You're Going to Survive: True Stories from People Who've Endured Soul-Crushing Moments in Their Careers—Failure, Rejection, Disappointment, Public Humiliation—and How They Got Through It

it takes time to find your voice and build momentum. Most people quit way too quickly. The people who succeed aren’t necessarily more “interesting” or “talented.” They’re just the people who don’t quit.

“It’s been thirty years since I started working on ______, and I’m so glad I didn’t give up, because…whoa. Here’s what’s happened in the last thirty years…”

If there’s one thing that is universally true about human beings, it is that we tend to give up far too quickly and too easily. We don’t like hard work. We lack patience. We do everything in our power to avoid rejection, disappointment, and humiliation. We don’t like to feel emotions that are not “fun” to feel. It’s easier to give up. So we do. But

“Back at the beginning, I would pretend that I was a lighthouse beaming light and love out into the world. I would pretend that thousands of people were listening. I wrote ‘as if’ thousands of people were listening. I never missed a single blog post because I’d be letting thousands of people down! I imagined that I was changing thousands of people’

No amount of money is worth putting your safety or sanity at risk.

You can make excuses or you can make yourself proud. You can make excuses or you can make progress. You can make excuses or you can make art. Every day, it’s your choice.

If you’re getting a funny red-flag feeling that’s purely emotional and doesn’t seem to make any rational sense, just go with it. Trust your hut.