The writer Matthew Kelly said, “It is important to understand that you are not writing a story or a book, or a sentence or a paragraph. You are writing a body of work. Whatever you are writing today is just one small part of that body of work.”

This helps take the pressure off because we can easily get stressed out by feeling like we have to create a perfect article, social media post, email, or book chapter every time we sit down to write. But no single thing we write is the defining element of our body of work. It’s part of a much larger whole.

If you’re writing a book, don’t think of it as one book, but many. What if you thought about writing a dozen books over the next ten years? How would that change your point of view? It takes the pressure off.

Whatever you’re writing, it’s just a snapshot of where you are right now in your learning and life. There is no end to your knowledge and learning. So just write it now and move on. Your legacy isn’t just one book. The one book doesn’t represent the end-all, be-all of your learning.

At the Taylor Guitars company, they said, “The best guitar we make is the one we make tomorrow.” In the same vein, the best book you write is the one you write tomorrow. Always be improving and adding a bit each day to your body of work.

Question: Does thinking about your writing as a larger body of work help take the pressure off what you are working on now?