This blog post is something. It’s something to fill this space, on this screen, at this time. It is my way of taking my own advice: something is better than nothing. I’ve been sitting in front of my computer trying to write this week’s blog, which needs to go live tonight. I’ve started and stopped three different posts, and stared at just about every wall and ceiling in the apartment.
Strictly speaking, this is cheating. I had nothing to write, so I’m writing about having nothing to write. But you see, as I was staring off at the wall and running my hands frustratedly through my hair and over my face, I had an image of my old roommate saying “write something.” I had an image of my fiancée saying “write something.”
Tonight, this is me writing something. And while it may be a weak excuse for a blog, it’s important. It represents me fulfilling a promise: the promise that every Tuesday, there will be a new post on NickWrites.net.
There’s a strategy created and popularized by Jerry Seinfeld: “Don’t break the chain.” Many articles have been written about it, so I won’t go into too much detail here. In short, Jerry had a huge calendar for the year, and every day he wrote new material, he would put a big red “X” over the day. The goal is not to break that chain of Xs, and indeed, the longer it gets, the less inclined you are to break it. You can apply this to writing, to exercising, to meditating—whatever you want.
I’ve used this strategy before. My problem is, once I break that chain once, I lose a lot of the imperative not to break it again. It’s certainly a character flaw of mine. As human beings living in the world, we are bound to miss our goals at some point, at least for a day or a week. At some point, I likely won’t be able to get a blog post up on a Tuesday. But I am trying to push that day back as far as possible, because once I miss one Tuesday, it’s pretty easy for me to miss another.
The biggest consequence of having started and stopped so many endeavors, writing and otherwise, isn’t that I don’t have a big body of finished work or a perfect physique. No, the biggest consequence is that I’ve stopped believing myself. When I set a goal, when I say I’m going to do something, immediately I think, “No you won’t.” All of my other endeavors have come to an end, no matter how strongly I felt at the beginning. What makes the newest one on any given day any different?
It’s a depressing feeling when you don’t believe the promises you make to yourself. It’s hard to be motivated when you’ve immediately called yourself a liar and a failure. So my most important goal right now is restore my belief in myself. The world is fairly good at throwing up obstacles of its own.
The least I can do is be on my own side.