Why is the thought of starting something both exciting and paralyzing?
Starting anything means change.
Change can be pursuing a new venture or career, working towards a goal you’ve dreamed of achieving, or learning a new skill. It is easy to get excited thinking about what life could look like, but then our mind starts to twist things.
Change is uncomfortable. Doing something different is more difficult than maintaining the status quo. Doubt and fear begin to creep in. The thought of starting is scary.
Even famous authors, who have written dozens of books, struggle with starting. Stephen King said:
“The scariest moment is always just before you start. After that, things can only get better.”
The Perfect Start is a Myth
We often dream of the fantasy of a perfect start. Wouldn’t it be nice if every step we took was in exactly the right direction at exactly the right time, leading us along the quickest path from where we are to where we want to go? We can clearly see the entire plan laid out in front of us, with step by step instructions, ensuring that we don’t make any missteps along the way.
The idea that you have to have everything figured out before you start holds you back from ever starting in the first place.
Author Rob Bell understands:
“Far too often, we don’t start because we can’t get our minds around the entire thing. We don’t take the first step because we can’t figure out the seventeenth step. But you don’t have to know the seventeenth step. You only have to know the first step. Because the first number is always 1. Start with 1.”
Some questions may be coming to mind.
“What if I start and realize I am going in the wrong direction?”
That is great! You’ve learned something valuable and you can course correct so you are headed in the right direction.
“Okay, but I still want to start as best I can and feel stuck getting started. What can I do?”
First, realize that feeling is normal. Authors often write terrible first drafts. Books are written and then re-written before they are published. If J.K Rowling did not give herself permission to write an imperfect first draft, we wouldn’t be able to read Harry Potter today. The same idea applies to any book you’ve read written by any author.
Anne Lamott discusses this idea in her book on writing, Bird by Bird:
“Now, practically even better news than that of short assignments is the idea of shitty first drafts. All good writers write them. This is how they end up with good second drafts and terrific third drafts…
I know some very great writers, writers you love who write beautifully and have made a great deal of money, and not one of them sits down routinely feeling wildly enthusiastic and confident. Not one of them writes elegant first drafts…
Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere. Start by getting something – anything — down on paper. A friend of mine says that the first draft is the down draft — you just get it down. The second draft is the up draft — you fix it up. You try to say that you have to say more accurately. And the third draft is the dental draft, where you check every tooth, to see if it’s loose or cramped or decayed, or even, God help us, healthy.
This idea helped me when writing my first book and even when writing this article. Giving myself permission to suck liberated me from the pressure of perfection. It was reassuring to know that I could continue to refine and improve my work. You can edit a rough draft, but you can’t edit a blank page.
This same thinking can be applied to anything you start. No one expects you to be an expert the first time you do something.
Discover as You Go
Most often you won’t have a step-by-step plan when you get started and that is okay. Research can help you with planning, but there will still be a lot of information that you don’t know you don’t know. The best way to discover this information is to get started.
As Rob Bell referenced above, you only have to see the first step. Once you take that step you can see the second. Each step you take gives you a clearer picture of the next step you need to take.
“I don’t have a clue. Ideas are simply starting points. I can rarely set them down as they come to my mind. As soon as I start to work, others well up in my pen. To know what you’re going to draw, you have to begin drawing.” – Picasso
You will make more progress getting started, even if you struggle, than you would just thinking about getting started. The whole picture will reveal itself, but only if you start.
Let’s use training and nutrition as an example. If you want to gain some muscle or lose weight, you don’t need a sophisticated 48 step plan or have the perfect training program for your situation. All you need to do is start where you are with what you have.
You might start by going to the gym and trying out a couple exercises you read about online. Once you start you discover new questions you can ask that will help you progress. How often should I workout? What time of day makes sense to workout for me? How could I change my diet to incorporate foods that will help me see better results? Does sleep impact my workouts?
It doesn’t matter what questions you ask, the point is that you learn more once you start. You begin to learn things you wouldn’t have even thought about before you got started.
Starting may be a struggle and it may be messy. But an imperfect start is better than no start at all.