Your potential for growth is far more vast than you may appreciate
The mindset hack to increase your potential.
You don’t learn to write your name in one day. You don’t learn to cook fried rice in one day. You don’t learn to balance a checkbook in one day.
Artists like Matisse, van Gogh and Kahlo didn’t get up one morning, start a masterpiece and complete it before tea time. I’d be hard pressed to believe Homer wrote his epic poems in one sitting.
Technology and scientific advances we reap the benefits from were brought about over generations, not hours.
A truly satisfactory product takes time to develop and hone.
Why do we feel the need to pace ourselves by any other timeline?
Can you remember the first time you failed something you weren’t prepared for as an adult?
By the time we grow up into newly-minted adults and are introduced to the world, we’ve developed a great deal and have (hopefully) established an identity.
Sometimes that identity, especially in the overly-competitive Western world, is tied to winning.
You’re more valuable in society, on an individual level, if you’re labeled a winner. We see ourselves through this lens.
We learn to operate within the world and we play by its rules. But we learn very quickly that we don’t always win.
Sometimes we don’t win because we were destined to fail from the start.
There are, of course, the one-off success stories we’ve all heard.
The new employee who BS’ed their way into the position and proceeds to thrive.
The new parent who wasn’t explicitly prepared for children to enter into their lives but who were blessed with a familial support network to act as a safety net and buffer the transition.
For most of us, that’s not the case. In general, you get the result you’ve prepared for.
If an opportunity drops itself into your lap and you haven’t prepared, if you’re like most of us, it slips through your fingers. You’re SOL.
Most things in life we want are the product of continuous commitment. For a fit body you watch what you eat everyday and regularly work activity into your schedule.
To meet the partner of your dreams you develop yourself and put yourself in situations to meet new people. To sustain that relationship, it takes honesty and communication and a whole hell of a lot of work.
Everything done well takes concentrated preparation and work.There are two ways to receive this fact. The first is the typical reaction most of us have.
The second is a rarer reaction but is by far the more valuable of the two. You can receive it:
- with disdain. Or
- with encouragement.
Disdain: This all sounds like hard work because it is. I love to play the guitar but there are always days where there’s nothing I want to do less than pick up my guitar from its stand in the corner of the room and practice scales and chords for a half hour.
My resolve to practice is not rock solid. Consequently, I’ve never gotten beyond the level of 4 chord riffs that are barely suitable for a small audience of friends.
I am not a musician simply because I haven’t put in the work to become one.
Now take something I love even less than the guitar that takes more resolve for me to complete. Shopping for jeans.
It’s a little silly, but I hate shopping for jeans. I’m 5'10" and the inseam or the rise or the hip/waist ratio is never quite right for me, making for a long and often fruitless shopping trip.
Consequently, it becomes harder for me to be a woman who always has great, figure-flattering jeans. The effort is increased and my likelihood of improving on it is severely decreased.
If you want a superior result you need to put in superior effort — consistently.
It is not glamorous, hence the disdain. But then, there’s…
Encouragement: I’ve waited a long time to get to the juicy meat of the issue.
There’s a deep well of untapped potential inside you right now. No matter how frustrated you are with the state of your life, you can grow.
While we tend to think of ourselves as completing our development somewhere in adulthood, that doesn’t have to be the case.
Haven’t landed that dream job? Haven’t met the one? Haven’t bought that cute little home with the white picket fence or that Manhattan loft? You can’t have failed yet because you’re still growing.
You do not have to reach these milestones by 35 or 40 or even 60. You just have to keep improving in the direction you choose.
Self-proclaimed life-long learners know and understand this.
There’s nothing saying you can’t continuously be better than the day you were before.
If I choose to, I can get much, much better at the guitar. Or, much better at finding jeans to add to my wardrobe.
The difficulty with continuous learning is that you are perpetually in a state of awkwardness. No one likes that feeling when you try something and you’re bad at it. Especially when it lasts for a long time.
It’s hard to grow when you feel like a novice, but you reap the benefits as they add over time.
There are very, very few instances where the statement “I’ll never be able/have/go/do…” is applicable.
You can try taking up basketball, suck at it, and tell yourself I’ll never be able to make a free throw. To be straight with you, you’re probably lying to yourself.
If you decide to put time into practicing, seek out knowledgeable people to help you learn, secure a ball and a basket, there’s no conceivable reason that you won’t be able to sink a free throw eventually.
Really, think about it. What’s stopping you?
At the very least, if you’re honestly committed to it, you’ll make vast improvements towards that goal.
If you tell yourself I’ll never be able to save enough money to travel to Ireland, you’re probably wrong. If you limit unnecessary expenses, learn to budget, don’t touch your savings outside of emergencies, search for discount tickets ahead of time, conquer your fear of flying, there’s no reason you can’t go.
It may be years down the line, but you can go.
I’m sure I’m not saying anything particularly revolutionary nor is this something you haven’t pondered on yourself at some time.
To ask what’s really stopping me from doing X is common fare for us. It may be that this is a much-needed reminder that nearly nothing is stopping you from doing X.
You can almost always do X with work and planning.
This should feel freeing. Because it is.
Here’s the disclaimer you’ve been hoping for.
If you’re a felon, your travel options are realistically limited.
If you’re a quadriplegic, dunking a basketball isn’t likely to be in your future.
If you’re a member of a marginalized group, there are going to be systematic barriers in place that slow down your ability to live, let alone thrive.
If you have a stagnant relationship you want to rekindle, reviving it will take effort from both parties.
I’m not saying “you can do anything you set your mind to” because we all know that’s a lie. Not everyone can do literally anything. There are obstacles. That’s life.
And things can and do go wrong, even when you’ve prepared to the best of your abilities.
What I do mean, is that your potential for growth within your own personal control is far more vast than most appreciate.
The things that actually do lie in your control are manipulatable and encompass more factors than you’ve probably opened your mind to.
Pick something right now.
A problem. A goal you can’t seem to meet. A milestone you haven’t reached.
Now think — what have I tried to accomplish this? What’s slowing me down?
Say you wanted to go back to school. You did the research, secured the funds and enrolled. But you had to drop out before the semester started because you couldn’t get enough schedule flexibility from your boss to take on the credit load.
How did you react?
Did you quit your job and look for a new position?
Did you seek out another degree program?
Did you consider a different educational option like a certificate?
Did you check the schedule for distance learning or night options in a later semester?
Did you contact the program coordinator and ask about the possibility of introducing a night/online option in the near or distant future?
Or did you content yourself with I’ll never go back to school and leave it at that?
You only have control over so much in your life, but deliberately wield what you have.
If you decide to actively commit yourself to your full time job and leave more schooling behind in our silly example, that’s fine! Great!
You’ve still made an active decision that leads you down the path of development. No one’s in a position to judge you for steering your life deliberately (unless you’re a serial killer or a debt collector. Joking.)
You want to be sure the path you’re on isn’t the product of apathy or settling for less, you’re being true and honest with yourself about the direction you’re taking your life.
Like I said, I’m not a genuine musician because I choose not to take up my guitar more often. I’ve decided I only want it in my life as a casual hobby. If it were in my heart to get good enough to play on a big stage, I’d have some serious explaining to myself to answer why I’m not putting in more practice.
Don’t be apathetic. Life isn’t always beautiful and it sure as hell isn’t always easy, but it’s yours. No one can strip you of your right to live.
Don’t settle for less. You deserve to reach your goals to the degree life’s tangible and intangible boundaries allow.
You’ve got open doors all around you. The trouble is choosing which ones are worth your time.
It takes preparation and it takes work to walk over and be ready for what’s on the other side.
But if it’s what’s on your heart to complete, there’s no doubt it’s worth it.
You and I aren’t done growing, not by a long shot.
