This week is just you and me, because I want to share the value of practice and rituals in our life’s story. What we practice in our day-to-day lives says a lot about who we are, what’s important, and where our priorities lie. Practices and rituals also help give shape and purpose to our relationships, work, and passions. Some of the sub-topics we’ll be exploring include habit formation, writing guidelines, books and apps, the four rules of daily writing, spark files, and mostly how to simply get over yourself and get down to work. I believe the little things we do can have a great cumulative impact, if we’re just patient with process and practice.
Four Ways to Freedom in Your Practice
- No Hating
- No Doubting
- No Editing
- Just Practicing
Why this Matters
Regardless of the practice (writing, running, meditating) I’m always surprised how quickly I can move past the initial wall. In writing, the words want to come out, and I just try and guide them on to the page. When I get tripped up, it’s because of this. I hate the words, I doubt my voice, I edit relentlessly. Then my allotted time has passed, and I haven’t gotten over my inner critic enough to write very much at all!
This is a short episode, and I hope you can move through it quickly and get to work on your practice. In fact, my challenge for everyone this week is to pick one (not two, not three, not seven, but one!) practice you’d like to implement in your life. Then list a few small steps you can take to get started, and only do those small steps for the next week or two! I’d love to hear about them in the comments below!
Listen here
Resources
- Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott
- War of Art by Steven Pressfield
- Steal like an Artist by Austin Kleon (and his blog)
- The Writer’s Room Collection, curated by Steven Johnson
- Spark Files article by Steven Johnson
- GoinsWriter.com and Jeff’s interview on Story Signals
- James Clear’s interview on Story Signals
- Tyler Tervooren’s interview on Story Signals
- Lift App
- Evernote
- BJ Fogg’s Research on Tiny Habits
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