Bre Pettis and Kio Stark came up with what they call "The Cult of Done" manifesto. One of the statements in it is:
There are three states of being. Not knowing, action, and completion.
This statement really hit home for me. I believe that most people never achieve their potential because they get stuck in one of these states. This is how I see it:
The "not knowing" people have ideas but they don't know how to get started, they don't know if anybody will want what they would offer, they don't know whether it will be worth the effort, they don't know if they'll enjoy doing it... and on and on. They remain people with lots of ideas. They may talk about these ideas a lot, or they may just write about them in their private journals. But they don't DO them.
The "action" people take it one step further. They get started. They have drawings or blueprints or half-finished stuff. But most of them stop. They abandon the half-finished projects because they get distracted by something else. Or because they begin to doubt the value of what they're doing. Or because somebody tells them they're wasting their time. Or because it gets difficult.
The "completion" people finish what they start. That includes sending it out into the world for others to experience when that's appropriate (unless you've done it just for the experience, which is perfectly valid, finishing something and then not having the guts to send it out into the world doesn't count as completion). Even if the world doesn't accept it at first, they keep the faith and they don't give up. They also don't let it stop them from moving on to new things as well.
The people who make the most difference in the world are the "completion" people. The rest may be charming, intelligent, nice (or nasty) but they don't have much of an impact because their masterwork--which could be a great book or an outstanding brownie recipe--will not be experience by anyone.
We have to pass through the first two states to get to the third.
The first--having ideas--is most fun. Some people say it's better than sex (I guess that depends on how good your ideas and the sex are...).
The second--getting started--is harder but often happens with a surge of energy.
The third--finishing and not abandoning what you've done--is by far the hardest. I've failed at it many times. I'm pretty good at completing the project itself, but hanging in there for the hard, continuous marketing effort is where I tend to fall down, even though I know quite a bit about marketing. It's more exciting to go on to the next thing, but a lot of good things are lost that way.
Today, on my birthday, I declare myself to be in "completion recovery". Maybe I should start Completers Anonymous. Would you be a candidate?
