Give Yourself Permission to Write a Shitty First Draft.

Writer's block is a real thing. I knew writing a book would be challenging but not quite as challenging as I am learning. From the beginning it's been a mental battlefield. The first day I spent at the beginning workshop in Austin, the editors explained how much of a roller coaster of emotions the book writing process would be. One of the first things I received was a full poster trying to "map out" and explain the wild journey I had signed up for.

They were the experts, so of course I trusted them. I just did not fully believe them. I was so confident in the book I wanted to write. For about two years I had been thinking about it, drafting some and recently had put down on paper what I thought was GOLD.

Well...day three of the workshop rolled around and the book I walked in the same door 48 hours ago, I was SO CONFIDENT was great and what I would be writing, was not it. I wanted to trash the whole f*cking thing. In fact, I kind of did.

After a few discussions with the editors, I could not pinpoint exactly why, I went from loving it to almost hating the whole thing. I left feeling extremely defeated that afternoon. How could what I had worked on, wrote about and structured for almost two years not be the book.

I went and grabbed a beer with a good friend from high school at a local bar. I talked him through my predicament in detail trying to get to the bottom of why it was so wrong and how the fuck I was now going to write this book. God bless him for understanding my madness.

The second sip of my second hazy IPA, it hit me. I pulled out my notes app on my phone and I can still remember watching the words appear as I quickly typed them...I'm a mess.

The book I was planning to write still had, what I would refer to as, the "old me" as the narrator. The "new me" needed to be the narrator and the "new me" is a fcking mess.*

I explain the how and why for the death of the "old me" and birth of the "new me" throughout stories in my book. It is quite the journey in itself but to give you enough context behind the realization I had...

The "old me" had to have structure and everything had to be as close to perfect as the world would allow. You better believe if we had a coffee date at 9:00am and you had to move it to 9:30am you were fucking up my whole day. If it was not on my calendar or to do list to be crossed off and planned to the T, it was not happening.

The "old me" was also stuck, lost and hopeless. I cared so much about the structure of my day and perfecting everything I could because I could not see past it. I was in a place, relationship and job that were not fulfilling and never would be. Everyday felt suffocating and it put me in a place mentally where I shut down. I had no goals, I did not know what I wanted and worst of all, I didn't even know who I was. I lost myself. I was living a life I just thought I was supposed to.

Being a type A personality, none of this fit into how I operate and only had a little bit of that type of energy to use. This is how I found myself in a place where all I had to identify with was structure and striving for perfectionism in a life I was just going through the motions in.

The purpose of this book was to write to the "old me" and the audience being those who may feel that same way. Living a life unfulfilled. One you know you are holding yourself back in because "you are fine", feel stuck, lost, scared to change, confused or uninspired.

The "new me" does not identify in structure or perfectionism. I still maintain my strong structured, planner type A personality in my professional life but it does not define my daily life. I now take every opportunity I can to meet someone new, try something new or go somewhere I have not been. I do not rely on plans and usually take it day by day. If I am in need of a beach fix, I will hop in the car or book a flight that day.

The "new me" being a fcking mess, as I call it, makes a lot of mistakes with the free spirit I've become. With that has come more happiness, pure joy and success then the "old me" could have ever imagined.*

I recognized I had to go about writing this book completely differently than the way then even the "new me" would typically take on a massive task. Ass backwards being without any real structure at all. In order to be genuine and put the words on paper that would actually mean something I needed to write the way the "new me" was actually living...fearlessly, confident, vulnerable, and present. The necessary structure would come naturally.

One of the best pieces of advice I received from the continued education throughout the process from the editors is "give yourself the permission to write a shitty first draft".

The old me would have never given myself permission to write a shitty first draft. She would have been too scared of not being perfect and never started.

The old me would have thrown the towel in the afternoon. I walked out of that workshop out of fear of failure. I could have told myself after two years of drafting, this is just not going to work. I am not cut out for this. The new me didn't. I started and I kept going.

There are still days I want to go down that rabbit hole. I've been writing daily and A LOT for three months now and there are days I still hate the whole f*cking thing. I recognize it is because my "lack of structure" is working, at least for now, and I am actually being vulnerable with the pages. I am writing the most authentic, genuine and relatable content. It is so close to me so it feels like it just purges from my body and grosses me out that I am putting it out there for everyone to one day pick up and read. BUT I'm doing it.

From the insight on the "old me" to "the new me" and the conception of my book, this is the take away for you...

Give yourself the permission to write a shitty first draft.

I do not mean literally, unless you're crazy like me and want to write a novel then cheers! Metaphorically speaking... if there is something you know you want to do but you're not because you're scared of not being perfect, failing or judgement just do it anyways. Give yourself permission to make mistakes and f*ck it up. Do something without a plan and build upon it.

You can't have a shitty first draft if you do not start...What are you waiting for?