A Pause vs. A False Start - What's the Difference
Somewhere in Hollywood following an audition. Photo by my beautiful friend!
Looking back on my experience missing a post (completely subjective, I know, because this is my site and I get to decide when I post anything) had me thinking about how easy it’s always been to allow my missing a promise to myself to lead to never keeping said promise. Considering my history, missing this post could very easily devolve into this endeavor never growing wings. Blog who? Blog what?
Honestly, not posting could easily lead me to stop posting forever. It’s sadly true.
When you’re not used to being in the pocket or the flow of your work it’s so much easier to simply stop doing the work. These moments end up becoming false starts in our lives. Moments where we justify that the thing we’re doing is not worth doing or continuing. This could be for a number of reasons. A fun one for me has been a debilitating “what’s the point?” mentality that erodes any type of motivation or momentum I could possibly have for the subject at hand. And when you’ve lost momentum, it’s extremely hard to build up the energy to get going again.
But this is a new year. Hell, it’s a new decade. As cliche as it is, I’d like to make some difference in my life for the better. Not that I’m not doing well for myself, but I’d like to do better. Otherwise, operating in the same way I have been is a sure way to have my life be a series of false starts. Too often I’ve found myself at the other side of several years after a promise I’ve made to myself and realized no movement has been made. It’s taken a lot of strength to be very real with myself over the past few years and confront the ways my actions have been a disservice to the life I want to build and lead.
I no longer want to navigate through this life in the same way. Doubting myself and not believing in the promises I make and my ability to achieve those things. I want to build something different for myself through higher functioning habits. The best way I can see to do that right now is by working on shifting my perspective and energy to view the moments I realize I’ve not kept a promise to myself as a pause in the journey towards fulfilling it. As much as our fatalistic thoughts push us to believe otherwise, life goes on. And the thing you were trying to achieve yesterday that you didn’t get to is still there. So instead of losing the faith and labeling a break in the flow of what you were doing as a false start, how about we start viewing it as a pause.
A pause indicates that although there is work to do and you’re not doing it right now, there’s nothing stopping you from picking it right back up and giving it your all. A pause is good. We need rest. I choose to believe that I’ve been collecting my energy on this long pause. Now that my break is over, I’m just getting to the good stuff!
Has there been a time in your life where you’ve had a false start? What are some ways we can reframe that as a pause instead? Comment below!