Facing the blank page
Show up for your dream
“What do you want to be when you grow up?”
Twenty years ago I would have firmly stated I wanted to be a helicopter pilot, just like my dad. I was going to go to the Naval Academy, then fly V-22’s in the Marine Corps. I was certain about that throughout most of my childhood, even though it’s not the route I would ultimately take.
If you were to ask me that same question today you wouldn’t find a drop of that certainty. My mind seems to melt into a puddle of indecisiveness at the mere thought of choosing.
Alright, maybe that’s a bit much. I could certainly name a few potential professions. In fact, I could name a lot of potential professions, and that, I’ve decided, is a big part of the problem. I have many competing interests.
It would be easy to lean on “I have too many interests” as a crutch and remain indecisive. And I’ve done just that for many years now. But I think the real problem is that I know exactly what I want to do. The thought of it just scares the hell out of me and the thought of failing at it worries me even more.
I’ve always been someone with a lot of hobbies, someone that’s never struggled to stay busy. From art to fitness, music and the outdoors, no matter what the situation is, I can always find something to keep myself entertained and I’ve always liked that about myself. I love my hobbies.
But one day this thought started creeping into my head, looming larger as the months and years have past. It was the thought that one of those hobbies was more important to me than the others.
For someone with a lot of hobbies, that felt like I was saying I loved one child more than all the others (we all know it’s true, you just don’t say it out loud). But regardless of my other hobbies feelings I started telling myself that I wanted to be a writer.
Writing always gave me this very tangible outlet and seemed to serve many different purposes for me. From documenting my day and ideas to just trying to make general sense of the world, it has always been a pivotal tool for me to navigate my life.
But, after years of telling myself this and no books, or major portfolio to show for it, I’ve started to question my commitment to the dream. Is it legitimate or have I just romanticized it in my mind? Do I really want to be a writer or do I just want the stigma and status that comes with it? And why the hell haven’t I produced anything?
What is holding me back from to starting to produce and turning a hobby into a profession?
The way I see it now, there are a couple of things at play here:
- A lack of priority and structure —
I never realized it before, but I’ve been hiding behind my other hobbies for years now. I’m too afraid to pick a favorite child so I haven’t prioritized the development of that passion over others. For example, I love photography, but I can spend days nitpicking details and editing photos and if I were trying to be a photographer, that’s exactly what I should be doing, but I’m not. That has to change, and I’ve started being much stricter about what photos I spend time on and which ones are just fine as is.
2. I’m afraid —
I’m afraid of being judged and I’m afraid that I’ll run out of things to say. I worry that if I set a daily or weekly deadline I’ll never be able to produce enough content to meet those goals continuously. But in reality, as Seth Godin says,
I’m just “afraid of bad writing.”
Writers block is a fictional concept. There’s no such thing as plumbers block, or runners block. You just do it. And if you feel like you don’t have anything to say, well the only way to figure that out and find your niche is to write about anything that comes to mind. Something will eventually spark. The topic and the audience will find you, if you put the effort in.
You just need to get accustomed to poor writing. Only after you’ve written enough bad pieces will you eventually come up with something worthy of other peoples time and even then, most people will never read it! So stop judging your worth based off of how many clicks, likes, or shares you get. The perfection is in the practice. You need to put in the time before you see results.
“Do the verb to be the noun.” — Jim Kwik
So here’s my goal to combat this “I’ve got too many hobbies”, excuse. If I want to work on my other hobbies still, that’s fine, but prioritize first. Write for at least half an hour every morning before I allow myself to do anything else. It might not seem like much, but it’s a start, and if I still love writing after a week of that then we’ll crank it up to 45 minutes, and so on until I really am a writer.
I’ve always been someone that wanted to blend in, it’s time to break that pattern and do something bold. Not that writing to an audience of exactly zero is bold, but baby steps, man!
