Don’t get it right. Just get it written. – James Thurber
Time to get out that thing you’ve been dying to get out. Or that thing at work that has to be done. It’s your thing and now you just have to START IT.
Ugh. Sooooooo boring… soooooo something…
There’s this thing to say (write, paint, draw, code, whatever) that has to get out. And it’s going to happen, but it’s so (boring, big, naive, hyper-whatever, insert complaint here).
It’s a thing, and it’s going to get done (presentation, slide deck, pitch, bathroom renovation, whatever), so now there’s a million other things to do now that aren’t this THING. Like it’s better to do anything, ANYTHING. Instead of just starting the thing. That is just there waiting. It’s going to be waiting. WAITING. No matter what other thing you go and do.
It’s the FIRST DRAFT of whatever (pitch, script, messaging, poem, backyard deck layout, blog post, website, family budget, parenting plan, mission statement, family pizza dough recipe, whatever).
The FIRST DRAFT is waiting for you to do it.
And the very most important thing. The very most giant overwhelming thing about the FIRST DRAFT is just that: it’s the FIRST DRAFT, but somehow it seems like the EVERYTHING DRAFT – the ALPHA AND OMEGA DRAFT – upon which your future and the children’s future and the fate of the world’s future rests. All the future futures depend on it.
This GROCERY LIST cannot be started! It is too powerful a list to begin.
So here’s a plan for the FIRST DRAFT: Do. It. Now. If not now, then right after now.
Do it. And do it sloppy, slow, fast, neat. However you want. A FIRST DRAFT can and will be boring, naive, dull, tedious and hyper whatever. That’s it’s job. Let it do it’s job.
Your job is to Get. It. Done. That’s all.
The FIRST DRAFT is not the FINAL DRAFT.
You’re going to revise it at least once or, more likely, many many times. So get the FIRST DRAFT done. Then pat yourself on the back for getting it done. And look forward to doing the next one.
JB, Founder