Dear Writer,
When I read Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magic for my podcast Big Strong Yes, I got a lot of valuable creative advice from it. But if I had to pick the one most powerful thing that I took home from reading that book, it would have to be that a writer (or any creative person) really only has one job.
And that is to show up.
Same time. Every day. Even if it’s just 20 minutes. All you have to do is show up.
If you write, great. If you don’t, fine. What’s important is that you just don’t do anything else. And how hard is it to do nothing for 20 minutes?
Not hard at all. And when that 20 minutes is over, you know you did your job.
You showed up.
Eventually, you will write during that time. Eventually, you’ll fly through the 20 minutes and look up at the clock and realize two hours have gone by and you’ve written 1100 words.
Waiting around for inspiration isn’t going to cut it; we all know that. But that doesn’t mean you have to work without inspiration. If you make sure that inspiration knows where and when to find you, it will find you. It might take a few days, but it will find you.
So pick your time and your place now. That’s today’s job. And tomorrow, and the day after that, your job is to show up.
It works, I promise.
Everything,
L