The only real form of time travel we have in this life

Keeping momentum alive during long term projects is one of the biggest struggles for creative professionals.

It’s not specific to any one personality style or career path. It’s just ordinary entropy. Most things take longer than we’d like, and we can only sustain our velocity and enthusiasm for so long before the inevitable decline.

This is why regularly injecting fresh energy into our process keeps our story moving forward.

Take the tool of the victory log. This ledger is a small calendar that you populate with any and all victories, large or small, that you achieve each week as you go about your work. It’s a powerful way to emotionally invigorate yourself while creating.

By building an undeniable record of progress, you grow your confidence more each day. By surrounding yourself with concrete evidence of your execution, you keep momentum alive.

When was the last time you added something to your victory log?

If you’ve never implemented this simple daily practice, you’ll be amazed at the kinds of psychological dividends it pays. Having stuck with it for many years now, my experience is that when you focus on when you’re the recipient of your own past choices, it fires you up.

Anytime you think back to the past version of yourself that made a choice that earned you the right to add something to your victory log today, it not only builds confidence in yourself, but also builds continuity of yourself.

Wow, look at me taking action on things. Look at me being the executor of my ideas, and not just the ideator of them. I am amazing.

This is the only real form of time travel we have. We can literally send messages to and from our past and future selves. Treating things we do today as a compassionate investment in ourselves that we recoup tomorrow.

I think about this form of time travel at the beginning of every work week. Monday comes around, so I pull out my victory log from the previous week, noting all of the accomplishments from the previous seven days.

It may sound cheesy to you, but that communication between different versions of myself gives me an energy boost that makes me want to do it all over again.

Look, we all take our confidence wherever we can find it. We all do whatever we have to do to stay sane in this world.

If you want to sustain the momentum of your dream on a daily basis, start a ledger. Every time you accomplish something that’s aligned with your values and helps move your story forward, write it down.

Your future self with thank you.

How do you reconcile mundane tasks with meaning capital?