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Writing Slowly

My name’s Richard. I live in Sydney, on the traditional land of Bidjigal people of the Eora nation. Here I write about writing and reading (and what I do when I'm not writing or reading). I'm writing slowly but may at some point speed up. Connect with me on micro.blog or at Mastodon @aus.social@writingslowly. On Reddit, I'm @atomicnotes.

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    📷 I’ve taken a few days out to walk the coast. It was… well, you can see for yourself what it was. This might explain why my writing here has been even slower than usual. But now I’m back, and normal service will resume shortly.

    A scenic coastline featuring a sandy beach, an island, clear blue water, and hills covered with vegetation under a partly cloudy sky.
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    What I'm writing in October 2026

    The main purpose of my collection of notes, organised according to the Zettelkasten principle, is to help me complete writing projects, mainly small but sometimes large too.

    I’m always jotting down thoughts and ideas to use in my ever-expanding blog empire. For example, for some time I’ve been making notes on ideas about data structures. Soon these notes will see the light of day as an article or two.

    And I’m constantly working on larger projects which inch very slowly towards fruition. At the moment I’m working on a sequel of sorts to my book, Shu Ha Ri. The Japanese Way of Learning. And I’m also working on a memoir about a journey around Ireland with my father thirty years ago.

    As I’ve written about, my writing process oscillates between notes and drafts, so really it’s quite hard to separate the Zettelkasten notes from the drafts. Together they constitute a miniature working environment in which I think and write. Having said that, my writing system does keep them separate. The drafts are on a one-way journey to publication of some sort, whereas the notes are modular and can be used again in different contexts.

    My aim is to reconfigure networks of concepts to create new knowledge and insight.

    One area where I feel there’s scope to do things differently is in my reading. At the moment I seem to be reading more material than I’m making notes on. This feels a bit like a wasted opportunity. I need to be more systematic with my process here. Perhaps I can slow down my reading pace to let my notemaking keep up. I’m not one of those people who frets if I haven’t made 300 notes about a single book. I’m content with a dozen (provided it’s the right dozen, of course). But there’s a couple of books with nothing at all noted. I must make a time to correct this.

    Read more:

    How to write an article from your notes.

    Why not publish all your notes online?

    I found a way to create order from my jumbled notes

    Three worthwhile modes of note-making, and one not so worthwhile.

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    Now you can listen to Writing Slowly

    As attentive readers of this website will know, I’m happily using micro.blog as the site’s hosting platform. Micro.blog has a surprisingly wide range of features and it comes with several associated mini-apps, which provide easy access to those features. One of the apps is called Wavelength, and it has just been updated. This has inspired me, finally, to actually make use of it.

    Wavelength makes it easy to edit and publish voice recordings and now with Wavelength I’ve been recording my voice, reading aloud a number of the longer articles on this site. So if you navigate to one of these posts (nearly twenty of them so far) you might find there’s now a little ’listen’ button, which will enable you to hear me speaking my own written words.

    Why bother doing this? Well, so far it’s been quite fun, and you might just enjoy the opportunity to hear the person behind the writing.

    I feel these days it’s more important than ever to lean into our own humanity. Sure, you can get a better, more professional experience elsewhere, enabled no doubt by AI automation and by the mimicking of human experience rather than the real thing. But as I’ve pointed out before, my range is me.

    There’s an increasing amount of slop online and this is one small way to show my words are handmade and originated from a real person.

    I’m celebrating the human touch and trying to respect you, dear reader, as a real person too.1

    You’ll be relieved to know that while I might still insist on writing slowly, I speak at a reasonable speed.

    So do let me know what you think, and whether I sound like you imagined I would. And if you’d like to subscribe to the weekly e-mail digest, there’s never been a better time to do so.

    Talking of which, now would also be a pretty good time to check out my book, Shu Ha RI. The Japanese Way of Learning, for Artists and Fighters.

    A microphone is mounted on a black adjustable arm against a white wall.

    1. unless you’re actually a bot, scraping my voice to make scam adverts to send to my friends and family – in which case, my respect will be commensurately diminished. ↩︎

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    I took part in the August '26 IndieWeb Book Club

    The book selection for the month was 📚 The Mulai, by Munir Hachemi, and I posted my thoughts online. To sum up, it was a thought-provoking metafiction fiesta.

    Now VH Belvadi has posted the roundup, with a review – fittingly, I thought – in the style of the novel itself.

    You can take part too. Just read the book, post your thoughts somewhere online and let the organiser know. That’s pretty much it. September’s chosen book is An Unauthorised Fan Treatise, by Wren James. Sara Jaksa chose this title and put out the call for submissions.

    I know nothing about this book except that it appears to involve real person fan fiction conspiracy theories… er, maybe. This isn’t exactly my area of expertise so I’m looking forward to being enlightened.

    Details of this and other months’ choices are at the IndieWeb Wiki.

    *You can follow along with the continuing adventures of Writing Slowly by means of the RSS feed, or if you prefer, you can subscribe to good old email. *

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    A rocky cliffside at North Head, Sydney, overlooks the ocean with waves gently crashing against the shore and some greenery in the foreground.
    The North Head of Sydney Harbour is always spectacular.

    A coastal landscape at North Head, Sydney, features clear blue water with boats and a distant city skyline under a partly cloudy sky.
    It’s amazing how close to the city this is, yet it feels quite distinct.

    A dense cluster of white and red Australian native flowers surrounded by green foliage.
    We weren’t alone; the early spring wildflowers were already out in force.

    Two clusters of white flannel flowers with spiky petals and silvery-green foliage are growing among grass and dry leaves.
    Flannel flowers: an emblem of New South Wales.

    A coastal landscape with the rocky terrain and shrubs of North Head, Sydney, overlooks a blue body of water with South Head and a distant city skyline, Sydney CBD, on the horizon.
    I’m inspired to come here more often.

    A ferry is sailing on Sydney Harbour during sunset, framed by trees and branches in the foreground.
    The ferry took me home.
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    📷 🍳Sunday morning is time for shakshuka.

    A dish of shakshuka - baked eggs topped with herbs, crumbled cheese, and a tomato-based sauce is served in an oval ceramic bowl on a wooden table.
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    Loud and agitated shouting had me alarmed this morning. Sounded like a real bust-up. Then I understood. It’s the World Cup. Messi has scored. Our neighbours are Argentinian and this is only the start. ❤️🇦🇷

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    On Friday we learned our cat, who has visited Writing Slowly several times, has a terminal illness, with just weeks to live.

    I’m deeply sad. He has been my close companion through years of working from home. To discover I could feel this way about a cat is a harsh gift, but a gift all the same.

    A tabby cat with wide eyes is peering out from under a piece of furniture.
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    I find writing on the train works well. It helps that there’s a good view. Anyone else do this?

    #writing #notetaking #writingcommunity #photography

    A serene landscape features a large body of water, lush green trees, and a distant mist-covered hill.
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    I fell down a rabbit hole writing about Hypercuriosity! 🤯 Inspired by Anne-Laure Le Cunff’s work.

    Read how being curious about everything defines my process: https://writingslowly.com/2025/09/30/curious-about-hypercuriosity.html

    #Hypercuriosity #Curiosity #ADHD #Writingslowly

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