(note: I am challenging myself to write every day for 30 days. What follows may not necessarily be interesting or even coherent. Parental discretion is advised.)
Wow… This is it, folks! Thirty days of writing every day and I made it to the finish line without needing to pour a cup of water down my shirt.
When I started this experiment, expectations were low. I wasn’t thinking about the benefits of writing every single day but I felt like I needed a challenge and I’m glad I was able to achieve what I did. Credit goes to my lady for suggesting the idea in the first place.
There were days when I really didn’t want to write. There were days when I felt like my writing was crap, but there were also days when I realized that I liked having a routine and needing to push myself to fulfill an obligation.
I wasn’t sure what I would be writing about for my final post of this challenge. I thought it needed to be bold and epic and transformative and the most amazing conclusion ever — but really, the honest truth is that right now I’m just happy to have made it and don’t have a whole lot to say that I haven’t already spoken about.
In those thirty days I wrote across a wide range of topics and styles. Poetry, articles, personal confessions, stories, reviews and I learned from all this that I do have things to say when my back is against the wall. If you sit at a blank screen, eventually an idea will come if a bit of patience is exercised.
That was an interesting lesson for me to learn.
If you are reading this and are curious as to whether you can accomplish the same as I have — I say yes. Absolutely you can! Setting yourself a realistic goal and committing to it is a great feeling that can be applied not only to writing, but to working out, eating proper foods, going for a walk each day, getting up early at a certain time, constructing a piece of art, learning a new skill or even keeping a clean home all can be looked at as goals to be paid attention towards and executed upon.
It really is not that difficult to find twenty minutes per day and allocate the time to something that will benefit you. But it has to be taken seriously. It needs to be consistent because the momentum of keeping a streak going is what provides the fuel. At least for me it does. It gets harder to start the engine up again once you turn it off.
Going from here, I’m not sure what my next challenge will be. Do I keep writing every day? Maybe. I’ll be taking a break to consider what the best option would be.
I value my ability to write and though I may not have a lot of followers on Medium, I find that doing something with pride and commitment is as rewarding as any public validation would be. We don’t run marathons for the approval of others, we run to challenge ourselves. Tough to make that distinction for a writer who relies upon an audience, but that is a good foundation to have and build off of for anything you hope to achieve.
Do what makes you happy.
Live with passion and commitment to growth and personal development.
Aim at becoming a better person.
Momentum. Growth. Spirit. Willpower.
Heart.
These are the qualities that make life exciting and worth living.
If we aren’t growing, we’re dying.
The hardest part is being able to take the first step.
After that, it gets a heck of a lot easier.
Thank you Fola Veritas, for your support and encouragement in doing this.
Thanks also to my buddy Dan who inspired me by undertaking his own challenge which he posted up on YouTube.
And thank you all for reading.
Yatta!
