You’ve been there. You had a Dream, a bright shiny dream of change (sorry, can’t resist the Obama poke), and now after all this time of struggle, it’s a little less…desirable. You almost start not wanting it as badly because the emotional effort you’re putting into it is not paying off. You’re being rejected at every turn.

You have to ask yourself: Just how bad do you want it?

Sometimes dreams are best shelved, goals change…whatever…but before you shelve it entirely, you need to ask the question. Just how bad do you want it?

Some Saturdays I’m reading my book, laying on the couch in a near-vegetative state, and suddenly, I have a dream of Twinkies. But they are in another room, far, far away, and I have to ask myself, Just how bad do I want them? Usually not enough to disrupt my cocoon, not unless I also need to use the bathroom too. (I’m a multi-tasking vegetable, never doubt it.)

And then some Mondays, I’m doing my presses in my BodyPump class, kicking my feet to distract myself from the burn, listening to the instructor as she assures me I’m going to have a chest to weep over if I just hold out and keep doing reps. So I kick my feet and do my reps. (I really want that perky chest.)

I have wanted sex badly enough to do in it broad daylight and not realize windows were open; I have wanted to see movies badly enough that I have dressed in costume, taken time off from work, and gone to midnight showings; I have wanted specific dishes enough that I have cooked them from scratch even though I wouldn’t get to eat them until three hours later—and had to stand over the stove and babysit it. In all these cases, I wanted it bad enough to do just about anything to have it.

So what’s the difference now?

I mean, I can’t be any more naked than in broad daylight and in front of windows; I can’t be devoting more time or detail than making my own costume and showing up at odd hours; I can’t be putting any more work into it than I do when making my Chicken-Sausage Gumbo. There is no difference.

I just have to remind myself I want it. You know that hokey little saying that a friend is a person who knows the song of your life and plays it back to you when you forget? That’s what you have to do as a writer. You have to sing that dorky, hokey little song of the New York Times Bestseller’s dream to yourself until you remember it.

And if you can make a Harry Potter costume—and be a dead ringer for old Harry himself; if you can make a gumbo that even Cajun Joe would be proud of; if you can show up naked in the middle of the day and not even flinch—well, then, clearly, you need to be institutionalized…or well, you have exactly what it takes to get published.

You just have to want it bad enough.

Today’s inspirational message was brought to you by Secretaries Gone Wild! and Hellion in the Kitchen. What have you wanted badly enough that you went to extraordinary lengths to get it? (And was a man involved because those stories are always so much more funny….)