Weekend Wrinkle: Graduation and Writing

It’s the graduation “season.” I can’t help thinking of the parallels between academic graduation and completing a writing project.

• Writers often spend a long time working on a project, sometimes years – just like students pursuing a degree.
• Writers explore different aspects of their subjects to get to the final goal.
• When writers “finish” a project, they can’t help looking back and thinking they could have done something a little differently or put more effort into something.
• Writers often find it hard to move on from the environment and people they encountered throughout a project.
• Writers look forward to good things resulting from all the hard work they put in.
• When the project is done, writers move on to something new.
• Graduates and writers mark the end of one phase and the beginning of the next.

As we congratulate those students who have worked so hard to finally achieve the reward at the end of their studies, I want to remind writers to give themselves a pat on the back and a “great job” when they reach their own “graduation.”

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