Let’s play a little game, shall we?

Let’s pretend you have a dream. It’s not a slam-dunk dream, like “let’s go out for banana splits tonight,” which I think we should all definitely do (and if you get there first, please order mine with extra caramel sauce). No, this dream of yours is gripping and enthralling and ambiguous and challenging.

The gripping and enthralling parts tug at your insides and spark fantasies about how incredible your life could be if you made the dream come true … while the ambiguous and challenging parts drop-kick your dream into an open grave. RIP, kernel of a possibly life-enhancing idea.

Never underestimate our tendency to shoot ourselves in the foot before we even take the first step. To stop before we start. To leave a dream to die on the vine. Said in the most eloquent way I can muster, never underestimate our capacity to fuck an inkling.

When we don’t know where to start, and/or when we don’t know all the steps involved, and/or we aren’t 100% sure if we’ll be resoundingly successful … well. We sure know how to filibuster ourselves, don’t we?

Our reptilian brain gets a whiff of an idea/ dream/ goal and figures out fast how to kibosh it … for safety and all—what with the inherent and ruinous dangers associated with going for a dream that might not (*shriek in horror*) be a guaranteed overnight success. (Quick vent about our flawed human condition: why haven’t we evolved past this primitive, pointless, overprotective fear, now that we’ve been living in a sabretooth-tiger-free reality for 10,000 years? Grrr.)

“I don’t know how to do that.” This didn’t stop all the other people who figured out how to sell their paintings at the local gallery … start their nail salon … get a show on Netflix … work with a matchmaker … create an app … make Beef Wellington … deliver keynotes … write books … do that smokey eye makeup look (help me with that please, someone) … have a kid … do reels on Instagram … AND OH, HOW THIS LIST GOES ON.

We like the path of least resistance, but that path tends to not like us back. Sure, it’s easier to not do the hard &/or ambiguous thing, but when we play hooky from life we go to bed at night with that bewildering feeling of emptiness. It’s only when we give our dreams a go that we feel that special brand of happiness born from pride and contentment.

Living a life with living involves courage to launch our dreams, and then a fervent tenacity to keep at them. Here’s what Angela Duckworth has to say about grit:

Grit is passion and perseverance for long-term goals.
One way to think about grit is to consider what grit isn’t.
Grit isn’t talent. Grit isn’t luck. Grit isn’t how intensely, for the moment, you want something.
Instead, grit is about having what some researchers call an “ultimate concern”–a goal you care about so much that it organizes and gives meaning to almost everything you do. And grit is holding steadfast to that goal. Even when you fall down. Even when you screw up. Even when progress toward that goal is halting or slow.
Talent and luck matter to success. But talent and luck are no guarantee of grit. And in the very long run, I think grit may matter as least as much, if not more.

To underscore: it’s not about talent; you are allowed to suck when you get the ball rolling on your goals, and you may never be the world’s best nail technician when you open your salon. It’s not about luck or becoming an instant success. Steadfast, pleasurable progress—that’s what gets us there. And I will argue that “getting there” is less consequential than giving it the old college try.

Easy ways to start pretty much anything:

• Open a new document on your computer, click Save As, and name the file after your dream (like, “My Bestselling Book”). Voila. You now have a working document, you Little Engine That Could. Might as well start typing shit onto that page?
• Start calling yourself a writer if you want to write a book, a runner if you want to run a marathon, an entrepreneur if you want to start your own thing. Recreate your identity right now and then own it. (Maybe don’t start calling yourself a doctor until you’re legally entitled to do so.)
• Ask yourself what an eight-year-old would do if they were tasked with taking the first step towards your goal. Do that. (Unless it’s “go spend allowance on candy.”) (Actually, do that first anyways.)
• Slap yourself in the face when you catch yourself explaining how success is somehow unobtainable for you because, for example, “her dad was big in Hollywood, so that’s why she’s a big director now. I don’t have that leg up.” Imagine if every dreamer threw in the towel because they didn’t have the buoy of privilege?
• Look for examples of people who made it against all odds/ later in life/ after an avalanche of rejection, etc. Assemble an inspiration file of these stories to read when you start to feel sorry for yourself.
• Print out/ use as a screen saver/ embroider a pillow in the likeness of this little doodle I drew into chapter 11 of my book: DO IT BEFORE YOU DON’T. The siren call of safety is all too alluring. Learn to listen for the flirtatious whistle of “hey baby, come on over.” (Because your dream sounds like that—weirdly libidinous.)

There are no guarantees that your dreams and goals will win awards or lead to lifelong jubilation. I know you know that.

And I also think you know, deep down beyond the recesses of that scaredy-cat part of your brain, that not going for your dreams and goals will likely lead to lifelong, inner torment, characterized by questions you’ll ask yourself late at night after 1.75 glasses of whatever you’re pouring these days, like, “is there a cost to living an all talk, no action kind of life?” … “Is it possible to be this disappointed with myself?” … and perhaps most disquieting of all, “what could my life have been like”?

Yeah, we can’t have that.

Let’s stop stopping ourselves. We only have so many Mondays left, guys. So let’s finish our banana splits, then attack Step #1, whatever that might be. You with me?!