Going Against The Grain

If you haven’t already read part one, please check it out here.

It started with a phone call.

Tackling things on my own hadn’t exactly been working out, so I needed a new way to stay on track and be held accountable.

It didn’t take long to find and reach out to someone whose words really resonated with me.

Someone who made sense of things in a way I couldn’t.

Someone who showed me that things didn’t have to be so bleak.

During that initial phone call, I laid out everything that I knew needed to change, including my lack of direction in knowing where to start. I was (perhaps too) honest about my self-perceived shortcomings.

In turn, I was told not what I wanted to hear, but what I needed to.

I needed to be told that it would be a lot of work, that it wouldn’t be easy. I needed to be told there was a way out. Moreso, I needed to be told I wasn’t alone.

Often, when deciding on a course of action, I overanalyze every outcome. Endless possibilities overwhelm me, leaving me paralyzed.

Ultimately, I allow my brain to talk me out of doing anything at all.

I knew not taking action would mean staying exactly where I was. I also knew staying was no longer sustainable.

The choice was obvious: don’t think. Just do. After all, it’s better to make the wrong move than no move.

That phone call led to the split-second decision to begin working together. It was the first time in a long time I was actually excited about the prospect of work.

The first step, and perhaps the biggest takeaway, was the importance of mindset and its influence on how we perceive the world. Positive vs. negative. Limiting vs. growth.

Mine was obviously flawed; I was stuck inside a limiting mindset, where I believed that things were as they are, and couldn’t be changed. This became the first item to work on in order to achieve different results.

To combat this, my coach encouraged me to routinely practice gratitude, as well as use affirmations to work my way up her emotional progression chart.

The goal was not to jump ahead to the top, but to simply move up, one step at a time.

Doing the opposite of what felt natural was a hard process to begin. My brain had been steeped in negativity for so long that it had become my default.

Trying to undo years of programming was frustrating, especially since results weren’t instantaneous or guaranteed.

But I was committed, and so I forced myself to not only begin, but to keep going.