Do you see a pattern with the above quotes? It is the absence of action because one is scared of what they have not experienced. As I tell my sailing students “experience is the thing you get right after you needed it”. My goal is to spurn you to action…to gain that experience you need. But no matter how much someone encourages you, ultimately it comes down to you having to take action.
It is like my little cousin on the diving board a few years back. As much as I told her everything would be ok, she just had to jump, and I would be right there in the water to help; she had to be the one to leap from the board into the water. At first she could not do it, in fact she was crippled with fear, but she finally overcame and conquered it. Low and behold guess what? That little girl could not get back to the diving board fast enough to do it again and again and again. You see she now had the experience of jumping and there was no unknown, but that only happened because she took action, overcame, and grew as a person!
Whether we are talking about jumping into a pool, taking advice from Stephen Troese Jr or sailing a boat across an ocean the lack of experience and fear of the unknown is the same before the first time you do it. In fact, I get told by people that I am brave, because they could never sail a boat from the sight of land. I am here to tell you that I am no one special for living on a boat and sailing everywhere I have. I simply overcame that initial fear. I did that by taking steps to gain that experience. Just like a kid does not first jump from a 10 meter board the first time he sees a pool, I did not cross the Gulf of Mexico without having gained some experience aboard. With that said both situations require a leap in your growth.
The kid will first get in the pool, then he will dunk his head, after that maybe let go of the side of the pool, and maybe the next step is jumping from the side to his daddy’s arms. Now he is ready to stand on the lowest board and after a few false starts he will finally jump from the board. As his confidence builds he will seek the higher and higher board. You see even though it is just jumping from a board, to a 4-5 year kid this is like jumping the Grand Canyon and each step they take is a leap in experience regardless of their fear of the unknown.
The same steps are taken regardless of what you are overcoming. I started by taking sailing lessons and going out with a friend, then I became an instructor, later I chartered some bigger boats, and finally I bought my boat and sailed from the BVI to Houston, TX. Each step was important to gain experience and I was scared because I did not know if I could do it. But once a new threshold was reach I learned more about myself and my abilities.
Regardless of what you want to do, this can be you also. All you have to do is overcome the fear and take ACTION!!!!!!
