This Way

Note to Self:

You are standing at the trailhead of your own work, reorganizing the supplies for the tenth time, still looking for the map. There is no map. There was never going to be one. This is the kind of path you make by walking it.

So here is the plan, and it expires never: begin badly, on purpose, today.

You have watched the trick happen in your own hands, so you already know it. Confidence is not waiting at the trailhead. It shows up about four minutes in, once your hands take over and you forget to watch yourself work. It is not something you have or lack. It is something the doing makes. Start, and it catches up.

Bring the cheap paper, the kind you will not guard like an heirloom. Bring the questionable idea. Bring the part of you that has been elbowing you for years. The muse is famously unreliable and turns up only after you have started without her.

And to whoever is reading over my shoulder: this is not a trail led by someone who has done it all before. I am out ahead some days, lost in the weeds others, hollering back whatever I find. 50% doubts + 50% confidence but 100% willing. Come along, and I will show you what is out here.

Point yourself forward and take one inelegant step. The trail starts under your feet the moment you move.

• Art is the trek.
• Curiosity is the compass.
• Generosity is the scout.
• Grace is the pace.
• Connection is the campfire.

Let's go.