“This is a pile of steaming hot garbage,” I told myself as my mouse hovered over ConvertKit’s “schedule” button. 

I scrolled up to re-read my newsletter for the 42nd time and winced again. It still came off as uninspiring, vapid, and silly. 

I published it the following day at 8 am. 

As a creator, you’re never going to love everything you produce. There will be times when you’ll want to kiss what you’ve made and parade it in front of the world, and others when you’ll never want it to see the light of day. 

A pivotal moment in your creative career comes when you decide what to do with the steaming hot piles of garbage. If you do decide to hit “publish,” you’ll be better off than the creator who only shares their best. Really.

In the past two and a half years, I’ve published 75 newsletters and dozens of articles—and I’m proud of less than half of them. But it was by publishing the “so-so” work that I was able to hone my craft and earn a full-time living as a freelance writer and creative. 

The creator who publishes overcomes perfectionism 

It’s normal to want to be proud of your creations—whether you write, design logos, or create something else entirely. Your work has your name on it and reflects your character and capabilities. No one wants to be known as “the person who made [insert crappy thing here].” 

But that desire to be proud of your work can be a slippery slope into Perfectionism Land, a barren desert where nothing gets published because you sacrifice progress for perfection. 

In 2020 I delayed launching my newsletter because I wanted it to be “perfect.” It needed the perfect name, tagline, layout—you get the gist. Half a year passed and I was still newsletter-less. 

Eventually, I gave $150 to my partner and told him to keep the cash unless I published the first newsletter that Friday. I managed to scrape together a basic format within a few days and finally published the dang thing. 

I’ll be honest—that first newsletter was not good. It was mouthy, self-serving, and chaotic. But it finally existed in the world, and was no longer a figment of my imagination.

At left, one of my first newsletters. At right, the current edition. It's changed a lot, thanks to countless interactions and vital feedback.

The creator who publishes doesn’t live in a fantasy world

In Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake Koga’s self-help book, The Courage to Be Disliked, they mention a friend who dreams of becoming a novelist, but never seems to find the time to write: “But is that the real reason? No! It’s actually that he wants to leave the possibility of ‘I can do it if I try’ open...he wants to live inside that realm of possibilities, where he can say that he could do it if he only had the time, or that he could write if he just had the proper environment, and that he really does have the talent for it.” 

Ugh, relatable. Find me an aspiring creator who hasn’t gotten discouraged by the road in front of them and wanted to quit. That’s why a lot of people don't even start—they don’t want to see how far away from that goal they actually are. 

Each piece, no matter how “meh” you feel about it, gets you closer to perfecting your craft. Sure, it’s scary to break open the “realm of possibilities” snow globe, but the upside—living in reality, being able to say you made something—is worth it. 

The creator who publishes helps others 

Fourteen years ago, Marques Brownlee published his first YouTube video, a review of the remote that came with his laptop. The video is grainy, the audio stifled, and the lighting dingy. Today, Brownlee is one of the most successful YouTube tech reviewers with a net worth of around $45 million.  

Brownlee’s first video has been viewed more than 4 million times—people are curious and inspired by his radical transformation. 

When you see the beginnings of a creator you admire—their shoddy setup, their half-baked skillset—it’s reassuring. It humanizes them. They also had to go through the learning curve, and if they did it, you can too. 

So consider publishing your not-great work as an act of kindness to future creators. By publishing it, you’ll not only inspire people in the future, but it’ll remind you of how far you’ve come. 

That work you feel ambivalent about probably won’t get hundreds of likes. It likely won’t land you in Forbes or the New York Times, or on CNBC. Hell, you won’t even want to acknowledge its existence. 

But what it will do is be a sign of progress. It’ll serve as a testament to fighting perfectionism, to making your dreams a reality, and proving to yourself and others that there’s no such thing as a clean streak. And that makes this trash worth treasuring.