Defining Disciplined: When You Realize You’re Doing It Wrong
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I'm trying little mug, I really am. Photo via Pexels “You’re so disciplined.” People say this to me a lot, and it’s not entirely surprising. In my group of friends, both in the bookish world and not, I’m known for not sleeping, writing in cafes half the week, and being the first one at my coworking space, hunched over my laptop before the lights are even turned on. I’m your writer friend that’s on Google Chat when you wake up, and I'm still there when you’re about to go to sleep. During my undergrad, one of my favorite professors used to say that a lot of writing was just “showing up to do the work” and that “you really have to want it.” It was advice that stuck with me for a really long time and had a pretty profound effect on how I treated my time once I started pursuing writing books. I had to be disciplined. I had to find the time to show up. But lately, I’ve been rethinking what being disciplined really means, and if I can even call myself that. Over the past few years, in my wild push for my career in books, there have been a lot of sacrifices in the name of discipline. And that’s part of being disciplined, right? Control. Sacrifice. Staying up late instead of relaxing. Ignoring dozens of Facebook invites so you can get that last chapter written. Going to the bar for happy hour? I can spend an hour happily editing, thank you very much. And the result of this, is that I’ve been lucky.
Defining Disciplined: When You Realize You’re Doing It Wrong
Defining Disciplined: When You Realize You’re…
Defining Disciplined: When You Realize You’re Doing It Wrong
I'm trying little mug, I really am. Photo via Pexels “You’re so disciplined.” People say this to me a lot, and it’s not entirely surprising. In my group of friends, both in the bookish world and not, I’m known for not sleeping, writing in cafes half the week, and being the first one at my coworking space, hunched over my laptop before the lights are even turned on. I’m your writer friend that’s on Google Chat when you wake up, and I'm still there when you’re about to go to sleep. During my undergrad, one of my favorite professors used to say that a lot of writing was just “showing up to do the work” and that “you really have to want it.” It was advice that stuck with me for a really long time and had a pretty profound effect on how I treated my time once I started pursuing writing books. I had to be disciplined. I had to find the time to show up. But lately, I’ve been rethinking what being disciplined really means, and if I can even call myself that. Over the past few years, in my wild push for my career in books, there have been a lot of sacrifices in the name of discipline. And that’s part of being disciplined, right? Control. Sacrifice. Staying up late instead of relaxing. Ignoring dozens of Facebook invites so you can get that last chapter written. Going to the bar for happy hour? I can spend an hour happily editing, thank you very much. And the result of this, is that I’ve been lucky.