Twenty years ago, I joined a writer’s group that met at the library once a week. I aimed to publish a fiction book called “Three Thirty-Three” by my fiftieth birthday. I never met that goal, but I still have the first three chapters in a red box in the closet for “Someday.”
Fifteen years ago, I purchased my very first online course. It was titled “How to Be a Successful Blogger” and an “Introduction to Affiliate Marketing.” At the time, I had no idea what affiliate marketing was, but sign me up if it has something to do with shopping. I can do that!
I often think about where I would be today if I had just stuck with that one course, focused, and began taking baby steps on what was suggested and implemented. Or if I had continued working on that book? Would I now be a successful Blogger with monthly income made solely online, perhaps? Or a published author?
Instead, I’ve purchased other courses that offered varying opinions and strategies to make money online, improve my writing, self-improvement in general, painting courses, journaling courses, starting YouTube channel courses, photography courses, and then back to more blogging courses. I literally have a spreadsheet of courses by category with login information.
I love to learn. Well, I love learning if it sparks my business sense or creativity. I was never too keen on geometry, algebra, or calculus. Basic math and bookkeeping? That’s cool. I can make the most visually appealing spreadsheets you’ve ever seen.
Many of these courses were shelved to “available information if needed down the road” after watching one or two lessons. Others, such as painting tutorials, were never opened and left for “someday,” much like the self-improvement books I used to buy and never read.
I berate myself every time I look at this list of unfinished learning. What was I thinking when I bought this? What was my goal? How can this course help me to move further along on my path? Could it ever accomplish that target in the first place?
I admit to being swept away by the marketing and promises these courses offer, especially when it is an advertisement on Facebook or other social media. The combination of words and video is enough to completely eliminate any hesitation about the product’s viability and remove any sales resistance I may have left.
My husband would tell you that when God handed out sales resistance, I missed that train.
I am often attracted to shiny objects and the promise of possibility.
Is that such a bad thing?
It feels like it when I look at my spreadsheet of unfinished courses. At least with the unread books, I could donate them and not have them mocking me every time I turned on my computer. I don’t often dwell on my past mistakes, but they are there, just under the surface or, in this case, waiting to be opened on Google Drive.
It is late November as I am writing this. It’s that time when I look back over the past year, what I’ve accomplished, what I can improve on, the memories, and the gratitude.
Each of us around the Thanksgiving table remarks on what we are thankful for, and for me, besides my family, who are also first and foremost on the list, there was the fact that I’ve begun a consistent writing habit this past year.
I started posting online at least weekly before my sixty-fifth birthday last summer. Creating, completing, and sharing a post every week feels cathartic. Clicking away at the keyboard has always been my happy place. I’m likely not writing the next best-seller, but I hope my writing inspires someone else. Most writers feel that way, I believe.
Writing is a legacy to leave my family so that relatives I will never know may understand a little more about how I thought and what I experienced, if that matters to them.
At the very least, weekly writing and online posting give me a sense of accomplishment and purpose.
The idea of legacy has been on my mind since I have gotten older (and wiser?), along with the birth of my two granddaughters. What will they remember about me? What do I want to teach them? What kind of impact has my being here on planet Earth meant? What have I contributed? When I am at the end of my life, will I be happy with what I have accomplished?
I’m the kind of person with endless to-do lists, so as I have said before, I am absolutely sure I will never feel satisfied that I have done enough.
At the end of the line, I want to know that I have done more things right than wrong.
Over the past year, I have prioritized old and new friendships and made my family a prime concern. I joined a book club last Spring and a writer’s group in the Fall. I’ve perfected the art of the Zoom call. I finally bought that Canon camera with a zoom lens I’ve had my eye on for a few years. I’ve started and finished projects.
I have also begun researching, learning, and outlining how to write a memoir. This time, it is even more important to me to stay consistent and complete the book. If not now, when?
As much as my memoir is about different phases of my life, it’s also about the people who have inspired me and have made me who I am today. I have to give them a voice.
As crucial as publishing my book is to me, and even with support from fellow writers and a memoir coach, I often find myself drifting down various rabbit holes and frankly panicking.
I tend to “put the cart ahead of the horse,” as my Gram always said.
I haven’t completed the first chapter, and I’m already researching the costs of book coaching, editing, cover design, self-publishing versus traditional publishers, marketing, etc.
How am I going to afford all that? Will it be worth the time, energy, and expense for a book that will likely make few sales beyond friends and family? Less than that. I plan to give free copies of the book to people I know in hopes that they will share it.
Negative visualization is the precise reason why I have a spreadsheet of unfinished courses. At some point, I just stopped believing.
I stopped focusing and started looking for the next great thing.
Persistence is key. To have a consistent habit of working on the book, on writing in general, day after day. The magical power of the compound effect.
Along with patience and faith that it will all work out. But first and foremost, I must have produced and actually finished something.
So, I’m taking a deep breath and continuing with my memoir writing—chapter by chapter. Others have published their memoir and shown the way, and I will follow their lead. I don’t need to reinvent the wheel.
But first, day by day, I will finish it.
Thanks for reading!
Keep smiling!
xx
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