Last week I found an email I had written to myself back in September. It was a pleasant find, mostly because I had completely forgotten it and also because I can see my progress from then until now. While I have improved, I think it will be a lifelong process to master the art of properly managing both the big picture and the small.

Dear Jayme,

It’s time you started to make things happen to the degree of which you are capable. You’ve been holding yourself back by neglecting the process and the system and the structure. You know what you need to do.

You need to remember to not look so much at the big picture that you never get there because you’ve failed to attend to the small picture. It’s just as important, and you can find a way to make the seemingly mundane not so mundane anymore.

You need to find your system. Your process. Your flow.

You need to set your shit up. Like today, you went through this email inbox and created filters, deleted things you didn’t need, unsubscribed to lists you don’t want to be part of, updated your signature block, etc. These are the things that need to start happening more.

You need to create projects and break them apart and manage and complete them. You need to schedule better, and you need to stick to the schedule better. You need to find wonder in the seemingly mundane. Excitement in the tiny part. You need to practice discipline and control. You need to do the work that comes hardest for you in this whole be-your-best shit. The grunt work. You need to stop escaping into a dream world, and remember that if you put more time in the real world, the one that’s closer, the one right before your eyes, you might find that you can actually create the dream world instead of just dreaming about it.

You need to decide if you really want that dream world. What it really looks like and if you really want it. You need to start doing the dream daily, not just dreaming the dream daily.

Practice.

You need to organize your shit. File. Update your informational databases. Get back to tracking your finances like you were doing so well with. At what point did you drop off with that?

I understand life feels big right now. That it is exploding with ideas and opportunities and possibilities and excitement. Adventure. I understand that life is blossoming all over and around you right now, but guess what, you still need to do the work. Each and every day

You know what you want.

The point is, the life you want is yours, so long as you make it happen. And making it happen requires the little things. The daily things. The forgettable small units that compound into something great.