“The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function.”
– Albert Allen Bartlett, physicist
Whether it is compound interest, bacterial growth, cell division, or the degrading of radioactive matter, the exponential function is a naturally occurring phenomenon that describes the exponential growth or decay of a given set of data.
Here’s what I’m getting at: in the early stages of any endeavor, it can be difficult to identify one’s growth, and the temptation to throw in the towel can emerge.
What this means in terms of your writing is that while you might experience your growth as incremental in terms of putting words on the page, I believe it is exponential in terms of the wisdom you’re accruing.
Consider the doubling effect in mathematical terms: 2 x 2 = 4. 4 x 4 = 16. 16 x 16 = 256. In the early stages, the numbers are relatively small, but if each day we multiplied the product, notice what happens on Day Four. The number jumps to 65,536. If you graphed it, you would see the curve suddenly turn into an almost vertical line. This is the exponential effect. Day Five is almost 4.3 billion!
But even with exponential growth, it never moves in a straight line. There are downticks, and sometimes these downticks can feel like major setbacks. It’s important to remember that they’re temporary. Don’t make too much meaning out of them. Don’t confuse despair with a permanent state. In fact, it is not even a negative thing — it is a necessary aspect of the process that allows you to deepen your relationship to yourself. Remember, you are not the author, you are the channel. Writing may appear to be a placid, sedentary activity, but it isn’t. In memoir, you are, to some degree, reliving experiences that are inviting you to examine and reframe their meaning. You are moving out of victimhood and this can bring up all sorts of big feelings. Two steps forward, one step back.
With each passing day you’re building an inner core by developing a coherent narrative.
While it is human nature to chase short-term gratification, the long-term benefits of staying with your truth are beyond our human capacity to imagine. We tend to think in terms of being powered by our own steam, but when you engage in the creative process you’re tapping into something larger than you. You’re connecting to your Higher Self which is a portal to the wisdom of the ages. Yes, this is brave work, but the work that makes you tremble with fear today becomes a no-brainer tomorrow.
I believe our human capacity for compassion, forgiveness, joy, and self-worth is infinite. I believe our potential for true freedom and wisdom is beyond the limited ability of our left-brain to comprehend. Your left brain is logical. It sees things in practical terms, but it also only understands the world from your old limiting beliefs and hang-ups, those guilt-ridden messages passed down to you from your ancestors. It will never have a frame of reference for what is truly possible. If you argue with your left brain, it will always win, but that doesn’t make it correct.
Your subconscious is the seat of your genius. It has access to your Higher Self, and this is where the exponential function resides. It’s not supposed to make sense, at least not logically. There’s a deeper truth that may not entirely make sense at this point in your journey, but weirdly, when you get to the end, it will become self-evident. Despite this broken world we’re inhabiting, the universe is love, and it is this law to which the human animal will ultimately always bend.
Don’t stop. Trust your breakthrough today, as insignificant as it may seem. Trust the exponential function, because while it may feel minor, you are marching toward a freedom that is beyond your imagination.
Learn more about marrying the wildness of your imagination to the rigor of structure in The 90-Day Novel, The 90-Day Memoir, or The 90-Day Screenplay workshops.
