“The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work.”
~Emile Zola
This morning someone said to me as I was coming out of the gym, after complimenting me on my continuous efforts to get better in my physical fitness, that as long as I keep putting in the effort and hard work God was going to keep graduating me to the next level. There was something about the thought of being promoted by God to the next level of my life, or even the next level of my journey to maintain a healthier lifestyle that made me think deeply about what that meant in other areas of my life as well.
I will admit that when I started this conscious effort over two years ago to change the way I eat and my relationship with food, in addition to changing the way I think and feel about physical exercise, I became a little obsessed with it. I think that it might have come at the expense of my passion with writing every single moment I could get. I literally used to write everywhere I went, on napkins, on little bulletins or scraps of paper, I would write while I was eating, sometimes while I was lying down (supposedly trying to go to sleep). I put that much hard work and effort into it and while I had not yet saw the fruits of my labor at that time I didn’t really care, I was just consumed with the passion that I had to write.
When I wonder now why I have not yet gotten to where I feel I should be in my writing career yet, I now have to consider the fact that I simply stopped putting in the extreme hard work and efforts that I used to in order for me to graduate to that next level in my writing career. Now don’t misunderstand me, I have not stopped being passionate about my writing in any way (or I wouldn’t be able to maintain this blog). I simply seemed to have traded one obsession for another and my efforts were unbalanced. I don’t in any way regret dedicating the time and effort that I have to beginning my journey to a better and healthier, more physically fit me. I only regret not finding the balance I needed to graduate to the next level on both aspects.
When you’re younger you have these stages in life that you graduate from to move on to the next level. From elementary, middle and high school, to college and even graduate school. Typically when you’re going through the school stage of your life you get breaks in order to have time to gather yourself and prepare for what that stage entails. However, when you get into that stage where you have to really start living your life you don’t get those breaks.
There is no time to wait until you have thought about what it is going to take for you to get where you need to be, there’s just hard work and effort. Simply put if I don’t find a way to balance my efforts and my level of hard work in both areas that I am passionate about (health & fitness as well as writing) then I may not be able to simultaneously graduate to the next level on both fronts.
It’s hard to put all of my effort and time into just one thing because I am passionate about so many and in the case of my health, that is a passion that is necessary and I can’t afford to sacrifice. But writing is my first love, and like any kind of relationship, I have to put in the time, effort, pay close attention to it, continue to nurture it, and learn how to balance it with everything else that is important to me so that I can make it to the next level in my writing life. Until tomorrow…Are you putting in the time and effort so that you can graduate to the next stage of your life?
Jimmetta Carpenter
Freelance Writer/Editor
The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)
Writing as “Jaycee Durant”
https://writetobe.wordpress.com/
http://unpleasantlyplump.wordpress.com/
http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310
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