Stop, Stopping what you start!!

I have been building out content from the beginning of this year, and it has been so much fun. I have produced over sixty videos, blogged and journaled every day, and I have an iCloud stuffed with pictures. It has been a fruitful year.

However, it has also been time-consuming, and at times… it has been an additional pressure that I have forced on myself.

Working in the day job has enough pressure, yet I am adding to that situation by my own volition.

Some people would say that is not sensible.

But in reply, I would scream back that this has been a brilliant thing to do. I have got so much satisfaction out of creating videos, writing and wandering around Beijing taking photographs. This creative activity has kept me sane, happy and occupied, and it has taught me a lot about myself. 

It has made me clear that I can be self-driven, learn new things, and create something with a level of fulfilment that is not achieved in other ways. It has given me creative confidence that will set me up for a future journey into semi-retirement.

I was sharing some reflections with a friend, and he asked me what the difference was. Is it the fact that I live in Beijing and can travel across China?

I thought about that fit a minute and agreed that having a great subject matter was a bonus but the most significant difference.

The ONE THING that is making the distinction is that I refuse to stop.

You see, it took me so long to start. To get past the imposter syndrome, to get over the fear of failure and beyond letting criticism paralyse me that I point blank refuse to stop. I am on a mission now, and the stuff that would hold me back is in my wake. I have moved on to the keep going stage, and I have worked super hard to gather momentum that I will not stop. (That is my go-to phrase when I feel my inner voice call for me to slow down, to quit)

Starting things is never easy, but stopping things, chucking them, quitting, is always so simple. But yet, it is so damaging.

If you build up the habit of stopping. Of quitting, because things are going against you or because there is something good on television, you are training yourself to accept that stopping is fine. That it is ok to not do what you said you would. That you can stop, and there are no consequences.

That is what I always did. I would start on a creative endeavour, and then I would stop. So may things have never seen the light of day.

But not now. Now I am determined to keep going. My one piece of advice that I spray about like a New York City street artist is to not stop.

If I had a spray can and a subway carriage right in front of me at this moment, I would spray on the side of it the following…

Stop, Stopping what you start!!

I would then photograph it and share it on my youtube channel along with the behind the scene video.

That is what makes the difference. 

Not stopping.

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