The Real Gift
The restlessness you're born with, and the belief someone hands you before you've done anything to earn it.
A book by Imanol Galván · written at 19
I'm not yet ready.
A book by Imanol Galván · written at 19
I'm not yet ready.
Most books like this are written by people looking back from the top. This one is written from the middle, by a computer science student from the El Paso–Juárez border, while he's still standing in the space between where he is and where he wants to be.
Sixteen chapters. A fidget-spinner lunchbox business. A theater role he didn't get. A car ride with his dad. A bus trip to Lubbock. A beach in Miami. A grandfather meeting his favorite jazz musician backstage. Same idea, from every angle: you don't arrive and then become. You become through the moving.
“I can't is a wall. Not yet keeps the door open.”What the title means · Chapter 14
Each one takes the same argument, belief before proof, motion before clarity, and turns it a few more degrees.
The restlessness you're born with, and the belief someone hands you before you've done anything to earn it.
Nobody feels ready when they start. Readiness shows up because of the doing, not before it.
The bar is low when you're young. Take yourself seriously before anyone else does.
You're not behind. You're running a different race than the one you're comparing yourself to.
Two words that flip the default, so inaction is the thing that needs a reason.
What looks like luck is the gap between the wins people see and the attempts they don't.
Clarity comes from motion. The first step was never supposed to be good.
What's left once you stop needing anyone to clap. Built one piece of evidence at a time.
Everything worth doing happens in public before it's finished. Go anyway. Say the thing.
What it feels like from the inside, what the peak confirms, and what it means when it breaks.
You can't learn from a loss you've explained away. The real loser never showed up.
Define winning for yourself. Stay on the ground after you get there.
Every phase is complete on its own terms. The painful dots connect too, just not yet.
The title chapter. Why the phrase is an identity, not a consolation prize.
Not your goal. The aliveness underneath it. It fades through small, reasonable-seeming adjustments.
You don't arrive and then become. Close the book, and keep becoming.
“Nobody teaches you the hum. You're born with it.”Ch. 1
“You go, and the preparation happens while you're already moving.”Ch. 2
“The no is already yours if you don't try.”Ch. 5
“Call it whatever you want. It's still just math.”Ch. 6
“Quiet confidence is what's left once you stop needing anyone to clap.”Ch. 8
“You aren't late. You're just in between.”Ch. 10
Imanol Galván is a Computer Science student at The University of Texas at El Paso, minor in Entrepreneurship. Raised between Ciudad Juárez and El Paso, he builds AI projects, runs a web design business, and posts too much on LinkedIn.
He wrote Not Yet at nineteen, while still in the middle of everything in it.
The real playlist is longer than this. These are just some of the albums that were closest, the ones that were with the book from a half-formed document to a finished manuscript.
Listen to the full playlist on Spotify9 Months and 50 HoursLatin Mafia & Fred again..
and Todos Los Días Todo El Día
you seem pretty sad for a girl so in loveOlivia Rodrigo
and Sour
A Fever You Can't Sweat OutPanic! at the Disco
and Death of a Bachelor
Apricot PrincessRex Orange County
and The Alexander Technique
Free SpiritsCartel & Paco Amoroso
and Papota
ZoéZoé
and Programaton
Manifiesto de un Tremendo DelirioLeón Larregui
and Solstis
La Vida Era Mas CortaMilo J
and 111
DeadbeatTame Impala
and Currents
The Crux DeluxeDJO
and Decide
If you feel something but don't really know what to do with it yet. If you know you're capable of more but you're waiting for the right moment, or more confidence, or someone to tell you that you're ready, this is for you.
I know that person, because I was that person. I still am, some days. I wrote this book at nineteen, while still living through everything in it, because I decided trying anyway was worth doing before I felt ready.
It's about the things I believe. That belief has to come before proof. That you figure things out by moving instead of waiting until you feel prepared. That luck is usually just how many times someone tried before it worked.
But it also taught me that it's never too early or too late to enjoy right now, instead of treating it as something to get through on the way to somewhere better, and to feel proud of it while I'm still living it.
Wherever you are, I don't think you're behind or too late or finished. You're just not there yet. And not yet is a good place to be.
Kindle is available September 15. The paperback goes on sale September 26. Preorders are open now.
Or
Notify me at launch