Ok, I am sure my titles are getting more pretentious!
The fact is though that a commitment like the one I have made to write a blog post for 31 days in a row is hard.
If I am honest almost every commitment I have made is hard – and that is why many times in the past I have failed at them…
Of course sometimes I have succeeded… and I am not sure if it is because I am getting older or whether it is because I have a better sense of my life’s passion, or whether it is something else entirely but I am finding my commitments are getting easier. If pushed I would say it is because I am getting fitter… and that improved physical well-being and not smoking just gives me much more energy and drive.
Today I was struggling really with what to write about…
And I remembered some advice I received which is that if you don’t know what to write about just write one sentence… and then who knows where this will take you.
So that is what I did – I started writing and carried on and now here I am and we are 201 words in and 11 sentences so far… and now I am in a bit of a flow and will be able to write more…
It struck me that this is really exceptional advice for any aspect of life that you might be struggling in.
Whether it is:
- Losing weight – start with one less can of coke – or start with running for a minute
- Writing the great World novel – start with writing just one sentence
- Building a house – start with one brick
- Dental hygiene – BJ Fogg’s great example of flossing one tooth at a time.
- Insert your favourite example here…
You cure it by just starting…
As my buddy Brandon likes to say:
Whatever you’re putting off, just start
Because the struggle isn’t going anywhere
What are you struggling with? What could you start today?
Let me know in the comments and also for a bonus prize let me know what you are going to do to just start.
And if you are truly stuck for ideas you can do what I did when I first started trying to write and that was to join a challenge on what is now called Coach.me where they have a group called Write 500 Words Every Day. In there so far four writing coaches have run these 30 day challenges with a prompt for each day…
I have summarised the four coaches prompts below – to get more details you would need to look at Lift – It’s a nice challenge to do.
And the coaches so far have been:
- Cecily Kellogg is a writer and blogger and you can find out more about her at her website: http://www.cecilyk.com/
- Dane Sanders hosts the Converge, the Business of Creativity Podcast and also runs WeaveWriter, a writing challenge – with more great prompts.
- Jeff Goins is a writer and a speaker. You can find out more about him at http://goinswriter.com/about-me/
- Paul Jun is another writer and blogs at www.motivatedmastery.com
[one_fourth_first]
Cecily Kellogg
Write a letter to your inner critic
Write a love letter as though your last
Write a Press Release
Moving Day
How are your mornings
Tell a carefully edited truth
Write a character study or a customer avatar
Defend a lie
Mix memoir and fictions
Write about climbing
Lets talk about slaying dragons
Firsts
Branding
Wounded
Something Missing
Apologies and Forgiveness
Contradictions
Distractions
The Dreaded Elevator Pitch
Fantasy
This changes everything
Why, Why not?
What is your theme song?
Reverse Bucket List
Sticking Point
Taking Notes
Favourite Words
Endings
Who taught you storytelling?
[/one_fourth_first]
Hi Justin
Thanks for that post. I was just sitting here wondering the same thing: what to write about. Now I’m going to just start.
Cheers
Megan
Thanks Megan, Looking forward to seeing your writing… Definitely a question of just starting and then seeing where it takes us. The nice thing about a 31 day challenge like this write and run one is that if necessary I can always use the next 31 days to edit and hone the original 31 days worth of blog posts! I am hoping and indeed expect however that the more I write and exercise the idea muscle the easier the writing will become!
Great thoughts Justin! And this Brandon guy sounds like an incredible fellow. And I totally agree with everything you said. You can’t take step 1,000 until you take step 1. Much easier to just focus on step 1 and get to cranking.
Can’t make a million till you’re out of poverty. Might as well focus on getting out of poverty first. It’s always the first step!! But the first step can always be tough and make us all vulnerable and fearful. But that “awareness” can give us each a lot of power.
Awesome stuff broham, and I know you’ll keep busting out killer content throughout the next 30 days.
Fortunately there is only 24 days to go!
Thanks for the comments and you are absolutely right about the awareness being the key.