Daily Insight

#5 How did I ever let that stop me?

ByLukas

The other day you asked about my favorite words.

But what I really want to write about is my favorite questions.

Because as much as words can spark imagination, questions are what steer the mind – to good places or bad.

Consider this one:

“Why do I always give up when I start a new habit?“

This presupposes that I always give up and will ask my brain to come up with reasons (and excuses) to justify and perpetuate that behavior.

  • Why do I always get frustrated when something doesn’t go my way?
  • Why do I always wait until the last minute to start on a project, so I get stressed and barely meet the deadline?
  • Why do I always give up when I start writing and publishing daily?

And off I go, finding excuses for behavior, thus perpetuation.

“Look at all the reasons I found for behaving this way. I may not like it, but I guess this is who I am.”

Why would you send your mind there… If you could also ask yourself a question like:

“What would it feel like if I were already writing and publishing every day?”

How would I feel about myself…

How would I look at myself?

What would I say, what would I create… How would I act?

Which obstacles would I have conquered?

Which excuses would have become irrelevant, making me shake my head, saying to myself, “How did I ever let that stop me?”

And just like that, with my imagination set free

internal resistance melting away

off I go

finally becoming who I’ve always wanted to be.

P.S: If you MUST ask the “Why do I always…” questions, at least use them to justify and perpetuate positive behavior.

Why do I always wake up and immediately write three pages stream of consciousness?

  • Because it helps me slow down.
  • Because it makes me aware of negative (and positive thought patterns).
  • Because I feel calm after writing them.
  • Because ever since I started, more creative, productive, and disciplined
  • Because this is who I am now. And I love this version of me much more than the one from before I started writing every day.

P.P.S.: Alright then, one more question to think (or journal) about:

Where am I perpetuating a situation or habit I say I don’t want but I secretly cling to because it feels comfortable and has become part of my identity?

#4 When the best story in the world has already been written…

ByLukas

When the best story in the world has already been written… why do I write?

Because writing is not a choice – and neither is telling stories.

Because stories are never finished.

Because the best stories in the world are written over and over again.

Because a story well-told depends on who you’re telling it to.

Because we all tell the same stories anyway, but that one little change, that one new interpretation can make the difference between touching someone or missing the mark.

But what IS the best story in the world?

I don’t know.

I do know they don’t have to be very elaborate to have impact:

For sale: baby shoes, never worn.

Ernest Hemingway

When someone, sometime, stumbled upon six words that can evoke so much… How can I NOT continue my own search for stories and the words to tell them?

P.S.: Credits to Jony Mitchell for writing the best song in the world.

P.P.S: Extra credits for singing the most heartfelt version even after suffering a stroke and having to relearn to talk and sing.

P.P.P.S.: Credits to The Tallest Man on Earth for showing that a new interpretation can make even the best song in the world reach new heights, and providing the inspiration for this post.

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#3 Trust issues and the Completion Paradox

ByLukas

Starting a new habit seems to come with three universal “self-trust issues”:

Trust in my Intentions. “Do I even have the time for this? Does making time for this make me selfish… Is it even good for me to spend time on this, out of all the priorities in life? Will this do me in any good in the long term?”

Trust in my Ability to follow through. “I’ll probably give up at the first opportunity, and then beat myself up again for not following through.”

Trust in my Skills. “Am I even good enough? I don’t notice any improvement, I don’t think this is working for me. I don’t think I can do this.”

(Source: Eben Pagan)

And even though I’ve slowly been gaining trust across all three dimensions in the past two years…

Whenever I start something new – like publishing a daily insight – the same trust issues resurface.

“Trust in my ability to follow through” is a particularly tough cookie. Not a day goes by without a self-defeating and endlessly annoying voice whispering in my ear: “Go ahead, try me. See how long you last before you return with another habit you gave up on…”

Which leads me to the Completion Paradox:

Trust in my ability to complete things is not a prerequisite to get started. It’s earned through getting started in the first place and then, slowly, but surely, day by day, following through. Completing something every single day. Proving to myself that I can, in fact, trust myself to follow through. Building up that self-trust every day through tiny trust builders.

So… the questions I keep in mind today:

  • How can I bring my positive habit-building experiences from the past, and the trust I built into this new activity?
  • What would it feel like if, instead of spoiling the fun of starting this daily publishing with nagging self-doubt, waiting for the “inevitable moment where I’ll give up”… I celebrate each time I’m following through and see it as another step closer to a new habit… another step closer to self-trust?

Taking it one step further:

  • What would it feel like to have this new habit in place already? How would I act if I already had enough trust that no matter what happens, even if I miss a day, or even a week, I’ll return back to daily publishing?

And with those questions in mind, I realize a simple thought can put my mind at ease…

“It’s all fine… I’ve been through this before.”

Because when my dreams start drowning in doubts
And desire turns into despair
When I suddenly see what I always had in me
Who I could be
Yet my thoughts already declare defeat
I step back
Look back
Feel back
And when at last I notice
That day by day,
I’m finally unleashing the calling I’ve always ignored
I remind myself
It’s all fine. I’ve been through this before.

#2 Why I write

ByLukas

If writing and creating every day were as vital to my survival as drinking water, ingesting food, and bonding… What would life look like?

Biologically, all behavior is driven by pain, pleasure, and the triggers and habits that come from repeated reaction to those stimuli.

So I eat because I want to escape the pain of hunger – or heartbreak, sadness, and frustration.

I connect with others because I’m neurologically hardwired to feel pleasure when bonding… and pain and deprivation when I’m abandoned.

Similarly, I write because I want to escape the frustration of not being able to put into words an insight.

I also write because I enjoy the rush resulting from finding the words that convey what I want to say.

I write because I love the tingling in my back and neck when I combine those words into sentences with just the right rhythm, just the right cadence capturing the meaning, context, emotion of what I want to say…

I write because writing wrests the essence from the whirlwind of thoughts and emotions racing through my mind and body.

I write because when when I write, I feel that at last, I can make sense of life.

And the more meaning I find, the more likely I am to write.

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#1 Sculpting Away, Day By Day

ByLukas

On Sunday, January 3 2021, motivated by an emotional low point and an article I read on writing “Morning Pages”, I grabbed an old notepad, pen, started writing and didn’t stop until I had filled three pages.

It was the first time in 5 years I wrote something by hand, and the first time in my life I journaled.

I liked it so much that I kept writing every day.

We’re 625 days later now, and I never stopped. 3 pages of Stream of Consciousness journaling a day, 625 days in a row: that’s 1875 pages or relaxing the mind and letting my train of thoughts “stream onto the page”, unfiltered, playfully wandering through my experiences, thoughts, and insights.

But no matter how enjoyable the wandering, lately I’ve been feeling the urge to create something tangible (and valuable) with all those insights and ideas.

Here’s how I envision it:

Daily journaling (Morning Pages) unblocks my stream of consciousness and transfers it to paper, forming the raw material out of which ideas and insights can emerge. In my experience, once I’ve gone through the sea of fluff, I can expect an insight (maybe two if I’m lucky).

Daily sculpting helps me remove all the fluff until only the pure insights are left, and then refine them, like a sculptor chiseling away at a massive block of marble, working to reveal the essence hidden inside of it.

sculpting away day by day
Sculpting until only the essence remains

“If you want me to give you a two-hour presentation, I am ready today. If you want only a five-minute speech, it will take me two weeks to prepare.”

– Mark Twain

Sculpting is the hard part. Because when you think about it, the raw material – the ideas and insights – have always been there, just like the famous Davide sculpture has always been hidden inside the block of marble Michelangelo hauled from a quarry in Carrara in the Apuan alps. He just paid attention in a different way and saw what many others didn’t see.

Yet, he wasn’t the only person who had the idea to use a block of marble to sculpt a Biblical figure. But the way he shaped that raw material into something impactful, beautiful, that accurately represents what you had in mind…

That made all the difference.

And it’s a skill that takes a long time to hone.

Which might be why I’ve avoided it for so long. So far, out of 1875 pages of journaling, I’ve published… 4 articles.

Time to change that. From today onwards, I’m adding a “sculpting session” to my day and will publish the result as a “Daily Insight”.

I don’t expect it to be particularly insightful anytime soon. Maybe I’ll never be fully satisfied with anything I come up with.

But when I stick to it every day and arrive at day 50, 100, or day 625…

Who knows how much I’ll have learned about writing, insight generation, communication,…?

Who knows what will have emerged?

Surely more than if I’d do nothing.

Which leads me to the question I’m asking myself today:

What would it feel like if I remove all external judgment from writing and see writing as the practice of exploring thoughts, ideas, feelings, insights, and becoming ever more accurate and impactful in representing them?

My current answer: I’d be focused much more on process and progress, not on competition. I’d feel how I’m getting better every day, not in relationship to others (as in competition), but in relationship to the purest expression of a certain art, skill, or action.

Sculpting away, day by day.

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