Hello and welcome to today's lecture. In the following 500 words or so, I will be discussing the importance of writing things down. During this time, I will also be desperately trying to remember something I didn't take note of last night. There may be swearing. There may be tears. If you start to feel uncomfortable, please stop reading.

Last night I was a good boy and went to bed on time. As I was drifting into dreamland, I thought of something I could write about for today's post. I remember thinking it was a great topic, easy to write about and might strike a chord with those reading. The only thing I didn't remember this morning was what it was. Some would argue that that is the most important thing to remember. Now, I have upset myself.

I love my mother. I truly do. As I have gotten older, her life lessons have hit home. As I began discovering that all I wanted to do was write stories, I would talk to her enthusiastically about them. She would listen and say, "write it down".  

As I became a young adult and "adulting" was part of my life more and more, for example, dealing with social welfare, the bank etc., there was a lot of information thrown at me. I would recall the information to her, and she would say, "write it down".

When I started driving, dealing with the RSA and the like was something I had to do. After the many driving lessons and the many, many, many tests that I ended up doing, I would tell her the feedback that I was given, and she would say, "write it down".

Last night I did not write it down. I am ashamed of myself. I am a bloody idiot. I started carrying around a pocket notebook the previous year for a while. Not much came out of it, but I think it is time to start that up again. That is the beauty of life. Life is an experiment. If something works, it works. If it doesn't work, maybe it will work at some point. I realise that now. I have learnt my lesson.

I have prided myself on all the productivity and self-help malarky I see other people do, and I have tried to follow suit. I guess it takes practice. Everything is practice. Exercise is practice. Writing is practice, and meditating is practice. The important thing is that we don't give up. I don't say I give up on things anymore. I acknowledge that I know it is still there and that I have every intention in the world to return to it, like the gym.

That may sound like a cop-out, but a saying comes to mind. I don't know who said it, but it goes like this: never give up on something you can't go a day without thinking about. Isn't that nice?

Thank you for attending today's lecture. I hope you took notes. Lord knows I should have.

Have a great day, and thank you for reading.