Hey guys, it's Non here.
Coffee in hand. Before I post anything, I ask myself one blunt question: would I be okay if this were the last thing I ever wrote? Not because I am feeling morbid. Because it is the fastest filter I know for whether something is actually worth saying, or whether I just want to be seen saying it.
Think about that moment after a long, exhausting fight with someone at work. Maybe it was a boss who moved the goalposts on you for the third time this week, or a colleague who took credit for your project. You go home, and your blood is still humming. You sit down at your laptop, and your fingers start flying across the keys.
You want to write a post. You want to lay out exactly why they are wrong, why their leadership is failing, and why their personality is fundamentally flawed. You want to put it out there for everyone to see. But before you hit that button, you have to stop.
I used to think about this specifically regarding people I wanted to trash. I realized that when I am that angry, I am not actually looking for a resolution. I am looking for a release. I am trying to turn my private frustration into a public performance.
If I post that diatribe, I am inviting the whole world to watch me be miserable. I am letting them see me at my most reactive, least composed, and most impulsive. And this is the part worth stealing. If that post is the last thing anyone ever sees of you, do you want it to be a scream of frustration?
Or do you want it to be a reflection of who you actually are? If you get it wrong, you aren't just making a mistake in judgment. You are letting a temporary, fleeting emotion define your permanent identity. You are letting a bad Tuesday become your legacy.
We are going to look at why we feel this desperate urge to be seen. And how we can learn to tell the difference between a truth that needs to be told and a wound that just needs to be felt.
We must think five times even if we believe that whatever we want to write is so "true." At the end of the day, it could just be that what you think is true is just another version of the situation of which you happen to perceive a version.
You might be right to push back on this. A smart person would look at me and say that this sounds like a recipe for silence. They would argue that if everyone adopted this "last post" filter, we would lose the very things that make progress possible. They would say that some truths are urgent.
They would say that if you have a witness to an injustice, or if you have a revolutionary idea that needs to be shared right now, waiting to see if it represents your "best and most admirable side" is just a form of self-censorship. They would argue that being "composed" is often just a mask for being complicit. In their view, the "temporary moment of dissatisfaction" is often the only honest moment we have. They would say that by scrubbing away the anger, you are scrubbing away the truth.
That is a fair point. I can see why it feels like I am asking you to be bland. If we only ever posted the most polished, moral, and "admirable" versions of ourselves, the public square would become a gallery of statues instead of a place for humans to live. It would be a world of polite lies.
But there is a difference between being honest and being reactive. When we are in the middle of a fight, our perspective narrows. It becomes a tunnel. We see the other person as a monster and ourselves as the hero.
That is a very common human experience, but it is not a high-quality way to perceive reality. This is where we have to be careful. I am not asking you to hide your feelings. I am asking you to acknowledge the mechanics of how you are expressing them.
"Therefore, even if we know for sure what we think we know as truth, accepting the possibility that there might be another version of it out there somewhere is a must for a fallibilist, who is usually also a good scholar, thinker. And observer of the universe in which we live." By this, I mean that being a good thinker means accepting that your current view is limited. It is a "fallibilist" view, which just means you recognize that you could be wrong. If you are so certain that your anger is the only truth, you have stopped thinking and started reacting.
You are no longer observing the universe; you are just projecting your own wound onto it. The goal isn't to be silent. The goal is to ensure that when you do speak, you are speaking from a place of clarity, not just from a place of heat.
Think about the last time you had to put your name on something. Maybe it was a project review you sent to a director, or a policy change you drafted for your team, or even a simple email to a client who was making your life difficult. You sat there, looking at the final draft, and you felt that familiar prickle of heat in your chest. You wanted to make a point.
You wanted them to understand exactly how much of a headache they were causing. You wanted to be "right" in a way that felt like a victory. But then you paused. You looked at that draft and thought about the "last post" filter.
If this document, this specific piece of writing, was the final evidence of your competence, would it serve you? Or would it just show that you were someone who couldn't handle a difficult interaction without getting sharp? This is where the abstract idea of "clarity over heat" becomes a practical tool for your actual work. When you are frustrated by a requirement nobody questioned, or a standard that feels unfair, the urge to write a scathing memo is almost physical.
It feels like justice. But watch what happens next. When you write from that place of heat, you are actually handing the other person a weapon. You are giving them a reason to dismiss your valid points because they are wrapped in your personal irritation.
You are letting them focus on your tone instead of your truth. The point of your work is to be effective. And effectiveness requires you to be a better observer of reality than the person you are disagreeing with. "For instance, if I get home one day after a long bad fight with my boss or my colleague and feel compelled to write a diatribe monologue about that person and against his or her existence at large, I would have to think first, 'how much do I really know about that person whom I am about to trash?'" I mean that before you hit send on that sharp email, you have to ask if you actually know the full picture of why that person is acting that way.
Are they just being difficult, or are they under pressure from someone else? Do you have the full context, or are you just reacting to the slice of reality they chose to show you? If you can't answer that, your writing isn't a contribution. It's just a vent.
And the most professional thing you can do is to find the version of the truth that remains true even when you aren't angry. That is the version that actually gets things done.
So, if this is the condition that makes me want to write something that isn't very nice, then perhaps it's best to scrap the post. And use that precious time to write something else, e.g., an email to a family member or someone I love and care about, or a daily dairy to remind myself what makes me think so hard today. These personal writings, of course, can include the narratives involving dissatisfaction. I mean that there is a difference between a private truth and a public performance. When you write for your own diary, or for the person you actually love, you have the space to be messy.
You can be hurt, and you can be angry, and you can be completely wrong about the facts. That is the safety of the private room. But the public square is different. The public square is where your words become evidence.
This brings us to a problem that I still haven't figured out how to solve for myself. If we strip away the reactive heat to find the version of the truth that is "effective," are we actually being more honest? Or are we just getting better at crafting a version of the truth that is easier for other people to swallow? If you spend your whole life refining your public voice to be perfectly composed, do you eventually lose the ability to hear your own raw, unrefined feelings?
How do we keep the fire of our convictions alive without letting it burn down the house of our reputation?