Sunday 26th February 2017
Today has been fuelled by Monster energy drinks.
I set my alarm early this morning so I woke up in time to go to swordfighting training. I was very tempted to give it a miss. After all, it’s not like I ever miss training when loads of other people do.
But this is the point.
It doesn’t matter if you want to write a novel, become a better swordfighter or even just get fit: you have to turn up.
It doesn’t matter what you want success in, you still have to turn up.
It’s so easy to find excuses. I’m too tired, I’m too busy, I have more important things to do.
It’s no secret that when I started swordfighting I was the worst. I went in fully knowing that. I was always the last person who picked up how to do any technique, it took me 6 months to pass my basic safety test, whereas most students do it in under 12 weeks.
But here’s the thing: I turned up.
Each week, I turned up. And when our swordfighting school opened two branches, I went to both. And when they started Sunday sparring, I turned up to that as well. And when I needed to improve my speed, I turned up at the gym.
In just the last week I’ve had two people unconnected with the school comment on my improvement over the last year. And how did I do it? I turned up.
Likewise, I often get people ask me how I wrote 600,000 words in a year. Again the answer is: I turned up. I sat down at my desk and I wrote. They weren’t the best words and they certainly didn’t always come easily, but because I turned up I was able to chip away at the wordcount.
So today, despite feeling like I haven’t slept for a week I got in the car and I drove the 90 minutes to Sunday sparring.
Was I my best? Not really, although a couple of cans of Monster really helped (I know, I know… I’m going to pay for all that caffeine down the road). But I had a couple of good fights and worked on my agility which, whilst it manifested itself in being defensive more than offensive, frustrated a couple of my opponents.
We went for a pub lunch. I wasn’t good. I had the burger, which because it was made of beef, means due to my weird metabolism that I’ll put on weight on Monday/ Tuesday.
Popped into my parents quickly as I’d picked Mum up a copy of Sarah Pinborough’s new book and kept forgetting it.
Got home in the early evening and had all the house chores to do that I didn’t do yesterday as I was too hungover. Time I sat down and ate whilst watching the last episode of Taboo, it was late evening.
I did some social media work that needed doing (and never got done yesterday due to my state), finally got issue 35 of The Climb posted, and did some articles for my swordfighting school’s website.
Beta reader and author extraordinaire, Kate, has sent me feedback on my first three synopsises I need to send to my agent. I’ve not had time to read them yet but I intend to go over them sometime in the next week as we are all meeting up on Saturday.
This weekend has been a busy one and I really need to catch up on my sleep. Hence I retired early this evening to try and get a good night’s sleep before the day job tomorrow. And whilst I have no idea why I got drunk on Friday night, I do feel as if my body needed it. I might feel tired but at least I feel a bit more relaxed.
And most of all, just because I was hungover or tired, didn’t mean that the core activities I needed to complete didn’t get done. I turned up
If you want to follow more of my journey, then be sure to check me on my social channels. Likewise, if you’d like me to expand on any point mentioned above, please say so in the comments.
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