“The secret is just to start. When you’re stuck between a rock and a hard place, all you have to do is push the rock,” Loren Ridinger.  We spend so much time looking at all the avenues of how we can’t do it, how things are stacked up against us, how we won’t succeed.  I mean, we are a problem-centric species because we have to be able to survive so we are trained to identify threats quickly.  That behavior, while necessary to survival, is the inhibitor of creativity.  We can look for all the ways we have to wait, we can list all the reasons why something doesn’t make sense, we can explain all the can’ts.  But none of that will matter if there is still something in your heart that needs to be addressed.  There can be all of those reasons not to, but all it takes is one good reason to move forward.  We may not be able to move the boulder in one push, but we can start inching it along day by day, and when we find the right leverage, the whole thing will move.  All we have to do is start.  And starting today gets us one day closer than yesterday and one day closer than we would be if we started tomorrow. 

I know it’s easy to believe we aren’t capable. There are people who will hold us back simply because they can.  Some people do it because they feel a sense of power.  They use our mistakes as a weapon and make it about our ability rather than our humanity.  Our ability is infinite—while it may take time to develop, we are capable of anything.  Our humanity is universal and we are all subject to it—we make mistakes to learn, it’s part of life.  The fact is one mistake doesn’t define us.  People don’t get to decide what stops us and they certainly don’t get to decide what makes us qualified for anything.  In this commercial, industrial, revolutionary technological age, we feel this sense of power.  Things change quickly and there needs to be more space for adaptation.  Just because we don’t get it right away doesn’t mean we won’t—keep going.  The only way failure is assured is if we don’t start.

The truth is, it’s often the simplest things that have the biggest impact.  Momentum is created simply by putting things in motion.  We see the next step by taking the first one.  Our strength is found and developed in the moments where we have to decide to stay the same or go for what feels right, in the moments when we have nothing or are cornered, when we feel like there is nothing left.  It feels like the rock is sitting on top of you.  If you can move, you can do something about it.  Look for the ways to get moving.  Often you think you’re moving a mountain and it’s a pebble.  Sometimes it’s a boulder.  And yes, sometimes it may be the mountain, but we have the capacity to move the whole damn mountain.  We are never stuck so don’t ever let anyone try to convince us that we are.  It’s all in our minds.  Decide the story we want to tell.  Moving the rock or letting it pin us down.  Just start moving and we become unstoppable.