Rule #12 Don't Stop

Momentum is an amazing thing. Once you get it, great things can happen. However, the exercise of gaining momentum can be pure hell. It will seem like you are walking through wet cement. It will seem like momentum will never be achieved. You will feel unqualified. You will feel stupid. You will feel defeated. It will cause you to doubt your path, goals and ambitions. You will ask yourself, “If this is what I’m supposed to be doing why is it so hard?”

The answer is simple. Nothing worthwhile is easy. I just watched a documentary called “The Biggest Little Farm.” I highly recommend it. It shows one couple’s struggle to leave the city and create a fully sustainable farm in the hills of California. Time after time they could have stopped. Whether it was coyotes eating their chickens, uncontrollable wildfires bearing down on them, relentless snails eating their peaches or gophers sapping their trees- they had plenty of reasons to stop. However, they finally gained momentum and pressed on. Now Apricot Lane Farms is a tourist destination and the subject of a great film.

I just saw a post from Jon Acuff, one of my virtual mentors. That basically means he has no clue who I am, probably never will, but he’s crushing it so I watch what he does and take notes. He posted a picture on Linkedin of him siting alone in a meeting room. He had just planned his first meet up for readers of his blog. Only two people showed up. Neither were actual fans. They were well-wishers. In the post Jon stated he had one of the people take the picture to remind him of where it all began when he set out to achieve his dream of speaking and writing.

In the Linkedin post Acuff wrote, “I think about that moment sometimes because it felt like a failure, but really wasn’t. It wasn’t a failure, it was a beginning. And that’s how beginnings often look.”

I’m practicing what I preach. I’m there right now. I’m pecking away this blog knowing only a smattering of people may read it. I just recently spoke to a group of about 25 industrial workers, which is not exactly selling out a convention hall. However, it may as well have been. I am so grateful to have had that opportunity. I will never take it for granted, and one day I will look back and remember the privilege of getting to speak to those folks.

Whatever it is you are pursuing-a better marriage, being a better father, learning a new skill, starting a new career, getting in better shape don’t stop. Eventually, momentum will come, and when it does, do not let up. Remember each and every day the times when you were first faced with that metaphorical bolder and how you didn’t think it would ever move. Get it rolling and continue nudging it lest it stop and you have to start the whole process over. Don’t stop.

You rule!

Jason