The Wrong Kind of Click For Writers
A lesson in motivation from Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
In Tennessee Williams' 1955 Pulitzer Prize-winning play Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, we meet Brick Pollitt - a former football star turned brooding alcoholic - who spends much of the play drinking bourbon and trying to escape the emotional wreckage of his life.
Brick is distant, disillusioned and damaged.
And more than anything, he’s waiting.
For the click.
Not success. Not healing. Not even peace.
Just the moment when his mind stops spinning.
When the weight of his grief, guilt, and fractured marriage lifts.
When, as he puts it, the "click" happens, and he can finally detach from it all.
For Brick, the click is a coping mechanism. A fleeting sensation of clarity that arrives only after enough bourbon dulls the pain.
It doesn’t solve anything. It simply numbs everything.
Escape, not resolution.
Numbness, not clarity.
And while we (hopefully) might not share Brick’s struggle with the bottle, there’s something in his longing that feels unsettlingly familiar to online writers.
Because we chase our own version of the click.
Not with bourbon, but with dopamine.
The little hit when someone subscribes.
When a post goes viral.
When an article is well liked.
We wait for those moments to validate our effort.
To make the hard work feel worth it.
To silence the self-doubt.
But here’s the uncomfortable truth:
If we’re writing just for that click - for the relief, the response, the recognition - we’re building on shaky ground.
Brick’s click doesn’t heal him.
It keeps him stuck.
So does ours, if we rely on external feedback to feel like real writers.
What can we learn from this?
Don’t wait for the click.
Don’t wait for perfect clarity. Don’t wait for inspiration. Don’t wait for applause.
Show up anyway.
Write to process.
Write to express.
Write to grow.
Let the act of writing be the clarity - not the temporary escape from your life.
Because if we treat writing like a coping mechanism, it will disappoint us.
But if we treat it like a craft; quiet, disciplined, and daily - we begin to build something real.
Not everyone will clap.
Not every sentence will shine.
But we will move forward.
Not away from our lives - but through them.
That’s why we write every weekday inside Weekday Writer.
Not for the clicks.
But because writing is the way through.
Subscribe to Weekday Writer and build a writing habit that’s grounded in practice, not performance.
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