Keeping the Streak Alive

It's 10:24 on a Sunday night, and I'm just sitting down to write this.

My excuse? The past few days got away from me. I was spending time with extended family (Texans I don't see often enough) and our flight home landed a few hours late due to weather delays. So here I am, starting much later than I'd planned, with a bed screaming my name.

I'll own it. I haven't been drafting content weeks ahead of time, or even a few days in advance. I like writing from what's actually happening in my life over polishing something I experienced a month ago. That tradeoff has a cost, and tonight I'm paying it.

I've written 41 editions of this newsletter. Every single Monday, without missing one. It's something I care about... I genuinely want to give you something useful to start your week, some original perspective that helps you show up for your job search today.

And there have been plenty of Mondays where I wanted to push it to later in the day, or wait until Tuesday, or just skip the week entirely. Tonight is one of those nights.

But showing up anyway, and keeping the streak alive, matters. Not because someone is grading me. Because the long games of life are won through consistency, and consistency doesn't care how tired you are.

I felt this exact same tension when I was job searching.

My energy to search, apply, and reach out would ebb and flow. Some days I was dialed in for hours. Other days I had almost nothing. And then a friend reminded me of something I needed to hear: motivation is unreliable. Commitment to the streak is how you stay in it.

So I made one simple rule for myself. Do at least one thing every day to move the search forward. It didn't have to be heroic. It just had to be something. And over time, that daily action became less about energy and more about identity. It became what I do.

One Thing. Every Day.

I'm not perfect, and neither are you. But showing up for your future self is something we can control. You don't need to show up perfectly. You just need to keep the streak alive.

I've been writing every week for 41 weeks. Edition 42 goes out Monday morning.

The streak continues.