Episode 017 | The Words You Say to Yourself

Last week in Episode 016 we talked about Fear Lists and Stoicism. The main idea there is to put as much energy as possible into things we can control instead of squandering it on things we can’t control. Through this, we can make steady progress toward making peace with the fact that while we don’t have control over what agents, publishers, book buyers, book critics, or movie producers are going to like or do, we do have control over our process and (at least to some extent) how we use our time.



Good news.



All of these things that we sorted into piles of “get crack-a-lackin‘ on this” and “get zen about this” were likely mostly external things: other people’s actions and responses, your actions and responses.



But what about the internal stuff? The fears themselves? Or the critical or defeatist thoughts? What can we do about them? Well, there’s good news and bad news.



The bad news is that no matter what you do, sometimes crappy and hurtful thoughts are going to arise in your mind. Anyone even remotely familiar with meditation has probably heard the metaphor that your mind is the sky and your thoughts are the clouds. The trick is to be the sky and let the clouds float on by without judgment and fully cognizant of their impermanence. The good news is while you don’t always have control of what will float up, you do have some control over which ones you invest in.



My all-time favorite coach is Tom Crean, who now coaches men’s college basketball at the University of Georgia. Before that, we were lucky enough to have him at Indiana University for almost a decade. My kids attended his summer camp for kids as many times as I could get them there, not because I was banking on their future college basketball careers, but because of Coach Crean’s focus on character, teamwork, sportsmanship, effort, and mindset. You know, all the reasons we have sports in the first place. (He seriously is the best.)



One of our favorite things that he used to say at these camps was “Every dribble counts, campers. Every dribble counts.” Now on one level, he was talking about a basketball skills tactic about making sure your movements are deliberate and productive (much like we might urge ourselves to make every word count).



However, it also reflected a broader mindset. One that dovetailed nicely with another of his oft-repeated expressions: “Practice doesn’t make perfect. Practice makes permanent.” It’s important to be mindful of your actions (all those seemingly insignificant “dribbles”) whenever you can and make them as productive and helpful as possible, because all those little actions, those small practices make permanent habits and tendencies.



But, come on, it’s basketball. There’s only so much you can control in a basketball game. You can set up plays and hope your teammates will be there. You can break down film, study the tendencies of the players on the opposing team and have an educated guess about what they might do. But when that ref throws that jump ball in the air and the players swat at it, it’s game on. And anything can happen.



A writing life is like that unpredictable basketball...