The Resistance

Third in a series of posts inspired by Seth Godin’s Linchpin.

A woman I know was laid off in 2008 after a 14-year career in broadcast journalism. Now at the end of her financial rope, she had just a couple months of living expenses left and no real prospects of another job. She was understandably scared.

“What should I do?”

I replied with my personal go-to philosophy. My beacon. My intent. The ace up my sleeve. I passed on the wisdom I learned from Lisa Hickey in Lemonade.

“Don’t be the person out there looking for the job. Be the person out there doing something interesting.”

I sat back, expecting the great spot light of epiphany to shine in her eyes. Go forth, and be interesting! She would surely cherish this chestnut forever.

“But I tried that and I’m still broke.”

Well, what are your passions? What do you love to do?

“I love broadcasting, but it’s a dying industry. There’s no future in it.”

What do you love about broadcasting?

“I love communicating. I also love networking. But there’s no money in that.”

Have you considered working for yourself?

“I have but I don’t have a spouse to support me.”

But. But. But.

In Linchpin, Seth Godin calls this “the resistance,” a term he credits to Steven Pressfield.  It’s the part of the brain that wants to retreat to the comfort of normalcy and inaction. Godin writes that the resistance “is working overtime to get you to shut up….The resistance is afraid. Afraid of what will happen to you (and to it) if the ideas get out, if your gifts are received, if the magic happens.”

There are so many reasons to not do something. But the biggest is that the voice that asks “what if?” is usually drowned out by the voice that screams “it’s too scary.”

I’m often asked, “what is the biggest difference between entrepreneurs and employees?”

And my answer is, a high tolerance for fear. You’ve got to be confident in your own ability to fail.

Failure isn’t a possibility. It’s a certainty. When you were a baby, you failed all the time. No toddler walks on the first try. No child can write his ABCs without lots of practice.

Look back at your own life, and you’ll see a string of failures. You’ll also see a string of successes. You’re walking. You’re writing. You graduated. If you’ve been laid off before, it also means you’ve been hired before. If you’ve failed at something, it also means you attempted something. You’re alive. There are people around you who love and support you.

Embrace failure. Believe you can recover. It’s the only way to resist the resistance.