When I stopped blogging consistently in June 2021, I was tired, bored and ready for a break. I imagined I’d be back to it after a few weeks, but in reality, it would be a whole two years before I made another blog post.
It felt really great to blog again. It felt like coming home… And yet, that piece in June 2023 would be a one-off. I haven’t written again until now.
Why? Because as I so often do, I coated my plans in a thick layer of expectation.
It wasn’t enough to just write when the feeling took me; when I had something relevant or important to say. No, no, no! I should write three pieces a week, at least. Or every day! Or every day, for a full year, like I did in 2018 when I first began the blog.
The problem with all this, of course, is that I didn’t actually want to write this often. I didn’t have the time or will. And so, in the face of all these shoulds and musts, my inner-rebel decided to down tools completely, resulting in… well, diddly squat.
There’s nothing wrong with being ambitious, but if you demand too much of yourself, you’ll likely fall foul of expectation paralysis. Expecting too much becomes quickly overwhelming. And life just isn’t very fun, with an inner-critic who is never satisfied; a voice that tells you that you’ll be ‘enough’ once you’ve gone the extra mile, only to shift the goal posts once you’ve arrived.
The solution? Start small. Start now. Just put one foot in front of the other.
For me, this meant writing this blog today and ignoring the flurry of thoughts about what/when/how I’ll blog again over the coming year. I wanted to write, so I wrote.
For you, it might mean taking ten minutes to look for jobs, instead of a whole day. Or taking a walk around the block, instead of wallowing on the couch because you didn’t make the gym again.
I’m all for dreaming BIG. But if your plans are so grand that they overwhelm you into inaction, then you probably need to think smaller. When you’re crossing a river, it doesn’t pay to keep looking at the whole distance you have to cross. You have to focus on the individual stepping stones. You have to cross them, one at a time.
Small consistent actions will eventually add up to make big progress. Step by step, you’ll cross that river. You just need to start! x
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