I used to prescribe to the “all or nothing” mindset. On the surface it seemed like an admirable aspiration. I either give one hundred percent of my energy to an activity or I just don’t do it all. Hot or Cold. Fully committed or not at all committed. But what if I only have 85% to give at that moment? My all or nothing attitude would rationalize that I wouldn’t do it until I found that other 15%. No transitioning to that, not spectrum.
Basically, all or nothing became my excuse, rather the ego’s excuse, to not move forward with things that I really wanted to do. Can’t spend five hours a day writing my novel? Then it will just have to wait until I find 5 hours per day in my full time work schedule to do it. Don’t have hundreds of dollars for a gym membership? Then I will not exercise until I get more money. We think well I can’t fully commit so I will just have to wait.
And their goes the illusion–once life is “better” then I will do what I really want. Yet, what I have seen to be true is that when you start doing what you want, then life inevitably gets better.
I decided to take small steps and those steps became big leaps. I spent 15- 20 minutes a day working on my novel and within 2 months, I had done first round revisions of the entire manuscript . I started meditating for 1 minute, then 5 minutes, now I am up to 15 minutes.
Let’s break all or nothing thing and redefine it. Sometimes you can’t give all or nothing in the sense of huge chunks of time and money. But what if give 100% focus to a small step that get you moving towards your goal? So if you can’t spend hours to work on a project after work? That’s ok, take 5 minutes in the morning to work on it. 5 focused minutes.
The all or nothing illusion makes us think that small, mini steps are not enough but that’s not true (ask a baby learning to walk how important each step is. ) Change happens in every single step.
Put your all into taking one step right now. That is all you need to do to start a revolution in your life. One step. May you find peace in taking one step at a time rather than beating yourself up for wanting to take more steps, an impossible endeavor.
One Step. Right Now. Change Happens
xo
K
Reimagine Self Care 