Day 3, Fall 2023 Mini 1000
Hi friends.
Today we will write 1000 words. Together. Because we are trying to build the foundation for something new. Something huge. And we’re going to finish it. We’re going to write as if our life depends on it. Because in a way it does.
Think about what you’re trying to build here. It’s never just a book. It’s never just a screenplay or a master’s thesis or an essay it feels desperately important to put out in the world. Underneath it there is always a minor current if not stated then at least felt: If I write this, then my life will shift.
Every time I write another book I become something new. I’ve built a slightly different version of myself. Even if it’s just the person who wrote that book. The person who finished that project. Even if nothing happens with what I’ve completed — and believe me, I have written books and thrown them away — I still identify as the person who did the damn thing. And that, for me, is a basis for growth.
The person who finishes something is the kind of person I want to be. Need to be.
And I think you’re here because you want to be that kind of person too.
Good luck out there. You got this.
Jami
Didn’t write Saturday. Wrote about 3,000 words yesterday and in doing so finished the novel draft I started in June 2020, three days into my first 1000 Words of Summer. Tonight I’ll journal for a thousand words about this project. So grateful for this space which has pushed me to be a person who finishes things. Thanks, Jami. 💛💛💛
1197 words today. A completely different vibe from yesterday. I found myself wishing (again) that I had a body of work to draw from as I write this memoir. I am not a theologian, philosopher, psychologist or poet. And then I remembered my teacher Jim Finley telling me that my body of work is my life. Anne Frank had no " body of work," her body of work was her life. I keep showing up and paying attention to the curriculum of my life. I keep writing. I keep learning. I keep listening.