An Amazing Way to Get Started When Your Stuck
It’s as simple as changing your mindset
My last article focused on perfectionist tendencies, overthinking, and how to overcome those particular roadblocks on the road to success. As a designer, I struggled with the simple act of starting something. I suggested that in order to create something good, you should focus on creating something bad. With the pressure off, you can get started and self-correct, to hopefully end with something you're proud of, or at the very least, learn something.
Everyone is different, and this idea may not work for some people. Telling yourself to create something terrible might not have the intended consequences or you might need more weapons in your arsenal to help you move forward. Whatever the reason, I have a simple trick to help.
Leveraging Good Habits
Every action you take can develop either good or bad habits. When you brush your teeth at night you’re developing a good habit, but when you eat a whole bag of chips after your trip to the grocery store you’re developing a bad habit. Every time we take any particular action, we make a choice, and that choice helps shape our habits.
Our brain LOVES habits because it doesn’t have to do any heavy lifting. Oddly enough, no matter how much you may want to put down the chips, or how badly you want to skip brushing because your too tired, your brain will have trouble letting go. That’s why we want our actions to leverage us towards good habits.
I learned a lot of this from James Clear a while back while on his newsletter and took a dive further into the subject. I was fascinated by how our brains fight us when we want to improve. Your brain is basically you, but somehow it won’t listen to you? It’s a weird thing to wrap your head around. There is one simple trick to make your brain work with you, and that is changing your mindset.
One Small Change
Say you wanted to start flossing your teeth, but you haven’t done it before, and you think it’ll be a hassle when you could just brush. You could start flossing your entire mouth. It’ll hurt because you’ve never done until now and you’ll likely stop in a couple of days. Maybe you’ll try again in a week or two but it’ll be the same result, leaving you feeling demoralized and without any flossing into your nighttime routine. Ultimately, your efforts end up going nowhere.
Do you know why people fail to continue going to the gym after New Years'? The gym is packed on the first week or two after New Years’, but slowly it returns to normal. Of course, the simple answer is that people gave up on their New Years Resolution. But why did they give up? Let’s go back to the flossing example to see what happened.
For someone who has never flossed before, the task of flossing is not an ingrained habit like brushing is. And so, your brain will fight you every step of the way as you try to form this new flossing habit. It’s not only painful to do but thinking about doing the task brings mental anguish as well. You should know this feeling anytime you think of going back to the gym after a long period of not working out. You might be motivated at first but the pain is too much and the reward is too slow to perceive.
That’s why I don’t focus on the long-term reward, but the habit itself and the short-term rewards it brings me. The key is starting small.
Try This If Your Stuck
Choose the smallest version of the new task your about to do and start building a new habit.
If flossing is a new habit you’d like to accomplish, floss one tooth. If exercise and a gym routine is your new goal, workout for one minute. If you want to write, write one sentence. And if you want to draw, draw one line.
It seems silly, but if you’re stuck trying to get started, it’s the best hack towards growth that you can get.
Why does this work so well? You remember back when I asked why people gave up on going to the gym after New Year’s? The answer is simple; they tried to do too much at once.
People will poke fun at you if you tell them you’re only working out for a minute every day this week. But reaching your goals will leave you feeling accomplished, building your confidence. Not to mention it feels easy, so you don’t stop. A few weeks later, you’ve upped the time to 5 minutes, and most people after New Year’s have already given up and left. You feel even more accomplished and confident. Now you’re up to 10 minutes a few weeks later and it’s starting to get easier, your falling into the motions and feeling the habit take hold. And finally, a few months later, you're working out for 45 minutes a day, your body feels great, and it no longer fights you to accomplish the task. In fact, if you don’t do it, you feel a little restless.
This is the kind of power that helps you get started when you’re stuck. This is the easiest hack to help your brain form new habits. When you start, make the task so easy, you can’t say no.
