Should you quit

Or keep going: a modern quandary / Issue 1,200

Oh, hi friends!

I began listening to another Seth Godin book last night which is all about The Dip, that hard part after starting a project, where the newness and excitement have worn off but you haven’t yet mastered what you’re doing, so you’re just kind of wallowing…in the Dip…

And his advice is to quit. 

Actually, either quit before you hit the Dip, before you’ve sunk in time you can’t get back, or to recommit and never quit. Not until you, or what you’re making, is remarkable. The best in the world.

And I like this book, and this idea, very much. Of course I do. I like the push towards excellence, and allowing yourself to draw boundaries and quit what isn’t working.

But this is so much harder in practice than on paper. If I took his advice, I should probably quit at least three things: no more books, no articles, no podcast, no newsletters, no social platforms, no poems, no plane sessions. Wait that’s a lot of things. Probably no musicals or plays either. 

And suddenly I’m left with a very empty plate. 

That doesn’t feel freeing.

That feels like freezing.

And so what can we do during the Dip — when we’re on episode 30 of our podcast or the third draft of our novel or the muck of the middle of what once felt shiny and new?

We can do it the same, but different. 

Can you get a new kind of guest or find a fresh reader or tear down your marketing technique? Can you inject some humor or get weird or be serious?

We can improve a skill.

Can you take a class to sharpen your mind, or read a book that can create new sparks or subscribe to one newsletter that will point like an arrow toward where you want to go? Can you learn from the person who’s done it before you?

We can love the foundation.

Can you accept that where you are now isn’t a dip or plateau, but rather a wide and expansive foundation, a springboard for your ideas, a footing and a calling, and maybe exactly where you need to be to grow? Can you love the fact that being in the Dip means you’re actually making something?

Harder in practice than on paper. But doable.

Keep going, is the point. 

Keep going is always the point.

PS — My new book Do It (or Don’t): A Boundary-Creating Journal is on sale Sept. 12. I felt burnt out before I wrote this colorful little bundle last year.

Working through it and drawing my own creative boundaries helped me find the way back to myself. If you need that, I hope it helps you, too.

Order now on Amazon, Bookshop, or your favorite indie. And if you’d like a copy and can’t afford one right now, send me your address—I got you.