There’s a podcast from Apple Fitness called Time to Walk, and it’s basically “notable people walking and talking alone.” I’d actually listened to it before, but sort of forgotten about it. When I set out on the dog walk this evening the sound of Jason Segel’s voice entered my mind and reminded me that the show (if that’s what you’d call it) existed.
You know that feeling when you can almost find what you’re looking for, but not quite? When you find ten or twenty or one hundred things that are almost what you’re looking for? At some point, the thing that you want exists perfectly in your mind, a blend of the not-quite-right things. You can see or hear or feel the thing in your mind as if it’s real.
In this research phase (let’s call it) that’s one of my favorite things. In one way you want to find an example of exactly what it is you’re looking to make, but in a much bigger way (ultimately) that’s the last thing you want, because you need your thing to be singular in some way. You want to be the person who brings it into the world for the first time.
Anyway, this show—Time to Walk—has something. It’s people just… talking, but people who are good at talking. It’s not performed, but it’s not not performed, you know? It’s often spoken by performers—and hey, who could resist a little performance when you know that what you say will end up on a podcast from a small computer company.
Honestly, I’m procrastiworking a bit. I need to sit down and write, but writing is kind of hard. Writing what you want to write is hard, at least. I could call it Resistance (of the Pressfield variety) and I don’t doubt that’s what it is. Starting a new thing fills me with self-doubt, and it only stops when I truly, properly start—so I guess it’s time to start.