I recently sat with my friend, Prisha, to catch up over mint chocolate chip ice cream. It had been ages since we last spoke, and frankly, it had been even longer since I indulged in some ice cream.
Prisha is a dedicated writer. She’s been writing stories since she was 17. I still remember her notebook filled with lots of fictional stories she wrote when class was boring. From those scribbles, she graduated to MS Word, and then, Google Docs.
Over ice cream, she casually mentioned that she had written 1,803 pieces and made over $300,000 just from writing!
Uhm, excuse me? Three hundred thousand dollars from one thousand eight hundred and three pieces?
How could she just casually say that with a mouthful of ice cream?
Apparently, she committed to writing at least one article a day for the past five years. There were days she fell short, but overall, her dedication was super impressive.
However, her tools and strategies shifted dramatically over the years. Opening her laptop, she logged into her ILN account to show me a few of her pieces. The difference was clear. She’d gotten so much better at writing.
Then, she got into her struggles, like limited digital space and the yearning for a designated “brain dump” — a place to just write all of her ideas and overcome writer’s block, among others.
This led to a discussion about her current system — ILN. Prisha uses a content management tool that’s categorized with tags and whatnot. It also has a scratchpad which she uses for her brain dump.
She talked about another challenge she’s faced — to publish or not to publish. I guess a lot of writers have this issue. She confessed that amidst the anxiety and fear of rejection and destructive criticism, there were some pieces she’d like to keep private. So, she found it great that ILN had the option of keeping some pieces private while publicizing others.
Out of her impressive 1,803 pieces, she had only published a few hundred. And the ones she had published on ILN were met with constructive criticism from the community. She mentioned being in a writing group where they’d regularly discuss and assess each other’s work.
The problem wasn’t finding an app to achieve all of this, it was finding an app that allowed her to do everything in one place. Sure, she could create a Google Docs link and send it out for feedback, but she’d be limited to just her family and close friends.
She’d tried other apps where she was met with extremely destructive feedback. Feedback that made her stop writing.
She could’ve looked at Medium; they have a wider audience, but it’s super hard actually connecting with people. It’s way more than just following one person and hoping they follow back. Plus, ILN had more features that she loved to explore, like their AI and content management tool.
I feel like a really proud friend writing this. This is my friend, quietly churning out stories upon stories, and earning six figures doing what she loves.
We ended the evening with some cake to complement the ice cream. But it got me thinking: what if we all became a little more consistent? How much would we have accomplished? A little 1% every day, just like James Clear said.
I know Prisha really inspired me, and I hope she inspires you too. Imagine what you could achieve by dedicating a little bit of time each day to your pursuits. Whether it’s writing, product management, cybersecurity, or anything else that sets your soul on fire.
I’m going to channel my inner Prisha, become consistent, and explore tools and resources like ILN that make my journey smoother. Hopefully, in due time, I’d be able to earn $300k too. Lol. I hope you join me too.
