Don’t be realistic when it comes to the size of your dream. But be realistic about how long it’s gonna take.  

You’ve found someone who has done what you wanna do, who’s living your dream. You stand in awe as to what they have created, feeling inspired and empowered as you see proof that it’s possible, that they have succeeded. Then you turn around and look at your current reality and you notice the massively wide gap between where you are and what you aspire to achieve. It’s disheartening. 

You have such a big, beautiful vision of the future that you almost can’t bear looking at what you’ve created so far. You hate how it shows with brutal honesty how much still needs to happen before you’ll even get close to your goal.

The thing is, you want that vision. And you want it now. You don’t wanna deal with the fumbling around that is the beginning; you’d much rather turn pro and be a success right away.

You wanna skip the fucking journey, and arrive at the destination already. 

I get it. I’ve been there.

That’s what happened to me over the course of the last summer. I have a big vision for where I want my life + biz to look like, I imagine what it would feel like, and what I’d be able to do once I’ve reached “the destination”.

Whenever I had a look at my current situation, I just couldn’t help but be turned off. “This is not what I want”, I thought “I want it to be more like that (insert business of superhero chica)”. Now what would have been the better thing to do in that moment? Taking an honest look at the gap between our vision and our reality, and to start taking small, consistent action to close that gap. 

Instead, I put down my head in shame, embarrassed as to why my business wasn’t as awesome as superhero chica’s biz. I hated being a beginner and I didn’t want to have anything to do with it. So I procrastinated and distracted myself. For months.

One summer night my boyfriend and I were having dinner in a tiny hotel restaurant. I fumbled around with my wine glass and looked down at the table while I opened up and shared my frustrations about my business with him. He looked at me with a raised eyebrow and said, “So you want it all, and you want it now. It’s like you’re aiming to be at level 50 when you’re only at level 5. How about you start being okay with where you are and just focus on getting to the next level?”.

Truthbomb, gently dropped. He was right.

So, here’s the lesson:

We can’t expect ourselves to zoom straight to success right from the beginning. If we look at our role models, it took time for them to get to where they’re at now. Instead of being intimidated by their success, we can look to them for inspiration as to how we can move into our own vision, step-by-step. 

It doesn’t make sense to stay in that place of doubt and procrastination, and to resist our current situation. We’ll never get to level 50 if we’re not comfortable looking at our current status at level 5. We just have to figure out how to get to the next level. And then the next. That’s how they’ve done it, too. So trust that you’re right where you need to be, and move forward with courage, celebrating every level along the way.

That’s what I’ll be doing from now on.