In December 2024, I noticed something. So many of the people around me don’t know what they like, what they believe, what they want out of life. But they know what’s trending or what’s going viral. Basically, they know what other people are doing.

I looked at myself and I realized that I don’t have this issue. I know who I am. And I’m very clear on it. But it hasn’t always been like this for me.

That’s when it came to me. ‘It’ being an idea for an online course about self-discovery that I’ve decided to call the infinite canvas: a guide for becoming who you’re meant to be.

It was going to be easy.
It was going to be gentle.
It was going to be loving.
It was going to be like a good friend helping you to see you.
It was going to be what I needed five years ago, ten years ago.

[Side note to me: Why am I using was? It’s still going to be all of these things!]

I remember the excitement I felt and all the energy I had. It was electric. Within two weeks, I’d outlined the course, found photos, and built the course page. All I had left was to write the course content and record the audio. And create a sales page. I figured that I’d have everything done by the end of January. Or Valentine’s Day, at the latest.

But before I knew it, it was St. Patrick’s Day. Then Easter. Then Mother’s Day. Then Juneteenth. Then…you get it. I started like a bolt of lightning. More than six months later, I still wasn’t done.

Why was it taking me so long? I didn’t know how to put the resistance I was feeling into words. The best way I could come up with was…a bad analogy.

a terrible parable

Imagine suddenly wanting to do something different, like painting your front door lime green. Painting your door doesn’t seem like a big deal, but it’s a big deal for you. You’re used to beige and tan and other neutrals. A lime green door? That’s different.

You go out and buy everything you’ll need: paint and primer and brushes and paint pans and that blue tape that keeps paint from getting in places that it shouldn't be like on the doorknob or in the lock. But before you start painting, you check the weather and see that it’s probably gonna rain today and tomorrow. And you decide to wait. It's just a few days. No biggie.

But then you have a couple of busy weeks at work where you work 60 hours. Your childhood best friend comes to your city. You have to get major dental work done. You remember that you haven't been to the gym in forever and you get completely wrapped up in that.

Then one day you realize that it's been months since you got the idea to paint your door. And all the supplies you bought are gathering dust in a corner of your garage.

You think about it and decide you still want to paint your door. So you bring everything inside and leave them right by the front door. That way when you’re in the mood (and when you have the bandwidth), you can get to work. Hopefully.

another way to look at progress

Years ago, my therapist told me that she wished more of her clients were like me because I was ‘doing the work’. A part of me felt really good that I was getting an A+ and a bunch of gold stars in therapy. But another part didn’t understand what she meant.

Doing the work sounds like going home and filling out worksheets and reading the recommended books and maybe forcing myself to do something that makes me uncomfortable, like giving a speech or touching a cockroach. It sounds like homework. But my therapist wasn’t assigning anything to me, not even as a suggestion. All I did was show up for my appointments and talk.

I didn’t get it then, but I do now. I’m starting to think that doing the work...is kinda boring.

Researching paint and primer and brushes and everything else.
Watching videos about the right way to paint a house.
Picking up paint swatches from Home Depot.

All of this counts as doing the work. It’s visible work. But it’s not all of the work.

An example of invisible work is having the self-awareness to recognize when the research you’re doing stops being helpful and becomes another distraction. Or deciding that you’re not conventional and you ARE the type of person who has a lime green door. Or when you affirm that, yes, you want to re-organize your closets, but right now you’re choosing to focus on the door.

The invisible work is constant and ongoing. Invisible tasks are overlapping. And they take time because you’re going from one type of person (someone who blends into the crowd) to another (someone who lives a bold, multicolor life with a lime green door).

So if I look at my journey of creating a course through this lens, I can see that I’ve been making progress the entire time.