Your book and why it isn’t done yet

Have I told you that I live in a gated community?

I do.

It’s something I never thought I’d say since I love neighborhoods with big trees that run parallel to city streets—the kind of street with a laundromat and coffee shop and taco joint and a bar.

However, I live on a floating home—yes, like Tom Hanks’ character in Sleepless in Seattle.

It’s a home (not a boat) that is built to float on the water.

Pretty cool, no?

Anyway…

In order to get to the dock where all ten of our little community houses float, you need to use your gate key to open the big metal gate to get inside.

Floating home communities are FASCINATING and so people want to, ya know, check ‘em out.

The gate helps us cut down on curious onlooker traffic so we can enjoy our little floating lives in relative peace.

The first year I lived in our floating home community, I went out on a Saturday night, had a few drinks, danced, had what you’d call a ‘really good time’, only to have the crushing weight of reality yank me back to sobriety when I stood eye to eye with the gate and realized “Oh freaking fracking frick…….. I forgot my GATE KEY.”

Now it’s eleven-seventeen PM on a Saturday night.

I know no one on the row (I’m still new).

There is exactly ONE gate key assigned to me and it’s nestled safely in my cute little house on my kitchen counter far beyond the gate where I now stand, mildly inebriated and royally annoyed with myself.

So, I do what any normal, neurotic person like me does when they’re working out a problem: I start to pace so my brain will work faster.

One of my favorite mantras for problem-solving comes from a business coach I worked with years ago. She always said, “You are bigger than your problems!”

I loved that mantra and it really stuck with me.

So, I start to say it over and over again as I walk back and forth, back and forth, in front of the gate.

I am bigger than my problems. I am bigger than my problems.

I stopped and stared at my obstacle.

Mind you, this gate is on a dock, a floating dock.

I’ve got water on either side of me.

Dark, cold, murky water with no way to pull yourself out onto the dock from the water if you were to, say, FALL IN.

The distance from water to dock is too large even for the strongest of upper bodies to pull themself out. You need a ladder.

There’s no ladder.

PLUS THERE ARE SEA MONSTERS IN THE RIVER.

Or at least carp, rambunctious river otters, and some beavers.

So swimming around was out.

I couldn’t climb over the gate.

It was WAY too tall.

Plus its metal construction of teeny, tiny little holes instead of sturdy chain link areas to grab and hoist myself over seemed focused on deterring intruders.

“Hm. Smart design…” I muttered.

Then, in a flash, I realized that I could get AROUND the gate with a little (albeit risky) maneuvering.

I quickly slipped off my flip flops, deftly climbed down and around the gate, balancing on a pipe that ran along side the dock *just* above the water.

I flattened myself against the side of the gate and reached across, gripping the very centers of the metal holes with the tips of my fingers.

Then carefully and slowly stepped along the pipe and and held on, and stepped along the pipe and held on until I… just… made it… around… to… the other… side… HA! YES!

I quickly clambered onto the dock on the VICTORIOUS side of the gate and clicked the button to open it from the INSIDE.

I reached down, grabbed my flip flops and my purse, gave myself a literal high-five, and then sauntered home in the moonlight smiling like Hermione after solving a tricky Potions problem.

Boo-yah.

What does this have to do with your book?

Well that (damn) gate is just like the (damn) blocks that you run into about writing your book.

Whether it’s the gate of:

• I don’t have enough time to write - or

• I’m too stressed to write - or

• Everything I write is crap - or

• I just don’t FEEL like writing - or

• I feel guilty when I write instead of spending time doing _____ - or

• I’m so freaking blocked, what’s the point anyway...

Whatever the gate (du jour) that’s blocking you, you will need to get around it (or over it or through it) to let your creative light and genius pour out onto the page.

You can act like I did on that Saturday night, pacing back and forth and mantra-ing your way into getting past whatever gate you’re facing.

And you might get lucky (like I did) and happen to get around the gate without a) getting picked up by the cops or b) falling in the dark, murky, SEA MONSTER water or c) spending the night curled up at the gate sucking my thumb waiting for someone to happen to come home and let me in.

You 100% could figure it out on your own without any mishaps.

But man, it’s so much easier when you’ve got support.

I would have loved to have someone there with me to help me through that gate instead of going it alone.

I would have loved to have someone to call or at least cheer me on when I (almost!) toppled back into the water at eleven thirty on that Saturday night.

I would have loved someone to at least WITNESS my sheer ingenuity and badassery at getting around that gate when I felt like I had NO options.

But I didn’t.

When you’re working on a big project like a book, it’s important to have someone there to help you through your OWN stuff (that’s where all the gates are) so that you can be a CLEAR channel for your work to come through you.

Here’s something people don’t tell you: lots of people don’t get it when you’re writing a book.

They can’t relate.

You’ll get through an especially excruciating chapter and your well-meaning husband will say, “That’s great babe.”

*dead-eyed stare back at him*

That’s. Great. Babe?

Yeeeeee-ah.

Like I said, not everyone can relate.

So—don’t go it alone. That’s all I’m saying.

I love helping writers go from not writing or writing in fits and starts to fully committing to their book.

It’s like, the COOLEST thing.

If you’re curious about what I’m talking about, let’s chat. I’d love to tell you what’s been working for my clients so far and see if that could help you too.

In the meantime, remember love, you are bigger than your problems. No tricky late-night, gate maneuvers required to know that. <3

Rebecca*

PS: Want to share this post? Here’s a link to the blog version.

PPS: Here’s that link if you’re interested in chatting. I’m not concerned about you signing up to work with me or not. I would love to see if I can help you with your next steps though.