You’ve Been Working Hard for a Very Long Time — How Can You Tell If It’s Working?

Have you failed? Or have you not succeeded…yet?

“In the moment, it’s impossible to tell whether it’s not working or whether it’s not working yet.”

-Dorie Clark, The Long Game

Going to the gym once or twice won’t tell you whether your current workout program is working or not; just like writing one chapter of your book won’t tell you anything about its possible reception by an actual audience.

You have to ship. Then you have to wait. And then you have to repeat that process over and over again for however long it takes!

And it’s probably going to take a lot longer than you think it will. I’m growing at about +100 new followers a day on Instagram right now, but I posted 700+ times before I even cracked 1,000 followers.

Building anything of substance takes time — sometimes more time than most people are willing to experiment with — and the trap that many people fall into is that they mistake their lack of progress for the idea that what they’re doing isn’t working.

Most of the worm’s life is spent in the cocoon until, HERE WE GO, the butterfly emerges on the very last day — that stunning, dynamic creature that was growing quietly inside the whole time.