Category: consistency (page 1 of 2)

education as resistance

March 22, 2017 / / 0 Comments

Knowledge is power. But power is only potential energy. It has to be put into action in order to be of any real value in the world.

I’m as guilty as anyone of reading too many books and articles, watching way too many videos, and taking too many online courses/webinars without actually getting anything done. I research the hell out of things. I always did this with term papers in college, too. I’d spend the majority of my time compiling information, with all of the real work happening at the eleventh hour. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty good at spinning my wheels.

You can be constantly acquiring information and knowledge, but you’ll never be an expert in your field unless you implement that knowledge. You have to DO your craft in order to hone your craft. You can be an expert at learning, but you’ll never be an expert at what you do unless you physically do it. Book learning and head knowledge alone can’t do what loads of practice can.

Learning without application is like watching a workout video from the couch. Don’t expect to see results if you’re only learning the moves instead of moving.

What sets apart the experts in any given field is that they’ve put in hundreds–if not thousands–of hours of practice. They are constantly honing their craft. If you want to be on the same playing field as the best of the best, it’s not enough to watch what they do and hear what they say. And comparison will only cripple you. You have to do what they do every single day. Implement your craft in your own unique style, and do it constantly. That is the one foolproof way to get great at anything.

Bottom line: be a perennial student, but don’t forget to do the work. Consistent practice is the key to mastering your craft.

perfectionism (series recap)

March 2, 2016 / / 0 Comments

The last few weeks have been a series of posts on the various aspects of perfectionism as resistance. This week I want to pull them all together and recap how we can overcome the offshoots of perfectionism that keep us from doing important work.

Paralysis

  • Many of us don’t start something because we have this perfect idea of the outcome that we’re afraid we won’t attain. We are so afraid of going the wrong direction that we go nowhere.
  • Fear of failure a vicious cycle that can be broken by repeated failure, otherwise known as practice.
  • We long for purpose and meaning in what we do. For this we need a plan in order to prevent paralysis. Preparing for our work equips us for success.
  • Identity: sometimes we are daunted by the idea that our work will define us. What’s more important is to consistently do work you enjoy, regardless of how you will be perceived by others.

Procrastination

  • For creatives, procrastination can stem from caring so much about the outcome that we’re paralyzed from even starting because we’re afraid of doing something less than perfect. The longer you wait to do something, the more you build up in your head and hold it to an unattainable standard.
  • Proficiency in anything is only possible with lots of practice.
  • You’ll go further taking one step every day than you will staring at the chasm you intend to overcome in a single jump. Don’t be so intimidated by the distance that you don’t make that first step.

Consistency

  • Having a routine makes you more likely to get things done because you don’t have to waste time deciding what needs to be done.
  • If you want to build momentum and avoid flaking out on what you need to do, show up every day and don’t break the chain.
  • Practice constantly. Create prolific amounts of work to hone your skills every single day.
  • “Continuous improvement is better than delayed perfection.”   –Mark Twain
  • Others see the story of you and your work by what you consistently do.

What do you struggle with when it comes to just doing the work? What prevents you from consistently creating? When do you feel tempted to break the chain? Drop me an email and let me know what kinds of resistance you face in your creative work.

making good creases

December 2, 2015 / / 0 Comments

It’s already December, and while I haven’t done an awful lot of my own creative work lately, I have already wrapped all of my Christmas gifts. One way I love to decorate gifts is with origami ornaments. It’s a fun way to add a decorative pop of color and a personal touch. This is about the only time of year that I do any origami, and I always think how fun and relaxing it is and that I should do it more often. Once you know the basics, it’s kind of a zen-like hobby. It’s amazing what you can do with nothing more than a single sheet of 6 x 6″ paper.

One important thing about the art of origami is not only making precise folds, but making strong ones. A good fold is one that you’ve creased very hard, and sometimes one that has been folded back and forth several times to make a crease that will go either direction later. Sometimes you’ll need a mountain fold (wrong sides of the paper are together so the crease makes a peak) and sometimes you’ll need a valley fold (right sides of the paper are together so that the crease forms a “V”). Often you’ll have made twenty or thirty folds, then unfold it completely just to make one little fold go a different direction before you continue. Steps 1-30 were just the groundwork for you to be able to go back and make that one little pocket fold in step 31. If you made good folds, getting back to step 31 will be effortless.

There’s a lot of groundwork to origami. 90% of the piece consists of preliminary folds that won’t look anything like the finished product until the very end.

Sometimes a lot of our work can feel insignificant or fruitless. We can feel like we’re doing a lot of work for nothing, or for no audience. But perhaps it’s important to remember that much of what we do is akin to the preliminary folds that build the foundation of the finished product; without which our desired results would not be possible. Everything done with the end in mind helps to wear a groove into your workflow to make the next step in the process that much easier, either this time or next time or the next one hundred times. When you are on step thirty and it feels like you have to undo everything you’ve already done, remember that it made step thirty-one possible, and that you’re on your way toward your end goal. Both mountains and valleys have made the rest of the work possible. It may not look like much even 90% of the way through, but when you achieve what you set out to do, the seemingly meaningless preparatory steps will have been well worth it.

the zen of bridge building

October 28, 2015 / / 0 Comments

Would you rather have a slow-roasted meal or a microwaved one? Good things take time.

We are often encouraged to “dream big,” but following the right path for you doesn’t have to be this big, revolutionary endeavor. Rather, it’s a series of single steps in the right direction. Whether it’s quitting your day job or training for a marathon, the process is gradual, not one grand dramatic act. I’ve been reading Jeff Goins’ book “The Art of Work.” In the fourth chapter, he says that too many people put all their energy into making the leap rather than building the bridge. The beauty of bridges is that you don’t have to see way into the distance where you want to land; you can take it one step at a time.

“First, we flirt with [our dreams] from afar. Then we fantasize, imagining what life will be like when we are united with what we love, without ever doing any real work. We wait, building up courage, and save all our passion for the big day when we will abandon everything and go for it. And finally, we take the leap.

Sometimes, though, we don’t make it to the other side. We fall on our faces. Doing our best to pick ourselves up, we dust ourselves off and try again. But if this happens enough, we begin to tell ourselves a familiar story. We remind ourselves that the world is a cold, cruel place, and maybe there’s no room in it for my dream. We get disillusioned and make the worst mistake you can make with a calling: we save all our energy for the leap instead of building a bridge.” (emphasis mine)

This idea of one step at a time coexists nicely with the kaizen mindset. Anyone who has worked at Trader Joe’s or Toyota can tell you that “kaizen” means improvement by gradual steps. Like the “work smarter not harder” adage we’ve all heard, kaizen is a Japanese philosophy that means “good change.” You can make things a little better every single day by constantly refining your process. It’s a very deliberate way of shaving off time and unnecessaries in order to optimize the things you regularly do, whittling away anything that detracts from keeping the main thing the main thing. It’s very much like a river defining its path over a once rough terrain; it may take years, but eventually the path is smooth, well-defined, beautiful, and strong. It is also not unlike building a bridge, one step at a time, to cross a river that we may not be able to jump across.

As it relates to writing, I recently learned that the famous author Graham Greene only writes 500 words a day and stops, even if it’s in the middle of a sentence. That struck me as a small number of words for a successful writer (this blog post is longer than that), but also made me feel better about where I am as a fledgling writer. Just showing up and taking a step is keeping you on the path to your dream. Every book starts with one word, then words become sentences, sentences become paragraphs, then chapters, then a whole novel. But no one writes a novel overnight. No one takes a big leap and suddenly a prolific work is accomplished. It takes time and work and a daily decision to take a step and keep going.

It’s easy to psyche ourselves out and feel overwhelmed when we dream big. That’s because we want it now and we want it so much that we start thinking about what sacrifices we can make to achieve that big dream. But if it’s a worthy dream, be prepared to nurture it with hard work and lots of time. Dream as big as you can, but take comfort in the idea that you don’t have to have every step in place right now. Just take the next step in the right direction. Repeat.

The path will more than likely change as you go, but you’ll be better for it. If a rock is in a river’s path, it doesn’t stop the river; the river goes around it and keeps going. Make your own process the best it can be every day. Great things take time, so be patient grasshopper.

What dream seems distant to you right now? What is the next step you need to take?

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