You're Not Behind

The internet is full of content. It's not full of voices.

The internet has never had more writers and never had fewer voices.

That might sound like a contradiction, but the more time you spend online, the more you realize how true it is.

There is a sea of content that reads like it was written by the same careful, competent person, pleasant and safe and forgettable.

And yet somehow, when you sit down to write that newsletter you’ve been putting off, or anything, really, it still feels like you’re trying to merge onto a six-lane highway at rush hour.

It seems like everyone online (and especially Substack) is already moving a full speed, with logos and paid tiers and audiences they’ve been cultivating for years.

Meanwhile, you’re sitting on the on-ramp with your blinker on, wondering if you’ll ever find a gap to merge into.

I certainly know that feeling.

And sometimes, a little voice pops up: why would anyone need another voice saying this?

It may even feel like humility. But it’s a lie.

A change of perspective

If you’ve ever looked at this crowded online landscape and felt overwhelmed, take a moment to consider what you’re actually seeing.

I think I can safely say that too much of what fills our feeds wasn’t written from somewhere real.

I don’t say that to judge anyone writing earnestly.

I’m referring to content that has been assembled because something has to go out, or because a trend was peaking and someone needed to captialize on it.

Much of it is competent and polished, and completely interchangeable with a thousand other posts that went up the same day.

That may sound cynical. That isn’t my intention; there are plenty of real people writing about real things and connecting with other real people. The problem is that those voices are now competing with an influx of content-for-content’s-sake.

But the truth is, that’s actually not as bad of a thing as it may seem.

You see, we’re not looking at a landscape of people who beat us to the punch.
We’re looking at a landscape that is starving for someone who has actually lived what they’re writing about.

The crowded internet isn’t evidence that there’s no room for you. It’s evidence that you are exactly what’s missing.

The rarest thing online

Think back to the last piece of writing that actually made you stop and think about what was being said. Maybe there was something that made you feel something real, that called to your spirit, or put into words something you’d been unknowingly carrying.

I’ll bet it wasn’t the most polished thing you read that day. It probably didn’t have the most optimized headline or the most clever hook.

What it likely did have was honesty. Authenticity. The ring of lived experience.

That kind of writing is becoming increasingly rare on the internet these days. The pressure of the platform and the pace of the content calendar and the sheer availability of tools that can produce “good enough” in seconds all push writers further and further from their own experience.

And that means that the writer who has actually been through the thing they’re describing, who isn’t performing wisdom but offering what they’ve seen, is increasingly uncommon.

You don’t need to be original, necessarily. You don’t need a fresh take that no one ever though of before.

You just need to genuine and honest. That’s it!

You’re not behind

At the end of the day, the world doesn’t need another writer. It needs you: the specific person who has been where you’ve been, who has been with God and who can use their gift to simply say “come and see.”

It’s something only you can offer, and it has been available since the moment you first felt the pull to write.

So no, you’re not behind. You haven’t missed anything. Feel free to merge into that traffic with your eyes closed and go for it.

Note: this advice does not apply to actual driving.