If you don’t know it’s impossible, it’s easier to do. Neil Gaiman, “Make Good Art”
If you intend to write and publish a book, you have given yourself an immense challenge. You might think it’s impossible to do. You must not think that. If you hope to make your intention a reality, you must view it as something that is possible.
If you can do that – if you can view your challenge as surmountable – you can begin toward your goal. You can research time periods, specific people, or sciences. You can begin to write an outline. You can set goals of how many words you will write per day, week, or month. You can do all those things, but you can only do them if you begin to view your task as possible.
Even if you can do that, you will still struggle. Gaiman says that a thing becomes “easier to do” not “easy” to do. If the work were as simple as thinking of it as possible, nobody would have to revise and revise and edit. Nobody would have to work with an editor. Nobody would struggle to sit in front of the computer or the pad of paper and work. Everybody would achieve their goals, but not everybody does.
The work may become easier to do if you stop thinking of it as impossible, but you still have to do, as Steven Pressfield says, the work. You’ve simply altered your perception of the work. You may not know everything you think you need to know, but you’re willing to try regardless. You’re willing to pretend you can do this impossible thing, and you do it by telling yourself that it is possible and that you do have the dedication to see the thing through to its end.
Image: grahamc99 (CC BY 2.0)