Mr, How do I Start?
Ask any teacher the number one question they hear from students and you get the big one - "What am I supposed to do?"
Usually that's because they weren't listening or maybe we just didn't explain it well enough. In school, it's a pretty standard correction. Evaluate where the breakdown in communication happened and clarify. But sometimes, even with that extra support, they hit you with a question that you don't always have the answer to: "How do I start?"
Oh yeah, I can tell them to "use a hook" or "look back at your notes" but the truth is, you just got to go. I've gotten to the point where I tell them to write the damn essay first then we'll fix the introduction later. It's a tried and true practice of putting all your ideas out there, no matter how messy it gets, and taking a look at it afterwards. What needs work? What looks good? Where does this fit best?
I know that essays aren't exactly a mirrored reflection of real life - Quick! Raise your hand if you've ever written an essay since you left school! - and a lot of times even teachers reevaluate and question why we do them. But the truth is, this sounds a lot like regular life.
The two questions that teachers always hear are the same questions that everyone asks themselves at some point - What do I do? How do I start?
I think anyone can you tell about their likes and hobbies: the football enthusiasts call for firing coaches every Sunday, video game streamers constantly destroying regular folks, and the never-ending DIYers on Pinterest. But then comes the tough stuff, what do I want to do? Fantasy football and angry tweets only last a few months. Most people aren't good enough to be featured streamers. And don't get me started on finishing that project I found on Pinterest 4 months ago. So where do we go from here? How do we really dive into those hobbies and interests? The expectations in our highly visible society are higher than ever and that doesn't always feel good because we start to expect too much from ourselves and we begin to feel overwhelmed. Feelings of doubt start to creep in. Comparing ourselves to the models we look up make any task daunting.
And even if we manage to work up the conviction to try something new, how do we start? Starting new things is such a mainstay in American society that we even rattle off an overstuffed list of New Year’s Resolutions. We set those expectations too high and the inevitable feelings of exhaustion and inadequacy start to catch up to us. Then we fall behind. And once we fall behind that goal we set for ourselves gets further and further away to the point that it’s no longer the motivating prize at the end of a long journey and instead becomes a taunting figure at the finish line of a race we have lost all interest in.
There are stories across history and in the social consciousness of people who overcome these deficits and heavy expectations to create something for themselves for which they alone are responsible. Despite all the guides available to us, or the tutorials sitting in our queue on Youtube, why is it so difficult to start a project?
For me, it’s the fear. The fear that I won’t have enough time. The fear that what I am creating is going to be lackluster and just not good enough for myself or for anyone else. The fear that putting effort into another project will detract from my other endeavors, from my work, or from my relationships. Starting a new, continuous project is scary and I am taking the first step right now through this first blog post. In doing so, I am taking my own advice - just write, then go back and fix it later. So here’s to ignoring expectations, ignoring comparisons, and here’s to starting something new.
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