Can I admit that it’s kind of embarrassing to go through your “messy twenties” whilst being on the Internet? Everyone literally gets to watch as you flail through life—trying to figure out who you are and why you’re here. I’ve always been a huge advocate that “everyone was placed on earth for a reason,” but it’s not always easy to figure what exactly that reason is. Especially when you’re in your twenties and flailing occurs and you have no idea which direction to turn or what to do.
Lately, I’ve been doing a lot of reflecting (shocker) about my life, and I’ve realized how content I feel in what I’m doing. I’ve finally landed on a topic that I love to write about, I’ve found a job that makes me feel empowered in my career, and I no longer worry about where my life is generally headed. It took a while to get here. When I look back at my journey before, I admit, I cringe a little. I didn’t just flail around trying to figure out what I want to do in life. I let myself flail publicly online—trying new projects, failing in front of everyone, and doing it all over again. I challenged myself to impossible tasks (like going plastic free or starting a YouTube channel) and even wrote about topics that *cough* I may have really not known about myself? It’s the messy part about being in your twenties, but now I feel like I’m finally settling in.
Here’s the thing that I don’t regret: Writing. This blog may be a mess and there are times where my content may not even make sense to people, but I am proud of the fact that I sat down as much as I did and tried to write on a consistent basis. Practice makes perfect…or at least makes you sound like a good enough writer to be published by major media outlets worldwide. Yikes. Is that real?
I’m here to tell you two things: It’s time to practice, and I need to do it regularly. I write all the time for work and journal when I can, but it’s not a daily practice. My blog and my online presence are already all over the place, so why not keep flailing? Why not keep practicing? I want my writing muscles to be so strong for what is to come, and the only way that is going to happen is if I sit down and jam my fingers on the keyboard.
Remember when we used to practice instruments for band or orchestra? Remember when we used to go to sports practices to prep for the big game? Remember when we spent countless hours in a dance studio rehearsing routine after routine just so we could win that award? I do. And it’s baffling me that I don’t practice daily in the same way for the one thing that I have dedicated my career to do.
Cultivating a regular practice of our craft prepares us for what’s to come.
So let yourself flail, and you know what, I even encourage doing it publicly. Let people see the messy process of creating, because heck, it is messy. People need to see that none of this is easy and that those moments of success require hours of hustling in order to get there. Gosh, I hate the word “hustle,” but it’s friggen true. Let your hustle be your daily practice. Let yourself get lost in hours upon hours of doing what you love, creating something beautiful, and throwing it out there. Let yourself FLAIL.
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