"Reading and writing more" are just aspirations. Those don't translate well to new behaviors. BJ Fogg (Stanford prof, behavioral scientist) lays out how to build new behaviors in Tiny Habits. You need to make them easy and attach the easy thing to something you already do regularly. (When I sit down to lunch, I read one page...) https://tinyhabits.com/

Secondly, your mind is interfering with its own work. Tim Gallwey talks about this in the Inner Game of Tennis (which is not really about tennis! ;). Your critic is not allowing you to "run hot" and put down some words that are less than perfect. It would be helpful to find something to focus your mind on, a simple count, like key strokes or word count. Alternatively, there's the practice of Morning Pages from the Artist's Way. Just let yourself write anything for a while. It's not for publication. You need to open the gates and you can do that by lowering the stakes involved with putting a word on the page.

Inner Game

https://www.amazon.com/Inner-Game-Tennis-Classic-Performance...

Artists Way

https://www.amazon.com/Artists-Way-25th-Anniversary/dp/01431...

I wrote about some other stuff here that helps.

https://vonnik.substack.com/p/a-few-ideas-that-made-my-life-...

agree. well said

we are all wired diff. adding 3 more - may or may not work for you but here we go:

1/ explore new ideas: read, go look at art in museum, play games. expose yourself to creative work of others 2/ read https://www.amazon.com/Artists-Way-25th-Anniversary/dp/01431... and do some of the exercises 3/ workout. if already doing it = ignore. if not = exercise. 5+ days/week

tldr/same as OP: take action

Yes, I think most people would consider 35 too late to stop one career (where you might already be making something of yourself, but aren't satisfied) and start another (that you might actually love).

With reasons ranging from too risky in terms of expected cost/benefit, to you can't learn as quickly, to family obligations won't give you the time or energy required.

I personally think the learning speed one is bunk -- even if your brain slows down a little (debatable), it seems more than made up for by experience in how you learn most efficiently, on top of general life experience.

So lists like this help remind you that you still can, if you're so inclined. For more inspiration in the creative direction (e.g. writing like in this list), see particularly the well-known book The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. [1]

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Artists-Way-25th-Anniversary/dp/01431...