How To Overcome The Urge To Give Up
“I just can’t do it”… “I’m just going to quit”… “I tried to do it once before”
To often we give up way to soon, way before we even have a chance to succeed, and sometimes before we even start.
Sound familiar? You can overcome the urge to give up and reach your goals, it’s not easy, but it is doable and you can do it!
The urge to give up can come on for so many reasons, but a few of the main ones are:
1- Fear: will I fail, what will others think, what if I can’t, etc.
2- Difficulty: this is harder than I thought, its taking more time than I have, I’m getting tired, etc
3- Knowledge: I don’t know how to do the next part, what about step 10 (when on step 2), I have never done this before, etc
This list could gone on and on, but what matters most is that we start being honest with ourselves about why we are giving up. Once we understand what keeps getting in the way, we can work on it and improve, which will keep us from giving up and then we can actually reach our goals.
I have quit on things plenty of times, sometimes we don’t even realize we are quitting on something because it happens so slowly, and in those situations you have to be extra cautious to notice your habits and patterns, so you can catch yourself if you are steering off course and away from your intended target.
Many years ago (probably 10 at this point, man time flies) I set out to start an online business teaching people how to workout online.
It was all about lifting weights, gaining muscle, and improving the over all athletic performance for the viewer.
At first I was all about it, being on a budget I did it all myself; built the website, made the content, had my brother hold the camera for the videos while I demonstrated exercises, and edited all of it myself.
It was awesome! I was loving every minute of it……then things started to crumble…started with fear, “what if someone else is doing this and has a better website”… then difficulty, “this is taking more time than I can reasonably give it later”… and of course knowledge, “how do I sell stuff on my website (I hadn’t even attracted any visitors yet)”.
Slowly but surely it slipped away and it ended up turning into nothing more than time spent.
I can tell you that I have done that more than once and you know it’s funny because people will say things like “must be nice to control your own schedule” or “things seem to be going well for you” and even in the cases where those things are true, no one see’s the mounds and mounds of ashes that make up all the failures that lay behind me.
Honestly, many times I forget about all the things I have had to screw up just to get a couple things right, but you know… that’s part of it and sharing these lessons for others to avoid some of those pain points is where victory in failure plays itself all the way out.
So a few ways to not give up and to keep moving toward your goals:
1- Self Development: this is something that will not only help you overcome fear, but that I didn’t know about or understand many years ago that has helped me tremendously. Read books, practice positivity, and shift your mindset.
2- Plan Ahead: things are going to get hard, but by planning your days it will keep you from getting overwhelmed with the difficult times.
3- Study/Learn as you go: you don’t have to know how to do step 10 when you are on step 2. You don’t open up a manual and read the last step first.
This is not a guarantee that you won’t WANT to quit or give up sometimes, but more of safe guards to help you keep going.
You and your goals are important, don’t give up!
If you need help, I am here
– Michael