I have wanted to tell a story via TREE for months. I was just waiting for the idea to show up. When I woke up Saturday before last I decided I was done waiting. It was story time. I still didn’t have an idea but I was committed. I lay in bed and started thinking. Little Silver Fish was my third-ish idea. By lunchtime I had four chapters planned and two chapters written.
The end didn’t come as easily. On Thursday night, all I had was the (weak) air conditioner joke. I had no idea that a big twist was coming until I started writing.
Overall, Little Silver Fish was well-received. At the extremes, two people unsubscribed, but one person – shout out to Jim – said, ‘My favorite week so far!’
My point is, if you’re thinking about doing a thing, stop thinking. Do the thing. It might fail. It might be great. Either way, you’ll learn a lot more that you would just thinking about it.
Later today, I will post links in the comments to two really good stories about people who just did their thing.
Grow slowly.
Jeff
I chose this track for today because the third line of the song says: ‘I know you like this beat ’cause Jeff been doing the damn thing’. Also, this is the title track of the best album of 2020.
The Memory of TREE playlist – every song from every email:
This story of perseverance from Humans of New York made me cry more than once: https://www.facebook.com/humansofnewyork/posts/5628303067243747
This is from one of the best pieces of long-form journalism I’ve ever read:
‘Like many billionaires, he didn’t have a decent explanation for his fortune. Because he hadn’t done it with Daddy’s money or what he considered a superior brain, he attributed his wealth to luck and to a simple lesson he had learned early in life. He was 13 and standing inside the Rutgers Pharmacy on the first day of his first job. The boss showed him a storeroom filled with chemicals tossed here and there and told him to bring order to the mess. He didn’t know where to begin. He studied the situation. The stacks of bottles gave him no answer. The boss came back in, saw his do-nothing, and said only three words: “Just get started.” He began to move, and the job went quickly after that. Digging in was its own wisdom, he discovered. Order finds itself through action. Just get started became one of his guiding principles.' —Mark Arax, A Kingdom from Dust.
https://story.californiasunday.com/resnick-a-kingdom-from-dust