Last weekend I finished the fourth draft of my very first novel.

I sent it out to Beta readers and, at the moment, I’m alternating between excitement and dread as I wait for their feedback.

Writing a novel has been a goal of mine for a long as I can remember. When I was little I used to write and illustrate short stories (usually they revolved around bunny rabbits and other cute critters), gluing pages together in a makeshift booklet. When I was in secondary school I stopped and started more novels than I care to remember.

Even when I left university I’d summon what I thought was a great idea, start writing, and then, two or three chapters in, lose all motivation and faith in myself.

So what was different this time?

Well, nothing, initially.

Then I realised that everything was different.

Let me just start by saying that I’ve never had any formal writing training. Sure, I did it in school, but that’s pretty much the extent of my grammatical and technical knowledge. I read articles about writing (or at least I try to) but, in all honesty, they bore me to death.

So I still had the same writing skills as before. I hadn’t had a “Eureka” moment; no epiphany; no nothing.

My goal hadn’t changed. It was still simple: finish a damn book. Just 70,000 words – how hard can it be?

What had changed, though, was my mindset.

The idea came about in the same way that many of my other novel ideas came about. Probably in that hazy moment before sleep or during some other mundane task. No change there. I’m betting a lot of you guys get your finest ideas in the shower or whilst you’re cooking dinner, right?

So I hashed out a few of the novel’s details – like I had done a thousand times before with different novels. And then, when I couldn’t hold back any longer, I started writing. Those first few chapters were awesome, like they always are. My mind was racing with connections, my hands flying over the keyboard.

And then the words “Chapter four” sat blinking at me on an otherwise blank page.

Uh-oh. It had happened again.

I felt deflated, useless, a failure – all those horrible emotions you feel when you let yourself down. Basically, I was back to square one.

Or was I?

If you want something badly enough in life, it’s worth working for. And not just working for, but working hard for. Even if it’s painful and seems to be going nowhere or it feels like you’ll never, ever, ever reach it (by draft three I thought I’d be working on the book for the rest of my life).

Do your goals sometimes look like this (big and unreachable)?

Christ, if I’d given up on everything whenever I had a blank moment or couldn’t find the motivation to pull through, I’d be in a very different position to where I am now.

Throughout school, university, and work I’d slogged long and hard to get to where I wanted to be. So why should writing a novel be any different? Why should it be a walk in the park? Why should I get it that easy?

The answer? It shouldn’t. It should be hard, it should be difficult, I should want to quit at every given opportunity because… well, because it’s worth it.

So many people hark on about it always being the journey that matters, not the destination, and I wholeheartedly believe that. Or rather, I believe it’s the journey that makes us enjoy and appreciate the destination.

Without the hours spent cursing myself for not having good enough ideas and not being able to string a sentence together, would actually finishing the novel have been worth it? Or would it have been a case of “Oh well, that’s that done now then”?

Quick recap

So my ideas were still the same (sub-par, if we’re being honest with each other) and my goals were still the same, but it was my mindset that pushed me towards the end result – a.k.a. finishing a damn book.

And now here I am. With a 77,000 word book under my belt. Yes, it feels great to have done that. But, even better, I know that I can apply this perseverance to pretty much anything and, because I know how it makes me feel at the end, it will give me that extra push in the right direction.

Life is a good old game of trial and error and I’m all for experimenting with different ways of doing stuff. But sometimes all it takes is a little tweak – something as small as telling yourself to buckle down and buck up.

I didn’t need to spend thousands of pounds on writing courses, I just had to give myself a stern talking to.

What next?

Well, like I said, I’m currently sitting around, twitching, nail-biting, and having minor heart palpitations whilst I imagine all of my Beta readers absolutely hating the novel. But apart from that, I’ve already got a few ideas jotted down for the next story.

I know I’ll have that moment (probably around chapter four) when I’ll stop and think “what the hell am I doing?”. But now I know that it’s just a stumbling block; a minor obstacle that’s merely a blot on the horizon. I’ll know that it’s possible to get past it and, when I do, it’ll be a great feeling.

Everyone deserves to have that feeling!

For those of you that are interested in the book here’s a short little blurb about it:

Norman lives in a caravan by the sea. He spent his childhood dodging the wrath of a pill-popping mother, and his young-adult life fawning over a rosy-cheeked troublemaker. Now, in his twilight years, he’s holed himself up at the edge of the Endeavour River, Australia, to protect his heart from any more hurt. For company he relies on a notebook, a trunk full of vegetables, and a wooden row boat.

When Norman’s boat is upturned by a larger-than-life fish, he is picked up by a trading ship heading for a notorious smugglers cove – a subterranean land far from familiarity and the comfort of his caravan. He’s surrounded by people who don’t speak English and he’s certain that his old bones aren’t up to the adventure.

On a nightmare journey filled with pirate attacks, human smuggling rings, and pilgrimages led by elephants, he is forced to rely on strangers if he ever wants to see his caravan again. More importantly, he’s forced to rethink his past which becomes increasingly tangled up in his mission to get home.

Norman’s adventure around the Pacific Islands and the Old Australian outback is intertwined with a fug of memories that have blurred over time. He needs to separate truth from elaboration, but when his version of the past doesn’t match up with the present day, he has to work out who is really to blame for his lonely fate – not an easy task for self-imposed hermit.

I’ll wait with baited breath for your thoughts!

Your turn! Have you had a similar experience with reaching goals? I’d love to hear your stories in the comments below!