Play for the thrill of it

Seth Godin wrote about the "lotteries" of life in his blog recently:

In terms of practical mathematics, whatever lottery you're playing (the marry a millionaire lottery, the get picked to be on Oprah lottery, the get found at Hollywood and Vine and win an Oscar lottery) has no winner.

In other words, your chance of winning is so vanishingly small it's as if, from an investment point of view, there are no winners.

So, says Seth, play for the thrill of it, not in the hopes of winning. Whether it's the have an art show lottery, the record a hit song lottery, or the publish a novel lottery, the journey is as important as the destination. Bogged down in the middle of a heinous novel editing project and surrounded, seemingly, by people who have "made it", it can be hard to see that I'm making progress, too. I have my own path to travel, and whether or not it lands me on the NYT bestseller list or wins me a Hugo or Nebula award (or even a Caldecott), I have to walk my own way. (Insert Aerosmith headtune here.)