It has been a long road, but I am delighted to announce that my first book, Inspired Action: Create More Purpose, Productivity, and Peace in Your Life, will be published this winter. I started writing the book in spring 2010, and now in 2015 I have finally finished the final draft and I’m happy that it will be published, aiming for next January.
In making this announcement, I wanted to share some lessons learned along the 5+ year road to completion which might offer both insights and compassion to those of you with similar long-term projects that have been “hanging out there” in your lives.
1. Commit to Completion, not a Specific Deadline.
If I had known that it would take me five years to finish this book when I started that would have been an exhausting thought. I was originally planning to finish it that same year, but that wasn’t what happened for a whole variety of reasons. In reality the book is so much better now than I could have written then. It paralleled my own journey of deepening in my productivity and intentionality work, and client stories over the last five years became woven into the text beautifully. This evolution happened naturally because I didn’t force myself to get it done by a specific, hypothetical deadline.
Sometimes it’s not about the deadline. I knew that I would eventually get it done because I was fully committed to its completion, but by allowing some grace for it to flow it’s a better book.
2. Priorities Change Sometimes, and that’s OK.
It was not five solid years of work on the book either. When I started writing I was single, living in a great apartment in an old house by the ocean. Then, six months later I met my (now) husband. Over the past five years we’ve moved twice, gotten married, and started Chosen Course (which didn’t even exist until 2011). Those are a bunch of major life events that became my priorities during long sections of those five years.
There was no question that I would finish the book, but I allowed myself to let my priorities for certain months change knowing that just because I paused work for now didn’t mean I couldn’t pick it back up whenever I chose.
3. Procrastination happens. It’s what you choose to do with it that matters.
Yes, there were definitely periods of procrastination. If I had never experienced procrastination, then I would have no right to work with others about it. Gotta learn before you can teach. And here’s what I now know about procrastination: It will show up over and over again, but there are strategies that we can use to nip it in the bud.
Overcoming procrastination starts by recognizing it when it shows up, and then just getting curious. What’s really coming up for me? There was a period when I was having trouble finishing the draft because I was unclear about the road after the draft was done, so I needed to spend time filling in the bigger picture in order to feel better about moving forward.
There was also a period when I was honestly scared because I had built up in my mind all these ideas of how my life would transform and be different after the book was published, followed by … what if that didn’t happen?! So, fears of failure and other disempowering states held me enthralled for several months. How did I overcome that one? I let go of the expectations, and I realized that I could be proud of the accomplishment regardless. Additionally, at minimum there probably were dozens (if not hundreds or thousands) of people who would be benefitted by reading sections of my book, so not completing it was selfishly withholding those insights and “ah-has” from them. So, in this case I needed to reframe the outcome to empower my continued action.
4. Small bites daily can get you anywhere
When was I most successful in making progress on the book? When I planned dedicated writing/book time into my daily rhythm. Most of the book was written, edited, and revised between 9-11am over probably about a year broken into 3-4 periods. When I first started, I blocked in morning writing time and would spend roughly 90-minutes writing each new chapter. (It’s 50 short chapters.) Since I managed to come up with the 50 chapter titles/topics at the beginning it was a great way to have focused bites. I would choose a topic I felt inspired to write about and just get started. It got harder near the end when I had to “muscle through” a few chapters that I knew were important, but I felt less inspired about. But, that same rhythm of choosing a chapter each day got me through that too.
I tackled the revising and editing in largely the same way, a chapter at a time. Right up until this past week when, with the support of my mother (and proofreader), we plowed through the last third of the book editing it in about 2 days. Surprisingly it went much faster than I expected. Sometimes a sprint over the finish line makes sense, but when you’re starting any big project… small bites daily will get you anywhere.
Next Steps
There are still a variety of steps that need to happen before you will be able to hold Inspired Action in your hands (layout, cover design, indexing, etc.) Which is why it will be January before it’s published, but the finish line is completely in sight now. And, I have had the gift of so many more lessons both for my own growth and to inspire my clients… I am very grateful.
Did one of the lessons above resonate with you? I would love to hear from you in the comments below. Which one of these issues has been showing up in your life, and what will you choose to do next having gained that awareness?
With a great sigh of relief, I take a deep breath, then head out to play and celebrate some more!
