do first, ask later: undoing the bathroom

when i was a teenager living at home, my dad decided to remodel the two bathrooms upstairs.

he had never done anything like it before, but he didn’t waste time overthinking the process; after all, the first step was clear:

smash the hell out of the existing bathrooms.

i helped him a bit with that part, and let me tell you, there’s nothing quite like smashing a toilet, hammering through walls, or dragging a giant porcelain tub down the stairs and out of the house to remind you that nothing is unchangeable.

as he went on with the demo, he researched and followed up on the next step, and the next…hired people when he needed to, experimented, learned what worked, what didn’t, and ended up with two truly amazing and beautiful bathrooms.

i learned a few things watching my dad go through that process:

1. if you’re going to remodel bathrooms at night (no time during the work day), the evenings will be full of loud noises and cursing

2. and, more importantly, if you want to make something happen, you don’t necessarily need to know what step two is going to be to get started on step one.

your brain is a ravenous learning machine. it’s smarter than “you” are.

so trust it, trust yourself to learn as you go, and all you have to do is get started.

-riley