Learning Curves

Every time I begin a new project, I’m reminded of lyrics from Faith No More’s song “Falling to Pieces”. The line that comes to me goes, “From the bottom it looks like a steep incline, from the top another downhill slope behind, but I know, the equilibrium’s there.” I find this to be true almost every time I start a new porject or experience something new.

Just a couple of years ago it seemed unthinkable that I would ever finish my college degree. I just couldn’t figure out where all the money and time for classes was going to come from. Eventually though, Susan helped me apply for a student loan, I started taking classes as night, and before I knew it I had earned my degree! Before I began it seemed like an insurmountable task. Looking back after it was all over, all I kept thinking was, “man, that was really easy. Why did I wait that long to get started?”

I experienced the same thing when putting together Commodork. At the beginning, organizing, writing, publishing, promoting and selling a book all on my own seemed all but impossible. But now, every time another copy of Commodork sells, I think, “why did I put that off for so long?” I currently have several other books in the works.

I’ve been wanting to learn VB Scripting for some time now. I don’t know why, but for some reason I had decided it was going to be extremely complicated. In the giant batch of e-books I recently downloaded I noticed there was one covering VB scripting. After getting through the first three chapters or so, I was like — wow, this is easy! Why did I wait so long to start learning this?

My advice to you today is, if there’s something you’ve been putting off because it seems difficult, or huge, or insurmountable, give it a shot. You may just find it was easier to do than it first appeared, and once you succeed you may find that you are an inspiration to both other people and, even more rewarding, yourself.