Life Experiment 31, 2021

Hey There.

I thought I had a topic "written" down for today's newsletter. But nope, no written drafts for this edition of the newsletter. I guess with all other long-form writing (that will come out in a while), I mixed things up.

So yeah, today it's my resilience against the blank page.

When I was still in high school, I always remember how frustrating it was to stare at the blank page, especially when we had to write a few pages. I hated writing. Until very recently, I really couldn't wrap my head around that writing frustration.

How do you make writing more enjoyable? Can you?

Because let's face it, something that sucks or feels like a chore when we are doing it is always a tough battle for our mind. We want to quit any moment now but at the same time want to push through.

But then there are things we just do. Something that just flows, and we could work on it for hours.

Yet every big project starts with a "blank piece of paper" and feels like a huge heavy rock we somehow need to move.

Starting from scratch

First, there's nothing. Then after weeks, months, years of work, there's something. We slowly chip away that big rock and move it piece by piece.

Doing anything "large" feels frustrating: building a house, writing an email, launching a business, writing a book, planning a vacation, putting together a project budget, getting out of bed, a PhD, ...

In large projects, there are so many things that have to be tackled that it's insane.

I always found it wired in scouting when we started a new project how clunky and slow everything was. Things just didn't make sense. But we simply took the next steps, one after another. Suddenly, the project was progressing forward with light speed like a well-oiled machine.

The same goes for my research work. For a while, my PhD work felt like wandering in the dark. I occasionally tripped over a stone, but that was it. I had to figure out the landscape I was playing in first. After a year and a half, I'm starting to grasp what I'm working on. The"storyline" is beginning to form.

Big stuff just takes time. Or otherwise, it wouldn't be big.

And yes, as we discussed last week in big projects Emotional resilience in the long run is what separates those who finish from the ones that don't.

One example of starting from scratch is the mountaineering season each year. I don't go hiking during the winter due to a lack of training and gear. So by the time I drag my ass to the first hill, half of the "summer" season is usually over. But last Friday, after a nah day at work, I decided to visit the world of bliss:

After all, I moved to the region with the Slovenian alps to do just this. Hike 🙂 Took me a while to start.

This scratch phase is where most projects die. Because things feel unnatural, clunky, but that's just phase 0 of any work we do. It's like when going hiking, the first few meters up the hill suck, but then the body and mind adapt and then as we get higher, the views open up. Pushing through the first period of pain always pays off.

By realising why the pain is part of the process, we transform from an apprentice into a master. There's a saying:

An apprentice knows how to do something. The master can do the same thing, but he also understands why it worked.

And starting new big projects is no different. You'll do a project that will be a success, and you'll do another similar one, and it will be a flop. Once you understand why things work and why things don't work, you become a master. Before that, you're just the lucky noob.

Epilogue

So this came out in under an hour. I'll let you be the judge of the quality. As I was writing this, I felt frustrated. I wanted to quit. Even procrastinated a bit, scrolled social media, YouTube, ... But I was taking down notes as ideas popped up. Then suddenly, the storyline started to form. I re-wrote the text a few times, and that was it.

One baby step at the time. There's all there is to work. That's the secret.

And I know you need to overthink, over-plan run every scenario in your head. Once you do. Start taking those next steps 😉

Enjoy

Ziga