Yesterday morning, my three-year-old son Noah asked me to make him a paper airplane.
So I grabbed a sheet of paper from my office and expertly crafted the perfect airplane for him. I took my time. I folded the paper perfectly. I made sure the creases were solid. I did a test throw.
Then I handed it off to Noah who grabbed it by its wing and started running around the room.
A few seconds later, his older brother Kyle came downstairs and saw that Noah had a paper airplane and wanted me to make him one, too. Kyle was about to leave for school in a few minutes, so I grabbed another sheet of paper and I quickly made my seven-year-old an airplane.
It wasn’t perfect.
The creases weren’t even. It was a little crooked. But it was all I could do with the time that I had.
Kyle threw his airplane and it glided across the room with ease.
Noah watched and realized that he was supposed to actually throw his airplane, not just play with it, so he gave it a try. Noah threw his airplane as hard as he could and it crashed and got bent.
He picked it up and threw it again with all of his might, not understanding that throwing a paper airplane that hard won’t make it fly at all, and again it crashed, bending it even further.
I picked up the airplane, reshaped it, and showed Noah how to properly throw it like his brother.
It made me think about how many of us do the same thing with our creative projects.
Like the first paper airplane that I so carefully crafted, I’ve been spending a lot of time working on my follow-up novel. I’ve been working on the plot. On the characters. On the twists. On the turns.
I want the novel to take off when I launch it and fly just as far if not farther than the first book.
But working on the novel and writing the novel are two very different things.
I realized yesterday that my outline has the perfect creases. It’s been expertly crafted. I’ve written a draft for the first act. My characters have depth. My plot is solid. I’ve taken my time.
But like Noah who threw with all of his might, much harder than was necessary only to see his perfectly crafted paper airplane crash and get all bent out of shape, I’m trying too hard, too.
If this sounds like you, realize that there comes a time when you’ve done as much planning, as much preparation as is necessary. Whatever you’ve been working on isn’t going to be perfect, either. So stop trying so hard. Stop planning. Execute. Get it done and start the next project.
Because like Kyle found, things don’t have to be absolutely perfect for them to be able to fly.