It's Never Too Late for a Second Act

The real trick isn’t so much vision as it is discipline.

You, dear reader, have met me at the dawn of my second act. Today, at the age of 44, and after what I can only call a shocking-even-to-me amount of buzz, my very first novel hits bookshelves. Later this week, a bunch of glossy profiles about me will be splashed around websites and newspapers, and soon you won’t be able to put on a podcast without hearing me wax on about my book, Olga Dies Dreaming. (Warning: I have a voice that was made for typing.)

Here is the bite-size summary of my story: A girl from a humble Brooklyn background stumbles into a career as a wedding planner and then, upon turning 40, finally decides to listen to the voice whispering inside her head and try writing. She blows up her business and her life, moves to Iowa to get her MFA, and, while there, completes and sells her first novel, which is now being adapted for television.

All of this is factually true, and, when framed that way, is the kind of story that you—or a past version of me—might find inspiring. But also, potentially daunting? Inspiring because, as I wrote a couple of weeks ago, America loves a Cinderella story. But daunting because the most compelling narrative—the one stripped of tedious details—can elicit an “If only I could do that!” even more easily than an “I should do that!” Put another way, without seeing how the sausage is made, our natural tendency is to attribute some magical, unattainable quality to the “Cinderella” of these stories.

The truth is, most of us harbor ambitions that we often don’t articulate. That tiny voice in our head that whispers I think I could do that or That would make me very happy. But all too often, we’re discouraged from pursuing whatever those ambitions are—whether running a marathon or trying stand-up comedy—because we think that there’s a mysterious “it” that we need to have to go from where we are to where we want to go. An “it” that only “other people” have.

So, in the spirit of the New Year—a time when many of you are no doubt ruminating on your own personal possibilities for transformation—this Cinderella is here to tell you that the only “it” quality you really need to mount a second act is discipline. Yes, talent helps, and so does vision, but at the end of the day, the gap between ambition and actualization is closed by staying the course. And, of course, knowing that the road is going to at times be hard.

I’ll use a universally relatable example. Right now, there are millions of people, who, seduced by “before” and “after” photos on social media, are joining gyms and signing up for weight-loss apps—and who, within a month or so, will quit. A large part of this is because, yes, we buy into the fairy-tale ending. But also because, too often, we don’t talk about the work that’s involved. We sign up for the gym not for sore muscles and hunger pangs but because we crave the results. The people who stay the course and end up with the “after” photos are not more talented or magical than the rest of us quitters; they are just the ones who had the discipline to push past things even when they weren’t immediately rewarded with the pot of six-pack abs at the end of the rainbow.

This new year, I’m sensing more people yearning for, if not entirely different lives, versions of those lives that are more closely aligned with dreams they have deferred. The mass loss of life during this pandemic, being overworked and under-socialized, the inspiration of the Great Resignation, well, they seem to have created a general sense of Life is short … What am I doin’? What am I about? I can’t imagine a better moment in time to listen to this voice.

So in that spirit, I’ll tell you some of the details of my own second-act journey, and hopefully help demystify it. I had always loved writing, but as a younger woman, I was too intimidated and burdened with debt to pursue it as a career. I thought the coolest thing someone could do was write a novel, but I never had seen a path to doing this myself. Then, when I was 38—and still running my event-planning business—a good friend of mine died young, which started the wheels churning in my brain. I had stuff I needed to do with my life that I wasn’t doing. Right before I turned 40, my grandmother, who raised me, also died. That, coupled with the generic midlife crisis this birthday tends to induce, gave me the courage to utter aloud that I wanted to write. And saying it out loud forced me to do something about it.

I left my business and got a day job to afford me more time and space to write. I applied to a writers’ program and got in. I felt encouraged. So, I committed to reading a book a week and writing every day. I canceled my cable to lessen my distractions and joined a small writers’ group. I decided to apply to MFA programs and write a novel. I gave up exercising so I could work on the novel before work every day, and I did not socialize until 2 p.m. on weekends so that I could have more time to write. When I got into the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, I gave up my job and my rent-controlled apartment and moved halfway across the country. When I wasn’t in class, I wrote day and night, like a person obsessed.

Am I a good writer? Well, I hope for your sake, yes. Is it a good book? It sure is. But though good writing sold the book, it’s not what finished it. What finished it was discipline. That I kept going back even when it was hard and miserable and I wanted to be doing other things. But I was driven by a desire. Yes, to write a novel, but more than that a desire for change. To stop being the person who ignored my own voice and to finally listen and see where it led me. To stop thinking that something would be cool and, instead, to try to do the cool thing. And that, it turns out, was enough to get me in front of the computer every single day.

So, I wish you not only a happy New Year, but a new year in which you decide to do that thing that you’ve long wanted to try, and to keep on doing it until you get where you want to go.

Here’s to second acts!