as a writer? Who am I as a writer? These questions are irrelevant. They only inhibit writing. Time spent answering them is time not spent writing.