Well, it finally happened.
I missed a week of sending out this newsletter.
Kelly, Mochi, and I went on a road trip last week down the coast to San Diego, stopping along the way at different spots to eat and sleep.
During the trip, I noticed myself getting distracted as I debated whether to pull myself away from what we were doing to honor my consistency goal of publishing weekly.
This is my reflection on the internal struggle and what I learned in the process.
Creating my own suffering
I’m still amazed by how much angst and discomfort I felt from resisting to accept the thought of missing the rhythm I committed to.
My inner critic was having a field day:
You know that consistency is key — breaking the streak means failing!
You committed to a weekly cadence — does this mean you’re not committed enough?
You’ll no longer be able to say you’re a consistent writer!
With each passing day, it felt like I was sinking deeper into quicksand.
The feeling that really stung was: I’m letting myself down.
The struggle was entirely self-made. And it sucked.
Many times, I thought about sneaking away from what we were doing to publish something — anything — to check the box. To keep the story going. To look good.
I’d been developing this vision in my head of becoming someone who shows up and writes consistently, and my ego wanted to ruthlessly defend that vision.
Yet I wasn’t in the mental space to do that. I wanted to use this trip to enjoy being with my family — especially the little moments.
This struggle was not helping me do either.
Welcoming failure
Finally, something hit me that suddenly made it okay and felt like I could breathe again: What if I gave myself permission to screw up this week?
In my first post, I allowed myself to write imperfectly, but since I hadn’t missed a week of publishing, I realized I had built up an attachment to the momentum.
In doing so, I let the idea of failure become too powerful.
Yes, aim for consistency, but how about embracing the fact that I’m a student of the process? Instead of trying to push away the feelings of anxiety and disappointment, what could I learn from sitting with them?
As a friend had so elegantly put it, “Try to be okay with not being okay.”
Clearly, I wasn’t okay.
And trying to accept that I wasn’t okay gave me the space to observe my thoughts and feelings in a detached, almost scientific, way:
I really do care about this writing thing — being able to consistently overcome my self-doubts and share my evolving thinking.
When I say to myself I’m going to do something, it’s really important to me to follow through.
The intensity of my cognitive dissonance is indicative of how strong my commitment is to growing in this way.
Here’s the rub: I had let the idea of missing a week threaten my perception of my commitment and integrity… but I don’t have to.
We get to choose what we give meaning to.
We get to choose how we dance with setbacks along the way.
And I know that I’m in this for the long haul.
~
Thanks for reading.
Much love dude. Thanks for sharing this!