i wrote a book

About a year ago, I had an idea for a book, and I decided to write it.

I haven’t written a book before. While I liked the idea of writing a book, since I wasn’t an expert in any particular area and I didn’t have a character that I wanted to bring to life, I had never really thought of writing a book as a possibility.

Once I came up with an idea, I certainly didn’t know if I would be able to finish it. I was scared of the incomplete manuscript. I was worried that a book would be just another dead-end idea that I wasn’t ballsy enough to complete.

What I did have was a personal experience that left a huge impact on my life – the experience of relocating my family.

Common sense told me that millions of other families must be moving every year, but during my family’s relocation I felt incredibly alone. I felt like moving was this giant puzzle that we were being asked to solve. I felt like I was standing in between two worlds fitting into neither. I searched and searched for tips and tricks and insights and advice, but all I found were canned answers. I was looking for something that felt like it was coming from a real person, because moving is an extremely personal endeavor.

I decided that if I could share a little bit about what we learned during our move and tap into the knowledge of other families that have been through the same thing that I could create the book I wish I had.

So last August, I started writing this book. And this September, I finished it.

Writing a book isn’t entirely what I expected. I didn’t know that I would be so painfully sick of it by the end. I didn’t realize that it would never feel complete so I would have to just pick a point to stop. And I didn’t expect that finishing would be rather anti-climatic because of both of these things.

But what was not surprising is this. Writing a book (or insert any other project or goal that you are interested in tackling) is about breaking down a large task into small pieces and then being disciplined about chipping away at those smaller pieces.

The trick to completing it was making it a priority. For months, I trained myself to work on my book first. I made it my top priority. Before email, before my blog, before dishes and laundry (never before coffee), my book was always first. Everything else had to wait.

On the days I didn’t feel like working on it, which was many if not most days, I would force myself to sit down for 25 minutes. That’s it. I would start with 25 minutes and that often turned into an hour but usually not more than that.

Is my book perfect? Far from it.

Is it any good? I think so. I hope so.

Will anyone buy it? Only time will tell.

This is what I know. I worked hard and created something that I am proud of. I did what I set out to do.

I stopped asking how. I stopped asking why. I just went for it.

I wrote a book.