Kevin Tumlinson

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Do something consistently

You know, I have “Write a blog post” on my schedule, recurring three days a week. But sometimes… I don’t want to.

Sometimes I don’t have a topic. Or my time is in a crunch. Or I’ve just eaten a big, carb-heavy lunch and all I really want to do is nap. Sometimes, writing anything feels like torture, even if I do love it.

Today is a good example of that.

The last thing I really wanted to do right now was sit down and write. It’s excruciating. I’m tired. I’ve got so many other things on my task list. I had that big, carb-heavy lunch.

And yet, here I am.

I love writing. I love everything about it. And I write a lot—multiple thousands of words every single day, stretching back years. I can’t recall a day when I didn’t write, actually. There is always the writing.

Still, that doesn’t make it easy.

You’re going to have days where the writing (or whatever else it is that you love and want to do) feels like someone is pinning you to the wall so they can drain all the blood from you. It happens. And on those days, it’s incredibly easy to say, “It’s fine. I’ll live. I don’t have to.”

And you’re right on all three counts.

But just think, if you could go ahead and push through, write something, just think what you’ve accomplished.

More than 99% of the world ever accomplishes, in terms of writing. Because instead of writing nothing, you wrote something.

That’s really all this destiny of yours asks of you. Write something. Create something. Do something.

It’s true for writing. It’s true for everything.

An inch worm scales a 100-foot Oak tree one tiny cluster of centimeters at a time. A canyon gets carved out of miles-deep stone one drop of water at a time. A marathoner runs 50K one step at a time. And you, if you would dare to write, finish a short story, a blog post, an article, a novel, one word at a time.

Doing something consistently can change your life and change the world.

Do something. Even when it sucks. Even when you suffer. Do the one little thing that you’re able to do, even if it’s not quite as much as you could do. Just do the thing, and then do it again.

And watch what happens.