Take the First Step
The Creative Rebellion • Dispatch #010 • 5 min. read
There's nothing like finishing a project. You get an immense sense of satisfaction upon seeing what all the hours and effort you've poured into something have brought forth. But that's at the end of a project. It takes a lot of work to get to the end. In fact, the hardest part of getting to the end might be starting.
Depending on the scope of your project, it can be intimidating to even think about the finished project before you even start. That's our old friend (foe), Resistance, whispering, "that looks like a lot of work. Are you sure you can handle it?"
Even relatively small projects can carry that weight of apprehension. Resistance doesn't discriminate. It will find ways to freeze us in our tracks before we take a single step.
It happens for me with this email.
I don't always know what I'm going to write about. I know I've made you a promise to send out something valuable every Saturday, and I take that promise seriously. But sometimes I sit down to write this and I don't know what I'm going to say. And if I stop there, Resistance will turn to fear. Fear that I don't have anything valuable to say. Fear that this email will be a waste of your time. Fear that you'll unsubscribe.
But there's a secret to getting past Resistance and fear:
Starting.
It's really that simple.
I don't have to figure out all 700-1,000 words before I write the first sentence. I just have to start.
And the act of starting pushes Resistance aside and starts moving me forward.
Starting is more than half the battle.
Sure, there will be moments in the middle where you get lost and don't know which way to go. And there are times towards the end when you start to wonder if it all makes sense, and there's a fear of setting your creation free into the wild world. But those aren't problems to worry about at the start.
At the start, we're only worried about the first step.
Not even the second.
The beginning is all about building momentum.
It's the same for a post on social media, an email, or a book. The process for each has a beginning, a middle, and an end.
For a drawing, it could be a quick pencil sketch, a pen and ink drawing, or a highly detailed oil on canvas. The bigger the project, the bigger the Resistance can be, but they all start with starting.
Pick up the pencil, the pen, the brush, the chisel. Sit down at the keyboard, the piano, the easel. Whatever you're working on, make a mark. Make a line. Write a word. Play a note. You're not committed to the whole project yet, you're just convincing your mind that your body will take care of this, one step at a time.
Newton's First Law of Motion states that a body at rest will remain at rest unless an outside force acts on it, and a body in motion at a constant velocity will remain in motion in a straight line unless acted upon by an outside force.
Your willpower is the outside force.
All you need is one single, defiant act in the face of Resistance.
And once you're in motion, it's much easier to keep going.
Starting can be the hardest part.
Here's what Steven Pressfield says about fear in his book (that I highly recommend), The War of Art:
Are you paralyzed with fear? That’s a good sign. Fear is good. Like self-doubt, fear is an indicator. Fear tells us what we have to do. Remember our rule of thumb: The more scared we are of a work or calling, the more sure we can be that we have to do it.
Resistance is experienced as fear; the degree of fear equates the strength of Resistance. Therefore, the more fear we feel about a specific enterprise, the more certain we can be that that enterprise is important to us and to the growth of our soul.
In addition to this email every week, I've been struggling a lot with writing lately. From LinkedIn posts to making progress on two different books I'm writing, I keep finding excuses not to get started every day.
This week, I shared on LinkedIn it took me 40 years to journal consistently. Now I've finally made it a habit. (You can read that post here if you wish).
The summary is this: the pages on the left are every journal entry from February 2006–December 2022. The pages on the right are from January 1, 2023–June 13, 2023.
I've written in this journal more in the last six months than I did in the entire previous sixteen years!
The visual of seeing the pages on the right was proof to me of how important it is to:
Commit to showing up every day
Start
Those two acts is all it takes to finish a project when you break it down to its simplest form.
Show up today. Repeat.
Over time, you build the sentences, the paragraphs, the pages, the chapters, until finally all the pages are full, and the book is written.
I'm "currently" writing two books, a non-fiction book on creativity and AI that I started at the beginning of 2023 (and which got way too big in my head, so I'm rethinking it entirely) and a fiction book (MG fantasy) that I started writing as a screenplay about nine years ago.
I started on both of them. But then I stopped. And the longer they have sat dormant (sure, changing jobs, moving houses, and all of life's busyness are good excuses), the harder it is to start again. In fact, it might even be harder to restart than it was to start in the first place.
But those pages on the right side of my journal...they give me hope. They inspire me that I don't have to write the whole book. And my plotter heart doesn't have to have the end figured out, or know every twist and turn, or even settle on the character's names yet.
All I have to do is write a few words each day.
Those words will turn into sentences.
Those sentences will turn into paragraphs.
Those paragraphs will turn into pages.
Those pages will turn into chapters.
And those chapters will make a book.
First things first:
Start.
As one of the Victorian age's finest poets, Christina Rossetti, said:
Can anything be sadder than work left unfinished?
Yes; work never begun.
Here's a list of great books that I've found inspiring in my creative journey. (A word of warning, though: don't let reading others' thoughts on creativity take the place of actually doing the work yourself).
The War of Art by Steven Pressfield
Show Your Work by Austin Kleon
Steal Like an Artist by Austin Kleon
Keep Going by Austin Kleon
The Creative Act: A Way of Being by Rick Rubin
The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron
What are you avoiding starting or restarting right now? Reply to this dispatch and let me know. I love hearing from those of you who have replied to previous dispatches. Thank you for sharing your creative journey with me. We're not as alone as we sometimes think we are.
Stay rebellious,
Travis
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