Think I've had my intro breakthrough

Stuckness is, in my experience, most often caused by trying to do something that doesn't work. Or do it in a way that doesn't work. Stuckness is your mind and body giving you feedback. Vague feedback, granted, but nevertheless information!

And I'm presently stuck on the intro to the new edition of JFS.

Normally when stuck, I simply go work on something else — but in this case, I can't. The intro must be rewritten first so I can nail the metaphors and throughline for the rest of the book to feel intentionally consistent.

First draft: I talked about the invisible wall as the thing you run into that makes you stuck. You can get stuff done for work or school, but not yourself? Why? You hit the invisible wall. The wall itself represents the fact that you're trying to use existing skills (design, code, etc) in a context without all the structure and reinforcement you're used to, so no wonder you feel hobbled.

Good first draft, but it doesn't work. Not only does the natural evolution of the metaphor — take down the wall, etc — conflict with our adjacent brand (Stacking the Bricks), it's just missing… something.

Second (mental) draft: In my head I've been trying out quicksand as a replacement for the invisible wall. Pros: it's shorter, it's vivid, it's crispy. Nobody wants quicksand whereas walls are usually good. Quicksand looks just like any other place to walk but it's secretly dangerous, sucks you in… and worsens as you struggle. If you know where quicksand is, you can go around it. Much more satisfying metaphor.

I'm still stuck, though!!

And I think I've finally figured out why.

I've been trying to shoehorn multiple layers and meanings into a single metaphor.

Stuckness is complex: there's the feeling, then there's the cause.

The wall inherently sounds like a cause.

Quicksand captures the feeling of being stuck, but not the cause.

Being able to say, "I'm in the quicksand" is powerful. Name a thing and you can start to be more objective about it, and reason about it.

But then you have to figure out why you're stuck so you can figure out how to get out.

And how and why won't always be the same…

• Sometimes you're in the quicksand because your system is shocked by the sudden lack of oversight and rewards/punishment motivators.
• Sometimes you're in the quicksand because you can't imagine the future… that terrifying blankness. And sometimes it's because all you can imagine are bad things.
• Sometimes you're in the quicksand because you have an infinite choice of tasks you could be doing and choosing right now is just too hard.
• Sometimes you're in the quicksand because you're subconsciously rebelling against an impossibly large project.
• Sometimes you're in the quicksand because you're afraid to find out what it will say about you.
• And sometimes you're stuck because your subconscious knows your effort is currently wasted because you're going down the wrong path (although I hesitate to tell this to other people because they'll overindex on this one, I'm pretty sure)

People talk about fear, and yeah of course that's the feeling quicksand produces, but it's not the cause of stuckness or procrastination or avoidance.

And in my case, my stuckness is caused by trying to shove all that meaning into a single metaphor — trying to cover the feeling, the cause, the effect with just one image.

It won't fit. It doesn't help. My stuckness is a physical sensation that's telling me, "This is wasted effort, go back to the drawing board." I hear you! Which is why I haven't been trying to write any more of it, just occasionally thinking about it and picking over it, mentally, throughout the days since. Prepared for serendipitous inspiration to strike.

And strike it did:

Yes. Yes I know that feel and I wrote a whole book about it (among other issues. There was nothing in this tweet that was new to me but it reminded me of all the causes that JFS, the book, actually tackles.

And that helped me find a solution that feels right:

Instead of treating all stuckness as a monolith — which makes the intro, by nature, vague and soggy! — I can get crispy and lay out a spotter's guide to various causes (stucknesses) and how the reader will overcome each one with the rest of the book.

By modeling the core of the JFS process itself, in a way, in the intro.

Bam!! Quicksand has turned to solid ground.

Now that I know what the intro should be, I can brainstorm a list of stucknesses, outline a structure for the chapter itself, and work backwards from there to fill it out with details.