One thing you can do to get started

Pick a thing.

Ah-hah. You thought I was going to tell you the exact thing you need to do to get started. But that's up to you, and that depends on what you need to do. Are you looking to write a novel? The thing you need to pick is probably writing. Are you looking to become an artist? The thing you need to do is probably drawing. Decide what the simplest step is - break it down to the least complicated building block.

Now do the thing.

Do the thing over and over and over until it's second nature.

No matter what else happens, even if it's just in tiny increments, you will get better.

My favorite college professor - a huge, linebacker of a man who wrote about heartbreak and barbecue sandwiches -  was in favor of what he called The Program. And The Program was essentially sitting down, one time each day, and writing, non-stop, for fifteen minutes. When students would come to him and ask how to solve writer's block, or what they should write about, he would look at them over the rim of his glasses and ask "Are you on the program?" 

If you want to do a thing, then pick up and do the thing. Not in huge, life-altering measurements but in small building blocks that make The Thing less a thing and more a regular part of your life.

Now why are you still reading this? Set a timer for fifteen minutes, and go do the thing.

If you're a writer and you'd like help doing the thing, click here to join other lovelies also engaged in the same journey. xD

You can do anything for fifteen minutes! 

Being Rose Tyler

I create myself. 

This is my favorite line, from my favorite show, from my favorite character. Arguably, I could say it's my favorite line from any imaginative literature, period (though it would have to do battle with Hamlet's to be or not to be soliloquy and The Princess Bride's declaration on death and true love). It boils with everything I want to do, be, say to other people.

I create myself.

In Doctor Who, Rose Tyler is pretty singular among the Doctor's companions for what she makes of herself. When she starts out, she doesn't have much in the way of anything. No job, not much education, no real prospects to speak of, and by the end of her tenure on the show, she's a dimension-hopping BAMF who knows what she wants, goes after it, and gets it. 

I've had a couple of rough days. Days where the things that I want to be and the things that I am don't seem to match up - where in order to get from where I am, to where I want to be, what I have to do might as well be hopping between dimensions because it's just too damn impossible. And every time, I go back to that line.

I create myself.

What does it mean? To Rose it meant she transmuted her helplessness into the power to do what she needed to do in order to save someone she loved. But how do I do that? I don't have a handy space-and-time machine or access to futuristic technologies that will make my problems go away.

I have a map, in my head. A picture of myself some indeterminate amount of time from now, in which I live in a house, and the inside is cozy, reds and browns, where the kitchen resembles a hobbit-hole, and the library is something like Hogwarts. This person I am is happier, healthier, well-traveled. She's a wife and a mother, she's got a warm, exciting life full of the things she loves, and most of all, she doesn't struggle nearly so much. She's content.

Most days, getting to be that person seems like an impossibility. Everything from my health to my geographical location seems to stand in the way. But here's the thing.

All world-ending obstacles are made up of tiny little annoyances.

Overwhelming obstacles are made up of little obstacles. I wanted to be healthier, so I started running. Not a lot, not frazzling myself - I just got up, every morning, and jogged for fifteen minutes. And it worked. I felt amazing.

Other obstacles have little steps to beat. I want to travel, but I don't have a passport. So I set everything in motion to apply for a passport; when I have it, I'll be one step closer to achieving the big, big dream I have. Don't worry about the big stuff right now. Fix the little obstacles, and when you get to the big ones, they won't seem so big.

Here's the part where I give you a giant hug. 

Man oh man, do I ever know what it's like to sob into your pillow because there's something you want so badly, and the hugeness of it is impossible.

Hugeness is made out of a lot of little things though. I'm trying to concentrate on one or two of the little things - chipping away at a problem steadily instead of trying to get rid of it all in one go.  What I hope here is that you see something huge and impossible happen for me, so that you know that it's definitely, 110% possible for you. I haven't reached that goal yet.

But it's gonna be mine.

I'm gonna do it no matter what.