Getting Ready

Eventually you will have to do something you have never done before. Probably, you have put it off. Perhaps you dreamed of it, or perhaps you believed this was the sort of thing that other people did. It seemed too big and you seemed too small; it seemed too distant, and only your familiar weaknesses felt near. Still, you couldn’t take your eyes off of it because imagining cost you nothing, and wondering cost you nothing, and asking a question of this one or that one cost you nothing. All you had to pay for your curiosity was attention, and of this you had no limit. You kept your eyes on this thing often without realizing your eyes were on it; you kept your eyes on it because you tricked yourself into believing that casting your attention in that direction did not draw you any nearer, even as you prayed secretly it would.

Until the day came that it was near, and now someone had asked if you would be willing, or you found you had opened a file that read, “Chapter One,” or you met someone who knew someone. Now you were on the doorstep, and though you had dreamed and dreamed you did not feel ready. You did not know what to expect. You needed to do more research. You had to ask more questions. You wanted more practice. No matter how much you researched and practiced you still did not feel ready, even as the moment arrived for you to do what you must do.

And yet there you are doing it. It is not what you expected. It less than you had hoped and it is more than you had imagined. You have not changed at all; you are only someplace new. In that moment, the limits of preparation are immediately apparent. No matter what you are doing, it will always be done in life, and how can you prepare for what you already are?

Write Within Yourself: An Author's Companion. "A book to keep nearby whenever your writer's spirit needs feeding." Deb Caletti.

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