10 things you won’t get until after the work is done

(a rumination to encourage myself to just FREAKING finish this dang enormously complicated project I'm building already)

I can figure this out. I can google the answers. I can build the narratives. I can alter the files. I can get help from people smarter than I am who I know are kind. I just have to, you know, DO WHAT I HAVE NOT YET DONE BUT THAT I KNOW I CAN DO. And I need to drink more water. Lots more water.

1
You won’t get supporters until after the work is done.
People need something to believe in and care about. Give it to them.

2
You won’t get haters until after the work is done.
People who don’t do the work need to feel better about themselves. Give them something to seethe about. And then laugh, knowing they couldn’t even dare to do the work they’re mocking.

3
You won’t get chances until after the work is done.
The proof is in the portfolio. Give people reasons to give you opportunities. The real deals don’t need permission to prove themselves.

4
You won’t get credit until after the work is done.
What you didn’t do you can never own. Give yourself a stack of bullet points to blow holes through the arguments against you.

5
You won’t get satisfaction until after the work is done.
Knowing you already did it will be the cudgel that you can swing to break down all the doors. Give yourself the tools you need to go where you want to.

6
You won’t get valuable until after the work is done—over and over again.
Potential is worthless. Experience is money, but laurels wilt so fast. Work from last year is not valuable: but today’s effort is real cash. Keeping doing the work.

7
You won’t get respect until after the work is done.
The difference between the dreamer-havers and the dream-livers is the work. Do it and change how people see you.

8
You won’t get better until the work is done.
You don’t know if you suck unless you try. If you don’t try, you most certainly suck. If you keep trying, you won’t as much.

9
You won’t get feedback until after the work is done.
You need to know how well you’re doing. And you have to be doing work in public to get that crucial information. Have something to show.

10
You won’t get anywhere better until the work is done.
If you want to change the trajectory of your life, do the work that must be done. And that work will take you everywhere.

Thanks to TATE London for recently reposting some Jenny Holzer (art hero who saved my teenaged life for real) posters and reminding me that flat-spoken dark lines are incredibly useful motivationally: especially when they backhandedly antagonize in all caps.