A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. I’ve heard this quote before, but it also came up recently (actually about 3 years ago because this has been sitting on my drive for a while) – printed across a wall at JFK in mural format, so yeah pretty cheesy. Like a lot of these cliche sayings, at the core everyone would agree there is an element of truth. What truth do I see? When we think about life, and specifically as we each think about our own lives, we rely on our imagination to show us lots of paths our lives may take. Some are more appealing than others – the best of these thoughts maybe even becoming dreams / goals – on a conscious or subconscious level.
One natural follow-up question that comes to mind: What is the difference between my life now and that life? It’s likely there is quite a bit of difference. [Short aside: let’s note for what it’s worth that it can be hard to be appreciative in the present and happy with life as you live it instead of postponing the verdict of happiness to some unknown future time and future you.] Next question. Can I get to that life? If yes, how do I get to that life? This part might require a bit of ingenuity depending on who you are and how you think about stuff, but assume that after some time you come up with a plan of action. This plan is going to have a first step, and this is the common denominator I think we all face in one way or another. The peculiar challenge of the ‘first time’.
By definition, the first time you do something the experience is going to be novel, and that means never before felt [happiness, surprise, calmness, shock, fear, stress]. It can be a feeling I didn’t mention or some weird combination of feelings. We might be more averse to some of these feelings than others. I’ll be honest, I’m someone that particularly dislikes feeling publicly inept, then regardless of what thing I’m doing for the first time, I’m going to be asking questions like:
- Who is going to be there as witness to my attempt?
- How good are the other people, and should I still try?
- If I do poorly, what will people think and what will I do?
Sure, sometimes these can be the right questions, but not every time. In other words, we are taking an action, and layering our own biases and fears onto it. What did that first time do to deserve that? It didn’t know it was your first time. For First Time, it’s not even the first time, it’s part of the daily same old. Pretend you’re a soccer player making a pro debut, then you imbue 90 minutes of soccer with ‘first time’ emotion while the other 21 players are putting in calculated, familiar work. I don’t think this can be avoided, and I don’t think we should try to avoid it. Life would be very boring in that world. The takeaway is don’t let the anticipation get so out of hand and irrational that it outweighs your initial decision to do something that would require you to have a first time experience. It’s a bit of a cycle – one that might start going in the wrong direction under certain conditions. In the right conditions, the cycle can become unstoppable to your benefit.
A lot of times now when I am facing something new and unfamiliar, I expect the anxiety. I know what it’s going to feel like. I know that I’m not going to like it, and usually I’m right – it’s not too pleasant. I also know that it’s most powerful over my feelings, mood, self-esteem, etc. the first time and a bit less so every time until eventually I win. Do I really win haha? Kind of. Like I said, when you know how to do something it can get boring, so I’m going to go after something new that will humble me all over again.
This moving on doesn’t have to be immediate either, you can spend years in a subject, field, or industry once comfortable and take advantage of your comfort to dissect everything about that area. No longer bogged down by emotions, you can see things as they are and note relationships where they were not clear before. In my opinion, this is a solid way to build differentiated knowledge, because it takes away the pressure of having to know the newest thing or even everything. You draw a line around an area, and you learn it as deeply as possible and it will be obvious when people speak to you that you know what you’re talking about. You may only know one thing, but it’s authentic. Over time, you can keep adding things that you know really well, which is cool (and can pay if you have an inclination for that).
Anyway, I think it’s a sane kind of crazy to expose ourselves to the firsts we all come across in life. Sometimes it’s brave, sometimes it’s stupid, and that’s how it is. I part with the wise words of Rigby from Regular Show who summarizes my thought as follows, “Once you do the hard stuff, it becomes…not that hard.”
Very interesting read !