Natural Progression of Development: We Can Only Apply Advice When It’s Time
By: Marcy Pedersen
Tags: Development, Growth, Progress, Creativity, Writing

You have to do things enough that the natural progression of what you are doing propels you to take the next step. It’s really why we need to show up every day and work on our thing. If we aren’t working on it we can’t progress with it. We can read all the self-help articles we want to, but if we aren’t in the natural progression of the thing no amount of tips can help us move forward. Reading gobs of articles will educate you, but if you aren’t ready for what they are saying you will just pile up information that can overwhelm you and make you procrastinate even more.

I started writing about four years ago. I started reading anything I could get my hands on about how to create a blog and then quickly jumped to reading about how to write and market a book. I was cramming my head with information that I wasn’t ready for. I hadn’t even got into the swing of a daily writing habit and was already trying to figure out what book I should write. I was feeding myself with some of the best how-to articles out there before beginning the process of just writing and figuring out what the heck writing was going to mean to me. I was missing the main piece of the whole thing. No wonder I was having a hard time adding to it.

How I Made $11,000 From Writing in 30 Days

I click on it. I am guessing you might too, or some variation that has to do with your craft/art/creative thing. I could use $11,000 extra dollars. Well times that by ten. Yeah, I could use that. So I spend a lot of time clicking on articles like that. They provide helpful tips. I click on them every day, but if I am not consistently doing what it is I want to do, I will have nothing to apply those tips to. Reading lots of blog posts and listening to pod casts is not actually creating. Actually sitting down and creating is creating. Do you do that?

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I am sure these tips would help someone become successful. I am sure these tips could help you if applied, at the right time. I write more and more every day. Obsess over it in fact. The more I simply write, anywhere, the more I want to write and the more I want to try writing. I found that I have naturally progressed to submitting articles to magazines and publications. Something I was never ready to do before I had a regular writing habit. It was something that I had read a lot about, and used to lay a big guilt trip on myself for not doing, but in reality all I really needed to do at first was just write.

The natural progression of doing so would make submitting stories a natural step, but the habit needed to exist before I could apply tips to it. I also needed time to develop my thing. There was no way around the fact that I needed to show up every day for a long period of time before understanding what I really wanted to do anyway. There are no tips or shortcuts available to substitute for what genuinely takes time to figure out.

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This is why I started writing in the first place. I found myself in a career transition that was difficult and a job that I hated. My husband suggested I started writing and see if I could make it as a writer. Sounds great, but in reality we had bills to pay and I wasn’t in a state of mind to get anything going fast enough to subvert my need for a regular job.

If you just picked up a pen, paint brush, modeling clay, or are learning how to code, concentrate on that really hard. Feed yourself with some good information, but understand that your progression will be your progression. It’s great to hear how everyone else did it, but in the end how we do things will be how we do things. Take things in and apply them when the time is right for you. You can find as many articles that say to quit your job as ones that say to keep it. So concentrate on your thing, a lot, and in time you will know all by yourself what you are ready to do. If you don’t you can always start reading articles again and use them to get new direction, but I’m betting you have what you need to get started.

You Have to Show Up Every. Day.

What we hate about work really. The fact I have to come here every day is so annoying. The same people, same desk, same tasks, same goals. Dang those employers. They know how to make money and get things done and they do it by getting people to show up every single day. There are penalties if we don’t. That consistency at work exists before anything else. We can have the best ideas, hire the best people, establish the most efficient processes, but if we don’t show up every day and do the work all that means nothing. Consistency comes before we can add anything else.

I have seen too many people in my career think that there is some natural progression to life, with certain career milestones preceding whatever you may want in your personal life. Unfortunately, life doesn’t know it is supposed to follow a schedule. Ruth Porat

I am not talking about making hard and fast rules. There is a time and place for outlines, planners, to-do lists, and business plans. Those are all fine and well, but first comes starting. We have to start the thing and then show up every day and do it. Get into that rhythm for a while and then start to filter in new information. Do it for a while longer and see how that fits into the bigger scheme of our lives.

If you want to start a business start a business. If you are dabbling with something you hope will grow and develop into something substantial then by all means do some goal setting, make some to-do lists, and create a plan, but remember in the end you cannot subvert the need to consistently show up and do your thing so as to allow a natural progression of development to occur. As you do you will know what to do. An inner prompting will tell you it’s time for the next step. All those articles are going to help you know what the next step is.

Nothing is more motivating then understanding naturally what we should do next. Those aha moments are irreplaceable. Once we understand what needs done few things can prevent us from doing them. At that point we need little help and outside motivation. We run at things with full force. That’s usually when we start making goals and formal plans. Trust the process to show you what is next and help you develop your thing in your way. Consistently feed yourself with information, but realize that there will be the right time to apply it and that time will reveal itself through the natural progression of development.

Marcy Pedersen