Unless I have a daily practice, I find it difficult to stick with things. If I told myself that I’d publish a blog post each week, I’d probably publish four and then stop posting for three years. If I told myself I’d paint one large painting every month, I’d… well… I’d never paint anything.
I used to hate this about myself. I don’t exactly love it now, but I have come to accept it, and even found some peace in embracing it. If my brain doesn’t want to paint something big once a month, maybe I can paint something small every day. Maybe I can change how I paint.
There’s something nice about embracing your brain in its most annoying state. There’s value in figuring out how to align your work with your mind. You can probably turn five years of daily blog posts into a book, even if you don’t think that you could sit down and… write a book.
I used to fight my brain on this; to make it change—because I do believe that it can change. I rarely stopped to consider if I could be just as happy (or happier) by changing my actions though. It turns out that I probably can. It turns out that you can accept yourself for who you are.
I started doing that with these daily blog posts. I have days where I don’t really write much at all, and other days where I write (I know, meta) about just showing up. I’m starting to do it with art. I’ll start to do it with exercise. A little bit, every day, until I’ve accrued a lot.