Who is the coolest person you know? It could be a real human that you know personally, a character on tv, a hero in a comic book. Just think about it for a second—who is the coolest to you?

Now, think about what makes them so cool. To me, the coolest people in the world are musicians. I found myself dating them, fantasizing about them, and wishing that somehow I could be as cool as they are. It took me a shockingly long time to realize that I could be like them, I can, it’s completely possible. The idea hadn’t really stuck with me because I felt like I should have been one already. I felt like I was already too far behind to even begin. Instead of inspiring me to learn, they made me grieve an identity that would never be mine.

Many of us go through this thought process. We hope and dream and we mourn this life that we feel like we could never have. I hear it all the time. It’s a very real, deeply rooted sort of grief—the grief we have for the person we wish we were. But we’re not, so we sit in low self-worth for years.

It’s a vicious cycle because the low self-worth also feeds the idea that we can’t reach this dream version of ourselves that we’d like to be. You have to ignore that voice that says “you can’t do it” and try, just try, to hear a voice that says you can. Why can’t you? Whether your goal is to learn to play the guitar, be Batman, or get that promotion at work. Why should it be anyone else but you?

Part of why we get stuck is that we’re focusing more on the time that has passed and less on the time that’s in front of us. We experience time linearly, so generally we have more memories than we have ideas about the future. We might have fear-based predictions of the future, worries, concerns. Opposite that, we might have fantasies about what our lives could be “if only” certain things (usually ones that are outside of our control) happen. It’s easy to get so caught up on what could have been that we don’t even realize what could be in 5, 10, or 15 years if we just start today.

Of course, some things are out of our control. If your dream hinges on you winning the lottery or going to Mars, those might fall through. Ideally, your dream is something that you have the power to control. It has to meet a few other specifications, too:

1. like the thing you’re doing, not just the idea of it.

If you really want to be successful at something, you have to have the motivation to continue. If you only enjoy the outcome of something, you’re going to be waiting a long time to get that dopamine reward that comes with it. Given that dopamine is really the only thing that motivates us, it’s likely that you will lose motivation before reaching that desired outcome.

If you enjoy the process, however, and the process of learning about it releases dopamine in your brain, you will easily find the motivation to continue practicing/learning.

2. Practice self-compassion CONSTANTLY

They say it’s easier to learn things if you’re a kid. What makes it easier for them? Yes, their brains are still developing. But another major difference between their brains and our brains is that we’ve picked up a lot of “should”s in our lives, and they haven’t yet.

Learning involves curiosity. If we are telling ourselves “you should know this already”, “this should be easy for you”, “why can’t you just get this”, etc, we’re not in the open, curious state we need to be in in order to learn. Learning something new as an adult means you have to let go of that critical voice and allow yourself just to learn. Learn at your own pace. There’s no deadline, there’s no grade. You’ll have more fun, you’ll be much less frustrated, and you’re more likely to keep trying.

3. Set small goals and recognize your achievements along the way

There’s this thing in the brain called the “discrepancy reducing feedback loop” and basically what it does is keep track of our goals. As soon as we set a goal, this part of the brain starts to monitor our progress. When it comes time to see how we did, this part of the brain gives us two options—keep trying toward the goal, or give up.

When we’re setting out to achieve a pretty lofty goal, it’s very important to give ourselves small, achievable goals along the way. Otherwise, this small part of the brain is going to be continuously tempted to say “abandon this goal”. When you set smaller goals along the way, it makes that part of the brain happy, and makes us more likely to stay course toward the larger goal.

4. Believe in yourself!
None of these strategies are going to make a difference if you don’t believe in your ability to do the thing you’re trying to do. It’s important to remind yourself that even if you’re bad at something now, there’s no reason you can’t keep working to improve. Everyone is bad at the beginning and that doesn’t mean there’s no potential to get better.

Start by figuring out what you want, then practice these tools to get there. If you’re having trouble along the way, therapy might be useful. You can contact me for a consultation here.