Remember when you were a kid and wishing time would go faster was normal? I remember wishing an hour would pass so I could get out of class, or wishing the minutes would hurry so my cross-country race was over, or wishing the years would fly by so I could buy a beer.

Well, most of us aren’t wishing time would go faster, right? We have a finite amount of time left on earth. So why are we wasting it?

photo credit: Kara Allyson via photopin cc

photo credit: Kara Allyson (cc)

Instead of wasting our precious time with things that don’t matter, why aren’t we writing? Let’s make a pact to use our time wisely, and to help get you there, think about the following questions:

What If This Was Your Last Day On Earth?

If I told you today was your very last day on earth and that the only thing you could do was write, what would you write about?

Would it be a list of your favorite memories, or a letter to your best friend?

Would you write something funny, or something introspective?

What’s The One Thing?

If I said you could only write about the one thing that had most touched your life, what would that be?

Would you write about your first visit to the beach, or the friend who helped you through a hard time?

Would you write about your third grade English teacher, or the aunt who never judged?

Who Would You Write For?

If I told you that you can only write to one audience. Who or what would that be?

Would you write to the campers you taught every summer, or your teammates on your high school football team?

Would you write for your friends, or for your enemies?

We Should Consider This The Last Day

If you’re reading this you’re probably in a part of the world that free speech is accepted. You are blessed. It’s a gift that we have the ability to write whatever we want, to touch the lives of others with a string of words. Why don’t we use that gift as it was intended?

Let’s stop worrying about the 70,000 words to go, and start living in the moment.

Let’s put ourselves out there and stop worrying about what other people will say.

Let’s stop getting in our own way.

The next time you get stuck, when your fingers stop, when the creativity comes to a screeching halt, pretend like it’s your last day, like the only thing you need to be worried about is the joy of writing. Because really, isn’t that the point?

What’s Stopping You From Writing Like It’s Your Last Day On Earth?


For the next fifteen minutes, write something that you think will make people happy.
