Showing Up is Hard.

Doing something once is not hard, continuing to show up is. It's different than just showing up one time. Things change, growth happens when I keep showing up. It’s not special when it becomes a routine. But the most growth happens in routine. When I show up once I just have to push to go that one time, I can pick and choose what day that is. The greatest at anything are the ones that keep showing up. 

“The formula for success is 2% talent, 8% luck, and 90% of showing up every day.” 

― Jeffrey Fry

Whatever it is you do when you show up every day or every week it changes it. It becomes more of who you are rather than something you did one time. This is much harder, but more important. For real growth to happen I have to show up every day or every week. The danger of this is it begins to lose its specialness. It's like how to learn the anatomy of a frog it has to die. This is also true with many endeavors. Comedy especially. In order to get really good one must show up as often as possible. When I show up often, some of the excitement is lost. What once was something fun I did occasionally and was special is no longer special. 

I recently attempted to do a month where I posted a new photo every day on my instagram account. I found this difficult after about a week, especially in the quarantine as I was mostly in my house and not really out doing much. But something wonderful happened, I began to get more experimental. I began to stretch and find new things to capture images of. I personally do not like to post a lot of the same thing, though there is nothing wrong with some similar photos. Some accounts are all just mirror selfies. That is not my account, I probably would have more of a following if I had more of a consistent post. But for me I find it fun to push myself beyond what I already do. By showing up every day I was able to push myself further creatively. I was able to get through all my basic ideas and get to the deeper ones, while I was also improving my skills as an iphone photographer. As I write this I realize that it is ok to have some of the same things and too much variety is actually a bad thing. People go to my account not for fresh new things, they come for more of whatever I have given them before. 

Continuing to show up is hard because it feels like work. That's because it is. When I continue to show up I am doing the work. I want to get really good so I have to do the work. It has always been this way for me. I am not the kind of person who is good at things right away. I have to work really hard to just be mediocre at things. This sounds like a downer thing but I have learned that in my life it has been a huge blessing. The reason being that I am forced to show up every day, every week and do the work. When I really do commit to things I get a much deeper understanding of things than so many others. I get a deeper appreciation for it as well. Take high school for example I had to work really hard to get my B’s. I developed incredible study habits so that when I went to college I already had those habits. When things got more challenging I saw so many around me falter, I did not have the study habits in place and I worked hard to get my B’s and C’s again. In my reading about professional athletes it’s the ones who develop the strongest habits that eventually rise to the top. It has led me to believe that talent does not mean anything. The talent lies in the ones who work for things. That is the skill that is the most essential of them all. The ones who continue to show up, those are the ones who are great. When it comes to things that do not have physical ceilings. But even that for some those physical ceilings are broken. We as humans are fascinating creatures and we are able to transcend what is thought to be possible often. Sometimes telling someone they cannot do something is the ultimate motivation to show up more and prove it wrong. 

Showing up changes what it is. We must be willing to allow the endeavor to change to really get good. Showing up is not exciting. Showing up allows us to transcend ourselves and reach levels we never imagined. I am not saying it cannot be exciting to keep showing up, there will be days when it is exciting there will be more days when it won’t be exciting. All these days are important to building skill. It is never a reason to quit. 

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Thank you for reading, You’re doing great. 

Bjorn RG.