You're Never Going to Feel Like It
A 2-Minute Read by James Ward.
Shel Silverstein’s poem, “Diving Board,” has been on my mind recently. Its tale of climbing up the diving board and doing everything… but DIVE takes me back to a younger James who became paralyzed when the excitement of climbing up the 3m board for the first time transitioned to sheer terror in an instant.
My pride wouldn’t allow me to go back the way I’d come, and my fear wouldn’t allow me to move forward. I wanted to dive, but my motivation retreated when I came face-to-face with the reality of it. So, I did what a lot of other first-time divers have done – I hung out and waited for the motivation to return. I was stuck…
“You’re never going to feel like it, ever.”
I’d probably still be up there waiting if it weren’t for a combination of the lifeguard’s encouragement, the line’s growing complaints, AND one of the bigger kids getting impatient and joining me on the board. I couldn’t wait for it to feel right any longer, I was forced to act. Funny thing? I didn’t die! In fact, I remember the first thought as I climbed out of the water being, “Again!”
Mel Robbins identified this phenomenon in her book The 5 Second Rule where she shares her only rule of success- “You’re never going to feel like it, ever. In any area of life where you don’t already have what you want, if you only did the things you didn’t feel like you’d already have them.”
She suggests that from the moment Inspiration hits, you have 5 seconds to act before your brain puts the brakes on (and you find yourself in the Hesitation phase). This method allows you to utilize the momentum of the idea to propel you forward into action. Imagine pushing a car. Is it easier to push it from a dead stop or once it is already rolling? Once you’ve taken an action, the next one becomes easier and easier.
My life has brought a lot of firsts for me and, while they weren’t all quite as traumatic as my first dive, I can see this same cycle playing in nearly all of them.
Inspiration -> Motivation -> Hesitation -> Action
Each time a first became a second, and a second a third, the Hesitation phase would decrease until it disappeared entirely. Each successful action made the fear smaller and easier to set aside on subsequent attempts. Like the Roman poet Virgil wrote some 2000+ years ago, “Vires acquirit eundo,” (we gather strength as we go). Momentum makes everything easier.
Is there an idea you keep coming back to but can’t seem to act on? Maybe an area of life where you aren’t getting the results you want? If so, I dare you to pick the smallest step you could make towards that dream and, much like that lifeguard encouraged me so many years ago, “1, 2, 3, Jump!”
Still finding yourself stuck up on that diving board? There’s a lesson for you to find in your hesitation and I’d be honored to help.