It doesn’t have to be that hard

When I was at the happy hour celebrating the last day of my corporate job, one of my mentors asked me, “Five years from now, what will you have accomplished that you’d be proud to share?” Without hesitation, I said “I’ll have written a book.”

Mind you, at the time, I hadn’t actually thought about it that much. I had an inkling that I’d like to write a book, but I had no idea what that would entail, and not even a solid idea of what I would write about. Have you ever had one of those moments where something flies out of your mouth and even you are a little surprised by it? Yep. That was me in that moment. And yet it felt right. 

One thing that I remember being very deliberate about was not letting what others said about the book-writing process get under my skin. A universal theme seemed to be “It’s really hard,” and even though I knew that, a part of me also knew that I could just keep putting one foot in front of the other and get it done without making that “it’s really hard” thought the focal point of my experience. 

Just over two years after I made that statement, my book was published. It didn’t take 5 years. Is there something that you really want to do or create? That you’ve thought about a lot? Maybe you’ve also been told or have heard that it’s really hard. Maybe you question if you have what it takes. How will you ever know unless you do it? You don’t have to have it all mapped out. You just need to take the first or next step.