A handful of years ago, a friend told me about her neighbor who finally started writing the book he’s wanted to write after 54 years.
One day, she said, he simply decided it didn’t matter if he felt like writing or not, and that his fear around writing once a day became submerged by his need to say something.
Writing doesn’t necessarily always feel fun. Having written is fun and enjoyable, but the act of writing? Often not the case. And building the habit of writing? Sometimes it feels like an impossible mountain to scale. But, the most uncomfortable of all is the space between thinking of something you want to say and typing the first word. That space can occupy seconds, but it can also occupy decades, as my friend was reminded by her neighbor.
Indeed, if we wait until our brains green-light the act of writing (or sketching, or making an outline, or whatever the creative process attached to your knowledge dictates) for a moment of "feeling like it" we risk waiting a very long time.