A lot of anxiety comes from uncertainty.
Not knowing one way or the other how something will turn out.
Especially if it's something you really want, and the possibility you might fail to achieve it is enough to make you second guess yourself. Your ego kicks in and you start thinking about what others might think if you fail. You're already running the scenarios through your head, and there's a million of them- and very few of them good.
Setting your sights on something, and wanting it really bad are just the beginning. A lot of it will play out in your mind, and you'll soon realize (if you haven't chickened out already) is that all the conclusions your mind comes to, are equally "hypothetical". You don't know anything "for sure", and you need some real answers.
How you go about getting it, and what those answers are to your questions are always inevitably on the other side of one thing-
The work.
You have to do the work.
What is the work?
The work is whatever action is required to answer your question. The operative word here is "work", you need to act.
What are your questions?
- Can I do this?
- Am I cut out for this?
- Is this really what I want?
You see these questions at so many junctions in ours lives. From which sports teams or special interest group you wanted to join in school, to choosing to go to University, get a job, or become a professional musician.
Inevitably we've all asked ourselves these questions about what we wanted in life, and if we were good enough. And in my experience there's only one way to know for sure what the real answers are.
Doing the work.
I say "real" because our minds are awesome at coming up with completely bullshit conclusions based on theories in your head, without ever setting foot on the field of "doing" or "action".
Just psyching yourself out before you've even tried to do the work.
Now, the work doesn't guarantee you get the result you want. That's not the promise of "the work".
The work promises to give you the feedback, the data, to figure out where you are in the process (s/o Gary Vee).
Did you start a business and its been struggle city for the first year?
Cool, it doesn't mean business isn't for you, it means you're early in the process and got work to do to figure out how to get better.
Did you apply for a job you thought was going to be a stretch for your skillset and once you landed it, realized you'd exceeded the requirements easily?
Cool, now you can re-assess your skill level against future job descriptions and more accurately gauge where you truly stand.
When my brothers were preparing to open their Tattoo Studio in Avondale, my brother Chris would always encourage me to go for the jobs or the businesses I wanted to start myself.
He'd say:
"Everything you want to know is on the other side of doing it. There's only questions on this side."
I remember at one point in my life I thought I wanted to be a professional MMA fighter. I trained, I dieted, I did the road work (running), I did the conditioning, I did the sparring.
I fought. I won.
After a few years of doing this, I asked myself again "Is this really what you want to do?".
It might be hard to accept the answer you find at that point in your journey, but you can't deny you worked to uncover some truth.
And the truth of the matter was I had my answer, the answer was "No."
That's what's been on my mind these past couple weeks I haven't posted anything- that there really are no short-cuts in life, not if you want to get somewhere worth going.
If you want the answers to the questions that keep you up at night- and you might not like them -but if you want them, then do the work.
Thanks for reading, see you in the next one!