Just before writing this, I was dealing with an incredibly bad case of writer’s block.
That feeling is similar to the feeling when you’re looking for that first shard of inspiration when designing a new sound.
You sit, you stare at the screen, you grumble, you procrastinate, you think you suck and maybe you were never cut out for this in the first place.
I push myself incredibly hard. I have a lot of things I want to do and accomplish, most of which require a lot of hard work. So when I get stumped, it’s incredibly difficult for me to stop and not emotionally crush myself.
I’m sure that sounds familiar to some of you.
This short piece is the best answer I’ve got for you to help move past that.
It’s Okay
Nobody bats 100% perfectly every time.
Often when we’re struggling, attempting to force ourselves to “be creative”, we’re fighting against an unspoken expectation in our minds.
It often sounds something like:
“You should be able to do this…”
Which implies that today, you’re just not good enough. My mind tends to take something like that thought and death spiral it out of control until I believe that I was never actually any good at the thing in the first place and I might as well crawl under a rock and die.
As… ridiculous, morbid, and embarrass as that sounds – that’s the honest truth of my brain. I’m not without my faults.
Thankfully, in the worst times, I haven’t actually acted on any of my worst mental impulses. At this point I just realize it’s my brain and I’ll eventually get beyond it – but it doesn’t pull me out of the crushing negativity.
But, the antidote I’m finding today goes back to that first sentence – It’s okay, nobody is awesome all the time.
The internet and our culture today make this fact incredibly difficult to internalize. It’s easier than any time in history to compare ourselves to others. It’s easy to look at videos and see how far you have to go, to see all your friends “enjoying life” through Instagram.
We all know it’s fake reality.
But when you feel like you can’t do your thing – the thing you’ve always done and are good at – it’s hard.
So here’s a dose of reality for you:
It’s okay to fail.
It’s okay to fail, it’s not okay to permanently give up.
Videos you see online were usually heavily edited before they hit your eyeballs. Each time the person edits, it’s practice. Sports superheroes spent most of their entire lives practicing so they could perform on your TV – they still fail. Every game you admire was fraught with brokeness until just before it was released (sometimes they even release screwed up!).
Life involves lots of failure.
It’s okay to have a rough day, it’s perfectly acceptable.
It’s okay to show up and not have your best.
It’s okay to be lost, having no idea what to do.
It’s okay, it’s allowed, it’s normal.
You have permission to be imperfect.
You just don’t have permission to quit, to give up permanently, or to internalize that you’re not good enough.
Let today suck if it needs to. Give yourself that freedom. What you’re not allowed to do is throw your hands up and give up on yourself forever. Give yourself a day, or more time, and get back on the horse.
But for today, if you’re not feeling it – that’s completely okay. You’re valuable anyway.
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