Why do we struggle in spaces where we resist change, knowing full well, change is a constant and could even be beneficial? We detest challenge even when a questionable event helps us understand those undeniable impressions we only seem to seize in sleepless moments. The challenge to think better thoughts, dream bigger dreams, to look better, to feel better, so we can get on track with life and attract something better. The key is decide to decide, then do something about it.
You cannot make progress without making decisions.
Whenever we’re at the crossroads, we wonder. We ponder what we should or shouldn’t do. If given a chance to change some aspect of your life, ask yourself, why not. Sometimes we choose the path of least resistance, where we feel compelled to do nothing. But this space can have you believing you are making progress when you aren’t. What happens if you end up where you don’t want to be? In that state of confusion, stuck, procrastinating, when it’s time to say something, do something, to achieve something better.
DECIDE TO DECIDE
A colleague once admitted he was where he wished he wasn’t. When I asked him to clarify, he just solemnly shook his head quickly as if he remembered some event, and replied, I made a mistake and now I’m paying for it, big time. I would have dug a little deeper but felt it wasn’t my place. If I pressed on, it would be like crossing some line simply because of nosy intention. The invisible line, the one where we may find out what we really didn’t need to know, but curiosity got the best of us. Regardless, he elaborated and I just sat back, held my mug, sipped my coffee, and listened. Sometimes that’s all we need to do. Just listen.
Decide. Take one of the most unsettling things you feel exist in your life and decide. Decide to meet it with love and understanding. Decide to meet it with a proactive spirit that believes that a solution, an ease, a peaceful resolve rests in the meeting.
It’s difficult to choose those things we see as being outside of our comfort zone. We are habitual to a fault. It’s easier to do nothing, or to take a route we are familiar with, one we feel more comfortable taking even though it may not be the right thing for us to do. So I remained silent. He didn’t want my take, he just wanted someone to hear him out. Everyone has a story. Everyone has a choice.
Step one is to know you have choices
Step two is decide to decide
Step three, choose
Step four, know it doesn’t end with just a decision
Step five, take action
CHOOSE A DIRECTION THEN TAKE IT
Sometimes we wait too long. We dream but do nothing about it. Years later, we wonder what the heck went wrong. Why didn’t we say what we needed to say or do what we needed to do? And then out of the blue, a friend asks that one question you were not prepared to answer. Why weren’t you prepared? Prepared to stake your claim, prepared to make a call, prepared to take a chance to change something in your life. Because you weren’t ready? Because it wasn’t the right time, the right situation, the right person? Perhaps it wasn’t what you believed it was.
The thing is, do we have to know it, feel it, and believe it before we take action? Why do we have a tendency to sit on a fence? Why not just go after it. Whatever the “it” is. Do it, say it, mean it, live it. Decide to decide, but follow it up with doing something about it. Decision always precedes action. Without a decision, without action, we stay where we are, perhaps where we shouldn’t be. Until we take those steps, nothing happens. To reach a definable moment, we’re asked to do what it takes to achieve a dream. Decide to decide then take a step in that direction.
Every decision brings with it some good, some bad, some lessons, and some luck. The only thing that’s for sure is that indecision steals many years from many people who wind up wishing they’d just had the courage to leap.