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“It takes twenty years to become an overnight success.” ~ Eddie Cantor
“All of the effort you’ve put in could be wasted by giving up just a moment too soon.” ~ Seth Simonds
On Friday I met with Brian after a few weeks off due to the holidays. I told him about starting my own weekly yoga classes on January 30th and asked him how he managed having an independent counseling and coaching practice. Brian spent many years working for other people and eventually had a job that encouraged him to step out on his own. His business has grown by word-of-mouth to the point that he can’t take any more clients now. His calendar is full.
Brian is thrilled that I’ve chosen to try to make a-go of Compass Yoga on my own. This is exactly the type of new beginning that he and I have been working toward in my coaching – the confidence to help me realize that going my own way is the best path for me. It’s the path I was meant for, where I can give the very best of myself, where I can do the most good. And his most important piece of advice on this path: “Have patience. It takes time. Don’t give up.”
Patience is a hard one for me. I want to get where I want to be now – I’m the box in the middle of the cartoon above. So the quote above by Eddie Cantor helped. In our society, we witness an enormous number of overnight success stories thanks to YouTube and a variety of televised talent shows, or at least that’s how they’re portrayed. Dig a little deeper and we find that any lasting overnight success really was preceded by many, many years of very hard work that wasn’t always recognized or appreciated. They persevered because they got energy from the journey. Even if success never comes, they still feel fulfilled because they provided something of real value. Success is just the by-product of doing what they were meant to do, of the help they were able to provide.
When I keep that idea in mind, the fear of going my own way subsides a bit, or at least long enough to help me get through the next step of setting up my class. And when the fear finds me again, I remember to breath, and smile, and keep moving. For more information my group yoga classes starting at 6pm on January 30th, check out the Meetup page for the class.
How do you grapple with fear when you’re working on something that you care about? How do you keep going in spite of the fear?
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Christa Avampato 