Think back to the first time you hit a writing milestone. Maybe that was finishing a project or a chapter, hitting a word goal, or having a big breakthrough. How did you feel when you sat back and realized what you\u2019d just accomplished?<\/p>\n
In my case, I felt exhilarated. The first time I wrote a book, every single word felt like a victory. I was amazed that I could write five hundred words in one sitting. I would hit 5K or 10K or 15K words, and I would celebrate it. When I finished that book, I was so incredibly proud.<\/p>\n
Now tell me, that first milestone\u2014the one that you were so proud of at the time\u2014have you hit it again? Written another project, or chapter, or significant number of words? Had a breakthrough that left you reeling? If you\u2019ve been writing for a while, you probably have. Maybe even multiple times. How did you feel the most recent time you hit that milestone?<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve written four books now, and even though I improve every time, each one feels like less and less of an achievement. I still get that thrill when I finally write \u201cthe end,\u201d but it\u2019s so easy to downplay the rest: I just wrote 5K words this weekend, that\u2019s not much. I\u2019m only 30K words through this book, I\u2019ve barely done anything. Etc., etc. I always want to go bigger, better, faster.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s so easy to lose sight of those early milestones when we\u2019re always focused on how we can improve. There\u2019s nothing wrong with reaching for the stars\u2014sometimes the best work comes from pushing ourselves\u2014but it\u2019s important to remember how far we\u2019ve already come, too.<\/p>\n
Writing a book\u2014or even getting more than a few thousand words into a project\u2014used to be the star I was reaching for. It felt light years away. Now that I\u2019m here, I find myself reaching for farther and farther stars while forgetting that making it this far used to feel unreachable.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s disheartening to look at everything you\u2019ve done and brush half of it off as not a big deal\u2014to pour yourself into a project and then shrug and say it\u2019s nothing you haven\u2019t done before. It makes it harder to muster the energy to write when nothing feels like an accomplishment anymore. What happened to that exhilarating feeling that made every word feel like a success?<\/p>\n
This is why it\u2019s so important to let yourself celebrate the small wins. Even if we\u2019ve written more, or better, or faster in the past, every word still counts. Maybe nothing will ever feel as huge as the first time\u2014the novelty of it is gone\u2014but every time we sit down to write, we\u2019re still accomplishing something.<\/p>\n
Next time you hit a milestone, give yourself some credit. Think back to that version of yourself who was amazed by the thought of doing this much and acknowledge how cool it is that now you can. You don\u2019t need to jump for joy or throw a party, but pause and take a moment to smile to yourself.<\/p>\n
Writing can be a hard and thankless task, but it\u2019s also pretty incredible what we can do with our words. Your writing matters. So celebrate that.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
This article was originally published in the 2021 Volume III issue of WordWorks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":938,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"class_list":["post-936","article","type-article","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dgl223.pcherry.imgd.ca\/assignment3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article\/936","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dgl223.pcherry.imgd.ca\/assignment3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dgl223.pcherry.imgd.ca\/assignment3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/article"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dgl223.pcherry.imgd.ca\/assignment3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dgl223.pcherry.imgd.ca\/assignment3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}