Guilty As Charged.

Today's Marketing Cookie is about getting started up and staying up.

I am guilty.

Oh, there may not have been a formal trial. No angry jury to decide my fate. No overweight judge wearing a powdered wig and black robe of justice to read my verdict and slam down his gavel on my reputation. You could look, but there won't be a parade of TV News vans on the street or reporters running up the courthouse steps to jam their microphones in my face—just hoping to get a statement or steal a picture of my shameful expression of guilt. No, there won't be any of this, but I am still found guilty.

"What dastardly crime has Myles committed?" you may ask. Well, my friends, my grievous guilt comes not from what I have done, but rather from what I have not done. Today is the twenty-ninth day of November, and yet only the fifth cookie I've written this month. I pledged on April second, nearly nine months ago, to write a marketing cookie every day, and I have not kept my word. I've broken my promise. I've slipped up, fallen down, messed up, and rolled over. I've given up the farm, lost my way, and dropped my toast, butter-side down. It's a travesty. I am guilty as charged.

I suppose anyone could understand if I missed writing a new cookie on the day when I was hiking in the White Mountains with my family. Right? One could imagine the rationalization of skipping a day here and there, even for no good reason. Correct? Even for this month, with the Thanksgiving weekend, my wife's birthday, and our anniversary, one could forgive maybe missing an entire week. No? Well, I've skipped a total of twenty-four days this month, and there's just no good excuse.

I would like to say this one thing, however...

You, like me, may choose to write a blog every day and successfully do it for eight months. You should be proud of what you've done, celebrate the results, and revel in the accolades. The greatest part of the good work you do may be measured in the way in which you continue to do it, even when life gets in the way. At some point, you like me, might drop the ball, skip a beat, or whiff on the pitch, but you can always recover the fumble, regain your rhythm, and get another at-bat.

I agree with today's fortune that says, "Ideas not coupled with action never become bigger than the brain cells they occupied." It should serve as inspiration enough to get you going on that awesome project you've been meaning to start. For those of you who've started and stopped, I hope you'll admit your guilt, dust yourself off, and continue onward with what you first created. I think you'll find it's well worth the effort.