or are you stressed out focusing only on your goal?

I have been totally immersed in the book The Practice: Shipping Creative Work by Seth Godin.

It is both inspirational and filled with practical insights.

The idea I’m hooked on right now is committing to the practice (the process) of your creative work without focusing on the product (the end result).

I have to admit this is a concept I struggle with. I have always been extremely goal-oriented, needing to reach one goal after another. The end result was the most important thing to me, and the steps it took me to get there were nothing more than obstacles I had to overcome as quickly as possible.

Returning to my dance training has been challenging to say the least! But I decided that I’m going to commit to the process. To approach my work in such a way that I can find joy in it. And not just strive for the end goal.

While this is freaky territory for me, it’s also been very freeing and I have enjoyed and am more in tune with my training and dancing than I have ever been. I’m letting go of the expectations. Silencing the recording inside my head that plays the demanding voices of my old teachers, choreographers, and directors to be better and work harder. The voices that always want more, more, more.

And from this place of committing to the process, and not the result, I am finding my expression and soul in my work again. I am discovering me in my work again. I am breathing again.

And even if just to me, it is beautiful.

❓Are you taking time to enjoy the work or are you stressed out focusing only on your goal? How can you let go of the expectations and just enjoy the freedom of creating and the beauty in the process?