A constant struggle with yourself. How do you start? Do I do it or not? Is it a good idea? How do I write something of value to others? Well you have to start with stories from your own life. And you have to leverage the power of necessity. Well, you say, that’s easy to say. It is. Here’s how you can do it.
Starting
The hardest part is starting.
Well, if truth be said, that’s a half-truth. It can be extremely hard to start, because we perceive the start as some giant task. I want to write a book, make a movie, become a professional photographer. It seems daunting.
The way to overcome this is to make starting something low-risk and make it very easy to do.
Write one word on a piece of paper. Just one. It starts with one. Can you do that? Any word?
Film one scene, or shot, it can be one second or less.
Take one picture. Only one.
Put on your running shoes. Just do that.
Dissect your goal into it’s most basic component and go do that. One step. One thing. The hard part is not starting, once you understand that starting, actually, only means doing the most basic element of your goal. The hard part is being consistent, following through and showing up again and again.
Leveraging Necessity
To facilitate that, you don’t want to have to make a decision as whether or not to do it every time. Because inevitably, it’s human nature, you will quit the moment it becomes hard and you don’t feel like it. So, rather, you make it something that is necessary.
Necessity breeds action in ways that you can’t imagine. That’s the power of deadlines. You have to get it done by that time or date you set and you don’t have a choice of putting it off.
For instance these 30 days of daily posts are just that. A structure that forces me to write stuff. It doesn’t matter that what I’m writing is good. What matters is that I’m writing stuff. Making content. If I write enough my writing is going to get better over time. I’ll be more effective at it.
You need to do. I need to do. To practice. To make. That is the only way you are ever going to get to where you want.
Do.
So create deadlines and structures that force you to put out content. The quality of the content is not as important as the act of creating. This forces production, reduces the fear of performance because you don’t care whether what you do is good. You simply care that you put in the work, and showed up.
This is something I struggle with every day. This is what Steven Pressfield, in The War of Art
Force yourself to create and you will improve because that is the only way you will. Force yourself to create and you will be forced to improve because you will learn to be concise and more efficient. That is how journalists become journalists. They must write something every day. A story. Anything. But it has to be done.
Make deadlines for yourself. Realize your future self will not be more likely to take action than you are willing to take right now. Force your future self’s hand. Get him to produce.
Start a 30 day trial, a daily challenge. Force yourself to create. Do that one simple thing and repeat it for 30 days. See how better off you’ll be. Go ahead do it. Plan. Execute.