A recurring theme in my life, and in my recent conversations, had been one of standing on the edge of a decision, or experience, and feeling trepidation about taking the next step.
Maybe you have already decided that you need to take this step to move forward. Or it’s an extreme sports thing that you know you were going to try but it is still scary. Facing this challenge, you also face paralysis. It takes a lot to open up, to step into the unknown, to throw yourself over the edge of a cliff, metaphorical or physical…
… the first time.
Invariably, consistently, in my experience the first time is the worst. There is so much anticipation, anxiety, all tied up in the unknown. Is it going to hurt to try this thing? Will I succeed? The anxiety and the butterflies in the stomach are real.
It may sound trite but one of the most iconic slogans in this recent age is Nike’s, “just do it”. Of course there are sanity limits, there are different levels of preparation, but when you are prepared, when you know, just do it. Standing in doubt doesn’t help at all.
For physical acts or challenges, doing something once gives you a reference point to learn from. Maybe you succeeded the first time, great! But if you didn’t then you now have an experience to draw upon. Change this thing, keep that thing. Your second attempt will be informed. And more in the spirit of this article, your second attempt will no longer have the same anxiety as the first. You know what you are dealing with. You are no longer stepping into the unknown.
On a personal development front, the difference between something being a nice intellectual idea that falls short of personal integration and the spirit of “yep, that’s for me” is often whether the element in question has been experienced. It’s a lot scarier giving your first speech than your second or your tenth. There are nerves wrapped up in submitting a creative work for judgment or acceptance. The nerves don’t go away but they’re usually worse the first time. It’s scary to imagine what it will be like for the first time to watch your partner make out with or be physically intimate with someone else right next to you, or for you to accept their invite of the same, or both, but that moment may become a beautiful shared experience and after that you know what to expect. Keep what works, change what doesn’t, but you know and you’re no longer stuff in ‘worst case scenario’ dread.
I didn’t try anything psychedelic for the first four decades of my life. I was curious after a point, but never acted on it. When it was finally offered to me in a safe and tangible way I didn’t know what to expect. Instead of dwelling on all of the possible ways it could play out, we took a small amount and I gained the insight of experience. The next time we took more but instead of wondering what the hell this psychedelic thing was like, I now had to contact within which to work.
When I was given the choice of accepting a life of polyamory in my new marriage, or no longer being married I knew what my path had to be. Those were the only two options and I wasn’t ready to give up. I stood on the precipice for a few weeks, probably two months, psyching myself up, buried and self-reflection as to whether I was up for the challenge. After that there was no denying that something had to move forward and there was no sense in delaying it. I had needed some time to start the integration but once I had actually committed to doing it, it started. If you know my story then you also know that it wasn’t easy and that a lot of pain was involved, but it was all based in actual experience (and during a closed-world pandemic! ) and not in an unlimited imagined anticipation.
Hesitation to enter a domain you know you must enter is the slow peel of a bandaid off your soul. You won’t rip it off, you gently pull, and there is a dull pain. Nobody recommends a slow bandaid removal. It’s coming off anyway, you already know this. Bit the bullet and rip it off!
Some answers come intellectually, some problems solved. Certain truths or emotions, however, have no way to reach you other than through direct experience. Science has it’s theoretical side and experimental side. The two of those working together in tandem achieve verifiable results. Personal life has its theory and it has its experience. Don’t fear the experience approach if you are working on integrating something; it has ways of reaching into parts of your mind, body, and soul that theory simply can’t get to on its own.