The creative process is something we all go through. Whether we are writing a book, creating a business, starting a new adventure... the process we go through to create this new thing in our lives is probably about as different as our DNA and yet as similar as drawing a breath.
The creative process is messy, scary, confusing, liberating, exciting, life-giving and more! I thought that if I share what I go through in this process, it might help somebody else not feel as crazy as I do... because it always works out. Always.
If you've missed it, check out The Birth Of An Idea.
This blog post will focus on the Oh Shits!
I rode the high of the idea of this massive book for several hours. Notes, research, YouTube videos and book outlining ensued. But then I looked over everything I had done and started to think, "Oh shit!" I was definitely at the point where I had too much information. So much information, in fact, that I knew there was no way I knew everything... Information overload at it's finest. The Oh-Shits kicked in full blast.
Oh shit - how am I going to do this?
There is SO much to do! How am I, singlehandedly, supposed to make all of this happen?
Oh shit - what if I mess this up?
I know this book is needed and is going to be a great resource. What if I mess that up? What if I can't do this book the justice it deserves?
Oh shit - this is SO much work.
Similar to wondering how I am going to do this; but now taking into account the time it is going to take. I want all of this done in less than a year. How am I going to get all of this work done in that short amount of time?
Oh shit - this is SO much pressure.
With my vision for this book, I plan on it becoming one of those best-sellers that keep selling and keep selling for generations to come. How am I, little ol' me, supposed to help others to that point of stature?
Oh shit - I don't know what I'm doing!
Imposter syndrome started to sink in, and sink in hard. Who am I to put this book together?! Who am I to start such an undertaking? Who am I to know how to promote this book in the way it needs to be promoted?
I slept on these stinky shits for a couple of nights. Should I continue? Should I scrap it?
The pull of this idea - this book - was too grand. I knew I had to do it. It has the potential to help so many people who are looking for this kind of help! It is going to be such a fantastic resource! What was I going to do? How would I even start?
That's when I decided to simply start. Even though I had an outline of what the book would hold, I started coming up with more sections and more ideas. What I thought was going to be fairly limited (yet extremely useful), began to grow even more.
There was nothing else left to do besides to start writing; so I started writing. As new ideas would come to me, I would update the table of contents, and then I would write some more.
Next time, I'll explain exactly how I buckled down and got shit done.