I love writing for others, but also myself. I like to look back on my old stories and ask myself “It’s amazing how many ideas one can generate”. I also like to view the stats on my stories, and not always do they get a lot of views or reads.

I, however, have found various ways to remind myself how important and valuable just a single read can be by changing my own perspectives.

Changing your perspective by imagining them in real life

I like to imagine my readers like they are right in front of me in real life. By imagining that you are trying to teach them different perspectives through a story, in real life, the things will feel a lot more valuable.

Imagine that this one reader is standing in front of you while you are having a conversation together about this one story you just wrote.

“The reading of all good books is like a conversation with the finest minds of past centuries.” —Rene Descartes

In order to get those “feelings of value” even more, you can try to imagine a past conversation you had with someone where you gave them advice, as well as all the feelings you got during and after that conversation.

Did you end the conversation with feelings of worth?

Was one person more than enough?

I bet that helping this one person was more than enough for the time being, and you didn’t have the need to help hundreds of more people with the same advice. Same thing with your story that only got 1 read.

Changing your perspective about hundreds of views

The story 10/21/2019 — Chapter One: Cognitive Load Theory and Autism is currently my most-viewed story, which I am very proud of.

This might not be a lot of views compared to other Medium writers, but I still think it is important to keep our perspective focused on “making every view count”. So how can we do that?

Imagine yourself walking in the city, a theater, music concert, whatever you want. The people you see or imagine around you are somewhere in the hundreds to a couple thousand. Try to feel how busy it is, how much space they occupy, and how different they all are from each other. How these people aren’t just “numbers” you can count easily, something which you may subconsciously do when viewing your own stats.

Or maybe imagining yourself in a classroom or school full of students does the job better for you. It’s all about perspectives and personal significance.

How to help other writers get the same perspective

Since I learned this way of perceiving my own stats, I try to begin my responses with “Thank you for this article” in the hope of giving them the feeling they have written something valuable. After that, I write my response. An example is from this article: How Stress Can Be Helpful — 3 reasons to respond to tension, instead of ignoring it

And this is my response:

Wu Wei and Seneca the Younger

Thank you for this article.

The opening quote reminded me remind of this quote:

“People change, not when they have an option, but when there is no option.”

I agree that stress shouldn’t be pushed away (immediately) or trying to compensate it with other activities such as meditating, but allow it to guide you for the time being.

I think people, or at least the Western society, are focusing too much on the “cognitive” part rather than the “bodily” part. Being aware of your bodily experiences like in some Asian practices, but also other more “cognitive” practices such as Wu Wei, part of Confucianism:

Wu wei means — in Chinese — non-doing or ‘doing nothing’. It sounds like a pleasant invitation to relax or worse, fall into laziness or apathy. Yet this concept is key to the noblest kind of action according to the philosophy of Daoism — and is at the heart of what it means to follow Dao or The Way. According to the central text of Daoism, the Dao De Jing: ‘The Way never acts yet nothing is left undone’. This is the paradox of wu wei. It doesn’t mean not acting, it means ‘effortless action’ or ‘actionless action’. It means being at peace while engaged in the most frenetic tasks so that one can carry these out with maximum skill and efficiency. Something of the meaning of wu wei is captured when we talk of being ‘in the zone’ — at one with what we are doing, in a state of profound concentration and flow.

Or from a Stoic philosopher, Seneca the Younger:

“For those who follow nature everything is easy and straightforward, whereas for those who fight against her life is just like rowing against the stream.” — Lucius Annaeus Seneca

Or following a modernistic approach: doing things that give you energy and avoiding things that take energy.

Practice questions

How can you make yourself feel like that one view or read is valuable? What are some possible reasons why you don’t sometimes feel like one view or read isn’t valuable? How can you make yourself feel like those hundreds of views are even more valuable than they originally were already? How to help other writers get the same perspectives?

Subscribe for more content like this: https://mailchi.mp/261ae9e13883/autibiography