Love What You Do Blog: Hurry Up and Give it a Go

Last night I couldn't sleep. I mean I couldn't sleep in a serious way. I spent several hours watching old talk show interviews on YouTube, I started re-reading The Scarlet Letter (and didn't get very far, because apparently when your English teacher isn't assigning that text... it's easy to put down) and then I clicked on a PDF that I had forgotten I had downloaded a while back: The Greatest Writer In The World by Dallas Clayton. Then, my sleepless night became my can't sleep but this sure is wonderful, night.

Dallas Clayton is a writer and artist. His website's bio reads:

My name is Dallas Clayton. A few years ago I wrote a kids book for my son. That book changed my entire life. Now I spend my days writing stories, drawing pictures, having big ideas and traveling the world sharing them with people of all ages.

Dallas Clayton seems like an all around awesome guy. I love that such inspiring and wonderful words could have been born out of something so simple -- he wanted to write a book for his son. Now he shares ideas and inspiration with kids (and grown ups) all over the place. You can view the text of his books on his website, and he shares daily pictures, ideas and thoughts, too.

One of his poems in particular really stood out to me as I was reading last night, so I thought I would share it with you here. Here's how it looks in the book.

In case you can't read it above, the text reads:

POINTS

Did you win the Superbowl yesterday?

If so
congratulations!

If not
let's work on that.
You've got an entire year.

Unless of course
you are not eligible
because of your age,
size,
determination,
or the fact that you don't like or play football.

If that's the case,
let's find something else to win.

There are plenty of things:
Games
Awards
Lotteries
Hearts
Life

Just pick something,
whatever it is,
and hurry up and give it a go.

So this time next year
the rest of us can cheer you on
and possibly dump beverages on you
because we are so happy
that we can't control ourselves
and that is the only thing that makes sense to do
to celebrate.

Here are some of my other favorites from Dallas's website. You should really go check it out for yourself, though -- www.dallasclayton.com.