Waiting. We wait all the time. We wait in line at the grocery store; we wait on the next season of a show to drop; we wait on the right time; we wait just a few more minutes/days/ months/ etc. Tom Petty even sang about the wait, indicating that it is in fact the hardest part. People have spent whole careers waiting. Sometimes waiting helps to build character. It can help build patience. But, for most it’s the source of ample anxiety. It’s also the downfall of most of us.
I have tried to be more cognizant of my idle time, my waiting time. Last week at a junior high football game, while waiting in car for time to go in, I took a power nap to utilize my time. This week, I took a book to read. I always have a book on my kindle to read while waiting on appointments, oil change, doctors, and business meetings that are behind schedule. And while the usefulness of our idle time while we have 15-30 minutes of wait time is very beneficial to us overall, the waiting I am talking about is more in line with fear of starting.
Why do we fear the start?
Intimidation?
More times than not, it’s never as bad as it seems. We wait to start getting into shape; we wait for the perfect time to ask the girl out; we wait until we have enough money before starting a family; we wait until….etc, etc. The point is we all wait. Some have shorter times than others. I have my CF-L1 and coach group fitness. Until recently our gym has been a CrossFit affiliate and I can’t tell you how many times I have heard that someone was interested in joining but he wasn’t in good enough shape to come. He wanted to wait until he was in shape to start getting into shape. I realize what they mean is that they think all CrossFit gym athletes are super fit and that they will be intimidated. Truth is, every gym has people of all shapes and sizes. Each person is on a journey and it doesn’t have to include anyone else. The root of this waiting is fear of being embarrassed.
Fear of Starting?
When asking people what would you do if money was no object, the responses are insights into what is their passion. Using mine as an example, I want to be a writer. I would love to be able to spend my time writing things worthwhile that people would beg to read more; thoughts in my head becoming reality on paper, but then I ask myself, why worry about what others are thinking about my writing. They are my thoughts, not theirs. I’ve gone back and forth on the notion of writing for me and my pleasure and writing for the public. In that see saw of thinking, I came to the conclusion that maybe my thoughts can relate to someone. Maybe something I have experienced or something I write can resonate with someone to help improve his life. So, in a since, my waiting wasn’t really affecting just me, but all the others that I am potentially not helping. Again, my desire to wait was more of fear of the start.
Overthinking?
I will give another example about waiting, I am working on Olympic weightlifting. Not for the Olympics, but the style of lifting, Snatch and Cleans. I have never been so humbled in the weight room as I have been on trying to perfect my technique. Recently, while trying to get my reps in, I was becoming slow. The moves for the Snatch are explosive. I, on the other hand, was as dead fuse. All the checklist items were running through my head and I was overthinking it, I paused…I waited and then missed the lift. Now, when my dear friend and coach saw this, she immediately instructed me to pick up the bar and complete the lift. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a lot better. I didn’t think. I didn’t wait. I just walked up and did it. And it wasn’t as bad as I had feared. For many golfers out there, its the same feeling. You walk up to the ball and usually if you just hit it, you will get a much better shot than standing over it thinking (waiting) for all everything to be ready to swing.
Ship It!
Those are two small examples about myself, but you hear it all the time. People waiting to start a business. People waiting to ask someone out. People waiting for the perfect stock price to invest. Doing something and it not being perfect is so much better than trying to get it perfect before you ever start.
I’ve mentioned Seth Godin before, but one of his big items is to ship it; Whatever IT is, ship it. Ship the product you are producing. It will not be perfect and probably won’t ever be, but it will get better. There is no way to get better without some failure to learn from. Everything we do is a process.
Habit of Doing
There is an old proverb that I reference often when discussing the timing of things. “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, the second best time is today.” Want to be a writer, start writing. Want to be an artist, start painting. Want to talk to your kids more, ask them how their day was. Want to be a better speaker, start speaking more. The only way to get better at anything we do is to stop waiting and start doing. You are a lot more likely to do what you continuously do. That’s a habit, right? Start doing, that will become a habit. It will get better, but understand it is a process. You will have gone from a habit of waiting, shifting gears completely, to working on a habit of doing.