I had a meeting yesterday morning where we did small breakout sessions, and we discussed a topic that I’ve talked about a few times here on my Daily-Ink. I wanted to share something I wrote, but decided not to. Then we met a second time but it ended up being me and just one other colleague in the room. We continued the conversation and afterwards, I shared a link to one of the pieces I wrote via email. I got a really positive response, and I’m glad I did share it, but I’m always hesitant to do this.
It’s kind of weird, I write every day, and my post is automatically shared to Twitter, LinkedIn, and my Facebook page, so I obviously don’t mind sharing my work publicly. Yet I always feel like sharing my own writing at work is like shameless self-promotion rather than sharing my thoughts. It feels like I’m trying to show off, or that I’m bragging. Sometimes I’ll use my writing as a reference to what I say, but don’t mention the blog post or share the link.
I think that part of the challenge is that on social media people can choose to read or ignore my posts, and there is no price to pay if someone chooses to ignore the post, However, if I share it directly with someone, well then I’m kind of expecting it to be read. I’m forcing it on someone. This is me just thinking ‘out loud’ about this. I don’t think I’ll change my habits. I think I’ll continue to be overly cautious about sharing my writing in conversations with colleagues.
It’s not that I’m shy, it’s that I’m trying to be respectful. I don’t want to push my writing on people. But sometimes I articulate things better in my writing than I do trying to formulate my thoughts on the spot. I’m a slow processor, a slow thinker, and work through things better through writing than speaking.
That said, I can be quite vocal and no one has ever accused me of not participating in a discussion. Maybe that’s part of issue? I am vocal enough, and spreading or sharing my writing is just ‘over the top’. I’ve spent a few years developing my listening skills, and redirecting my thoughts to what’s being said, rather than what I want to say next. This is a skill that needs to be practiced, especially since I tend to be a lateral thinker that sees connections to things rather than seeing a single track of a conversation. So my brain wants to bounce to related things, off topic things, and maybe something I’ve previously written. But is that thing I wrote truly relevant to the conversation, or is it just relevant to me?
I don’t think I’ll share my posts at work any more than I already do after writing this. I think it’s probably a good thing that I hold back, and I’ll continue to do so.
