Accountability is what makes the difference between passive wishing and active working.
Feeling unmotivated? Stuck? Know you need to act towards learning a new skill, taking a new action, or undergoing a new way of life, yet you feel distractions pulling you away again and again?
Your mind is pulling you away because there’s nothing holding your feet to the fire. There is nothing out there holding you accountable to yourself.
I’m going to give you a technique I use to hold me accountable when no one in my life will.
I call it: Crossing the point of no return. It involves making a level of progress and/or making a sacrifice towards that goal. It’s the point where you look back at your progress and you know there is no turning back. You have no other option but to move forward at this point. Otherwise the actions and/or sacrifices you’ve made become worthless. You’re committed.
Case in point – this blog that you’re reading right now. As I was putting my second book through my first initial draft, I was making necessary adjustments to this site and getting them off the ground.
It was completely new territory for me. Blogging, self-publishing a book, making a presence…. all of this was new to me earlier this year. I knew it could be done but I had to learn the basics. And I did read and learn about it. But I wasn’t ACTING on any of that.
There comes a point where your passive learning becomes a crutch for not taking any actions towards your goals. You justify it by making sure you do everything “perfectly” to lower your chances of making a mistake and possibly falling flat on your face. When the fact that making mistakes is inevitable is forgotten, that “crutch” is more like a handicap, stemming from the fear of failure. You want to avoid the inevitable.
Don't let fear hold you back from your dreams and what you want!
You must take action. Let’s say the worst happens. You have the idea to learn some new skills in the hopes that you will become prosperous and you’ll be widely appreciated for your efforts. But you know that success isn’t assured, and you could strike out and fail.
But if you let the fear of failing keep you from taking actions toward a potential success, you’ll increase the chances of failure to 100%. Not only that, but you must live with the regret of not following through on your idea. At least if you make the attempt, you can do whatever is possible to make it a success. In the worst case, you can walk away knowing you did everything you could, instead of just walking away with your tail between your legs.
Like Michael Jordan once said, “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”
So, get up and take your shot. Make progress to such a point that you cannot turn back. Work your life, or your life will work you.
You can do it. You may even surprise yourself in the process!