A little bit is better than nada

"Not good enough" is not good enough

Dear Writer,

In May of 1998, my kids’ dad and I drove from Tucson to Las Vegas to get married. The whole drive, we listened to one CD: The Best of the Texas Tornados. My favorite song on the album was “Little Bit is Better Than Nada.”¹ I loved that song for its bouncy, fun energy, and I will always remember the two of us singing along as we wound our way over the Hoover Dam to get started on our lives together. But looking back, I wish I’d learned back then to love that song less for its bounce, and more for the message in its refrain.

A little bit is better than nada…

I’m an all-or-nothing kind of girl. If I do something, I want to do it all the way.

If I find time to exercise, but I walk instead of run?

Not good enough. Might as well not bother.

If I try to start eating healthier, but five days in I fall into a pint of Ben & Jerry’s?

Not good enough. Might as well not bother.

If I try to establish a new reading habit, but only read a few pages once a week instead of the entire chapter every night as planned?

Not good enough. Might as well not bother.

In the end, after too many days of not good enough, I’d inevitably just quit. I realize this comes from years of being culturally trained that nothing I ever did was good enough. I could never be successful enough, thin enough, pretty enough. No matter what I achieved, the goal line moved along with me, and I was always behind. It got to the point where if I couldn’t be sure I could do everything, I didn’t bother doing anything.

It only recently occurred to me that those people who tell us that whatever we’re doing isn’t good enough? Have something to gain from our sense of failure. If we drop the exercise or diet plan, we’ll be back in a few weeks or months looking for more advice, more help, another gym membership. If we don’t write that book or create the thing we’ve been wanting to create, it’s less competition for them.

I haven’t been reading as much as I want to. Every time I sit down to read, no matter what time of day, I get antsy because after so many years of trying to fit as much accomplishment into every day, doing only one thing—reading—gives me fits. It makes me jittery and nervous, and I hate that feeling, so I don’t read unless it’s on audiobooks² where I can also do something else at the same time, or something I’m reading for an audience, where I am reading and also taking notes. So I stopped reading at night, and then the other day I was thinking about my failed reading habit, and I heard Stephen King’s voice from his book On Writing: “If you don't have time to read, you don't have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.”

Not good enough. Might as well not bother.

And then, out of nowhere, the Texas Tornados started playing over Stephen. A little bit is better than nada… and I thought, “You know what, Tornados? You’re right.”

I don’t have to read a whole chapter every night. If I want to read, I need to create a space where I can read. If I read on my iPad while I knit or do something else, fine. If it turns out that the only kind of reading I’m going to be able to do from now on is listening to audiobooks while I do other things, fine.

It’s okay.

A little bit is better than nada.

Everything,

L

1. I warn you before you click that link… you will have that song in your head for the rest of the week.

You are welcome.

2. I would like to say here that listening to audiobooks IS reading. But I’m trying to JUST read, do JUST the one thing, and when I listen to audiobooks, I am always doing other things. Let’s just be clear, though; it’s still reading.