draft chapter:

I am breaking “writer’s block” today and I am breaking it with sheer force. I have heard many opposing viewpoints and opinions on if this is even a real thing. I can tell you, from my experience over the past two weeks that it is indeed real. There may be similar chapters in the book that deal with the struggles of writing, but perhaps this isn’t really about writing, but about something much more. This will not be the most stellar of my chapters, but one of the more important. Stellar is not the point of today. Doing something, pushing through, getting after it- that is indeed the point.

  We all go through our own blocks from time to time. Some call them ruts. Some of these are easier to overcome than others. Some are extreme and never go away. Those lead to giving up, on whatever the block is related to. I am not going to let that happen, hence this likely shorter than normal chapter. Today as I finished my daily duties- corporate America- my mind was telling me to go home and take it easy, that it would be ok not to write something, not to get some thoughts on paper. The problem was that my mind had told me the same thing over the last couple of weeks. The major problem was that I listened. I let that inner voice- the voice of the lazy me- win out and allow me to feel ok with skipping the once daily writing session.

  Thinking back on those wasted days makes me a little sad, if not angry at myself. Think about it, this book is about my year between the ages of 39 and 40. That is 52 weeks and I just threw two of them down the drain. Those two weeks and everything I could have documented are never coming back. I could have written for ten minutes a day, or an hour per week, or anything at all. I did none of those things and ended up wasting two of 52 weeks. As I am sure you can see coming, there is a positive that has come from those wasted days. I am not going to let it happen again. I have become rededicated and refocused. I have vowed to myself not to let time pass by without going after my goals.

   As I am sure you can deduce, I am not only talking about writing. I am talking about life. We cannot allow something as insignificant as a rut or a block disrupt our momentum, our desires, or our aggression towards positivity. We cannot allow valuable weeks, days or hours pass us by without pouring everything we have into them. Now, I am sure there will be future chapters where I discuss a wasted day or something similar. I, and you, understand that those things are essential and inevitable at some point. I am talking about never again allowing something like a rut to determine the path of a two week span of my life. I will never quit something due to a glitch in my thinking or temporary lack of desire. I considered quitting this book over the past two weeks, after numerous hours spent trying to make meaning out of 39. I would have regretted this for the rest of time. I will not let that happen. There may be days where I will need to go back and read this chapter, read my thoughts of quitting, and realize how close I came to a big mistake.

    At 28 I would have quit the book. I would have convinced myself that it wasn’t that great of an idea anyways (it is) and that I had better things to do with my time (I probably did not). I would have rationalized myself out of it, out of committing hours of my life to discuss that same life. I would have played down the internal importance of the task and would not have considered my future regret. 39 is different and this is a perfect example. Those rationalizations and attempts to convince were indeed in my head over these past two weeks. The difference is I fought through them and won the battle. I understand that this was not a serious issue to fight through in the grand scheme, but maybe it really is, at least for me. What would happen if we let every “small” issue pass us by without a fight? Those would quickly add up to form a mountain of lost opportunities and regrets. At 39 those lost opportunities to fight are over. Things are different for some unknown reason. But that is exactly what I am trying to get to the bottom to- why? Why when 40 comes into view do all your other views change? Let’s continue this journey to discover why.