You can write about anything you want. Isn’t that freeing? Yes and no. You need something on the page to get going, but with so many options you start to feel a little anxious and overanalyze. Here’s three ideas from writers and thinkers to help narrow things down.

Pay attention

For anyone wanting to discern what to do w/ their life: PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT YOU PAY ATTENTION TO. That’s pretty much all the info u need.

Amy Kraus Rosenthal, message to John Greene

Writing is about learning to pay attention and to communicate what is going on.

Anne Lamott

You tend to pay attention to things that interest you. You might think about them frequently, you might talk to your friends or family about them, or you might feel the need to write them down. Follow that interest and keep note, especially if you write. Either physically or digitally. All writers have some way of noting observations and ideas to come back to.

Paying attention to our thoughts as we experience the world is step one in being present. It was Amy’s advice to John on paying attention that led to Anthropocene Review, still one of my favourite books over the last few years.

Just start

Expect 80% of the ideas in an essay to happen after you start writing it, and 50% of those you start with to be wrong.

Paul Graham

Don’t overthink it. Just start writing. Great musicians find their music in jam sessions – unstructured, no planning, just seeing what happens. I think good writing is the same. If you think about it too much, you’ll be stuck. Start with one brave sentence and see where it goes.

Morgan Housel

You’ve noted some things down, now you pick something to explore. You don’t need to know what it will look at the end. In fact, it’s probably better if you don’t. As you write, you think. And as you think, you discover new and interesting ideas. Go with the flow and be open.

Write for yourself

If you make yourself laugh every once in a while, at least you will have fun.

Tim Ferris

Instead of having one hundred percent of the people finding your mission acceptable or mildly commendable, you are better off having a high percentage of people disliking you and your message (even intensely), combined with a low percentage of extremely loyal and enthusiastic supporters.

Nassim Taleb

If I stay with it, then one day I will have been playing for forty years, and anyone who sticks with something for forty years will be pretty good at it”.

Steve Martin

Start with what interests you. One, because people will find your writing more interesting. Not everyone will (or needs to) find your writing interesting. If you reach one other person and help them, I think you’ve already won.

Two, because you’ll be able to do it for longer. You’ll get better at the craft. If you work on anything for long enough, then how can you not be good at it?

And if nobody finds it useful, then that’s okay. There’s going to be a lot of that.