Getting UnStuck
“It’s the start that stops most people.”
- Don Shula
I’m a self-starter. I didn’t need any prompting to begin to write a program for an upcoming offseason program. No one needs to fire me up to write a blog.
When I left coaching, I was already writing my book. As I wrote Move or Die, I was setting up speaking outlines. As I finished Move or Die, I had already started putting together ideas for a second book, which is in research right now.
My point is that I have the type of personality that has no problem with starting and finishing ideas. I’m in the minority. Too many of us have great ideas. We have great plans and ambitious dreams. But that’s as far as it goes. These ideas, plans and dreams all die on the vine. I love Don Shula’s quote that defines this action, “It’s the start that stops most people.”
No One Is Immune
He’s right. And if you are one of these people it hurts to read this, because it describes who you are. But it’s okay. This is why I wrote my book. You would be amazed at how many professional athletes have this problem. Those superstars who people watch every weekend. They are flawed; just like you and I.
God, gifted them with talent or grit to become the best athlete they could become. Just like us they have dreams that will change their life. They may even have goals to accomplish on the way to achieving their dreams. They may even have a schedule. They will tell themselves, “I will start on Monday.”
Monday comes … and goes. They lie to themselves again, “This wasn’t the right time, next Monday for sure.” And then the next Monday slides by.
It wasn’t that they failed. They just never started. ‘It’s the start that stops most people.”
Once their careers are over, they don’t know how to get their lives going. This is why more than 80% of professional athletes are bankrupt within five years of their retirement.
The Deadly Cycle: Stuck – Stagnate – Professional Death
For us “mortals”, who weren’t gifted with superpowers, we have could have the same problems. Once we get out of school and are sent out on our own, we don’t have a plan. We have dreams, but most don’t have any idea of how to make them come true.
We end up taking a job that will pay our bills and then we get stuck. We want to keep moving forward but we now have bills, and family concerns. Our dreams are put on the backburner.
Our dreams become the thing we think about as we are driving to work, or when we are reminiscing over drinks. “I coulda, woulda, shoulda …” – but you didn’t. You then stagnate. You forget your dreams and just put your head down and push forward to the end of your work life. You end up working for someone else’s dream.
You don’t have to be a great athlete to have this happen. You can just be like 80% of the population. Those are the people who work to get a paycheck. They never come home with a satisfied feeling that they made a difference in their life. Every morning they wake up dreading the rest of their day. Until one day they don’t wake up.
Solving The Problem
Above I stated that 80% of professional athletes are bankrupt within five years of retiring from their sport. Just like 80% of the population get stuck, they stagnate and their professional dreams die. It happens to more people than you think.
But don’t despair. This is good news for us, for two reasons.
The first reason why its good news is that even though there is a high number of people who are stuck, the statistic shows us that 20% of the population ARE living their optimal life! Which means that there is an answer to this phenomenon of being stuck.
The second reason that this is good news is that you have less competition on the way to accomplishing your dreams. 80% of the population is not going anywhere. They are either stuck, or they’re stagnating or their professional dreams are dead, and they’re just putting time in until they expiration date comes up.
As a professional watcher I have seen the difference between those who got stuck and those who became successful. Some would lead you to believe that once you are stuck, very little can be done. But that’s where I am different. Your dreams are still achievable. It doesn’t take a miracle for your life to change for the good. You will have to change some things in your life. But it’s a gradual evolution, from where you are at to where you want to be. To be different you will need to start to think different!
Here are the first three steps that will get you on your road to becoming UnStuck! These are simple. Enjoy the journey!
1. Believe You Are Worthy of Your Dreams
Too many who get stuck don’t believe that they are worthy of living a better life. Somewhere down the line they gave up on themselves. When we don’t think we deserve or have earned the right to have a better life then we will become stuck very quickly.
Those, who I have witnessed, who are successful have always believed in themselves quite strongly. They would laugh at anyone who didn’t think they could. They actually used their doubt as fuel to propel themselves farther along their path to success.
The first step is to stop giving ourselves negative messaging. These negative messages detract from who we can be, by reminding us who we used to be, or how we screwed up the last opportunity.
Start every morning with a positive message was soon as you get up. Throughout the day find the positive in the things that happen around you. Be open for the positive of life.
As soon as we do this, the rest of the day will start to be more and more promising. Eventually you will excited to get out of your warm bed in the morning because you can’t wait to see what other good things will happen to you!
2. Develop a Plan
If you are planning a trip, do you wait until you have the car packed and are driving down the road before you decide where you are going? Probably not. If you do, this might be why you feel stuck.
Before your make any major change in your life, decide where it is that you want to go. What is your dream? Talk to your closest friends about your plans to move forward with your dream. Make sure you ae talking to the one’s who will tell you the truth. Sometimes when we dream, we can get too far ahead of ourselves. We need a plan in hand to lay out what we are trying to do.
If this is a viable idea then start setting up your mile markers. These are your goals. Both short term and long term. Start from the end point of your dream and then work back. If you do this you will see how far you must go and what you might be lacking. As you work back towards your starting point you will begin to figure out how you are going to gain the experience, money, support or path to accomplish each goal.
When I was writing my book, I knew I would need a publisher and an editor. I still wrote every day, but I started to ask my friends, who had written books, how they became connected to their publisher. I also knew my writing was not clean enough, structurally, so I knew I would also need the help of the best editor. I was fortunate that the publishing house I worked with put me in touch with Katie Rios. She was amazing. She pushed my 600-pages of ideas, stories, terrible grammar into a book that I am very proud of.
3. Budget Your Time:
Most people who are stuck always say that they don’t have enough time to do what they want to do. Of course, they have the same 86,400 seconds as the rest of us. The difference is how they budget their time. Those who are stuck will allow time to leak throughout their day.
They push the snooze button, usually more than once. Just think of that as throwing out 600 seconds every time they push that button. They will worry about their social media more than those who are successful. The fifteen minutes they spend will be another 900 seconds of their day … gone. If they do this 3 – 5 times a day, imagine the time they are wasting. By the end of the day, those who are stuck have wasted hours … not just a few seconds here and there. At the end of the week they have wasted so much time that it adds up to wasted days. Days that could have been used to move away from who they were, and instead, move towards who they want to be.
Instead of wasting this time, make a schedule so you can account for your time.
From the minute your alarm clock goes off your day should be scheduled. If you have children that are part of the equation, how are you scheduling their day? The best way to get them out of bed is to have their phones turned off and put in your room when they go to bed the previous evening. Once they are up and ready for school, they get them back. Do the same technique with school work. Have them turn over their phones when they get in from school. They get them back when they are completed with all of their assignments.
Our son, Alex, was not able to watch TV or play any video games until he finished his homework. This became such a habit that he still does his class work for his graduate degree before he does anything else. We have a saying, “Stay ahead and you will never get behind.”
Learning to budget your time is the key to finding that extra time to accomplish your goals and to achieve your dream.
Move or Die, It’s Up to You!
These three basic steps will get you moving down your path to realizing your dreams are very achievable. Believing in yourself, is simple. Just look in the mirror and believe. After that keep pumping positive messages to yourself.
Once you gain your confidence make your plan to obtain your dreams by setting out simple goals. They don’t have to be huge jumps. Just small steps. But these small steps, when added up, will be a huge jump.
Once you have a plan, make your schedule of your day so you have time to get your goals accomplished. Each goal only needs to be a small step. In the end, if it takes you 1,000’s steps to get to your dream why does it matter. The important thing is that you took control of your life, and are on the way to living your optimal life.
My dream was to win a Super Bowl, it took me 40-years to achieve that dream. How many steps did I take? Literally thousands. But my focus on my dream was so focused that I would have taken thousands more to achieve it. It’s your choice, Move or Die.
Next week I will continue with this thought and discuss what the next steps are.
Have an amazing week!
