Write Like Nobody’s Watching

“You’ve gotta dance like there’s nobody watching,
Love like you’ll never be hurt,
Sing like there’s nobody listening,
And live like it’s heaven on earth.” ― William W. Purkey

One day at the beginning of class during my senior year in high school, my English teacher asked us to choose a song title from a short list on the blackboard and write a short, one-page essay about that title.

It was due at the end of class.

The song I chose was “If I Had a Hammer.”

I don’t recall much about what I wrote on my blank piece of notebook paper. I only saw that piece of paper briefly one other time… When the teacher stood in front of the class, holding my paper in her hand and reading my words to the class.

That evening she told the parents at PTA Open House it was the best and most creatively-written essay she received in all her thirty-plus years of teaching.

Nearly forty years have passed since that assignment, but I still think about it occasionally.

Not because it was “The Best”. Not because I got an “A” for the assignment. Not because my mother was proudly beaming ear-to-ear when she got home from the school after Open House.

I think about how easily the words flowed when I didn’t have time to edit or second-guess what I was writing.

I think about how easily the words flowed when I didn’t think anyone — except the teacher — would ever read it.

I think about how awkward writing is when I worry about SEO and peer critiques and what readers want to read.

Writing is difficult when I worry whether it’s good enough.

I love to write. I love to add value to people’s lives. I love to have people read my stuff and like it.

However… I’ve decided I’m tired of following blogging rules and fretting about whether people like what I write. I don’t want to have to worry about search engines or post popularity or driving web traffic to my blog.

I just want to write like nobody’s watching… so I will.