5 years
Back when I started my business and created my website (yes, I designed and built the very first version myself!), I made a space for a blog and I thought, oh good, a place to put all my big, important thoughts about things! 😂
And in the first five years I wrote about a dozen posts.
(When were all those big important thoughts gonna show up??!)
Five years ago, I decided to commit to posting once a week. Given my track record, this seems rather ridiculous in hindsight.
But here I am, five years later and, aside from summer and winter breaks, I have posted every single week of those five years. And it feels like a real milestone.
Each year, I reflect on this habit. Mostly I marvel that I’m still doing it. But there are also some things that come to me the longer I stick with it…
There were a lot of days I felt like quitting. Days when I couldn’t think of anything interesting to say, days when the words didn’t flow, days when I just didn’t wanna write at all…and the key for me was to keep the habit in the forefront (writing once a week) instead of any sort of long-term outcome (like making it to this milestone). Like most things, the hardest (and most important) part is showing up each day.
Showing up and doing something that seems impossible, or maybe just unlikely, makes me feel strong and capable. It reminds me I can do hard things and I can accomplish a lot when I stick to things.
There is infinite delight in the unexpected emails I get when a post resonates with someone and they take the time to tell me. That counts for more than any NYT bestseller list ever could (says the never-published non-NYT-bestseller-list writer 😂). I write for myself, but it tickles me endlessly to know it hit for someone else.
I don’t think I ever would have expected, five years ago, to be hitting this milestone. I probably figured I’d do it for six months or maybe even a year…but somewhere along the way, it became a sacred practice, a thing that felt closer to a part of my identity than just a habit or a goal. I think for most of my life I’ve thought that we are defined by what we accomplish, but this experience is shifting my perspective – perhaps we are most defined by what we show up for, day after day, no matter where it leads us…
What do YOU show up for?
