Knowing what you want isn’t always the hard part
I’ve been thinking about something lately, and I realized that one of the hardest parts of my transformation wasn’t figuring out what I wanted.
I actually knew.
I knew the kind of life I wanted. I knew how I wanted to feel, the things I wanted to do, the woman I wanted to be. And I knew, deep down, that I was capable of so much more than what I was doing with my life at the time.
I could feel it. I don’t know how else to explain it.
But here’s the thing. My reality was so freaking far from all of that, I couldn’t even imagine how I was going to get there.
And I think that was one of the most frustrating feelings I’ve ever experienced.
Because it’s one thing not knowing what you want. But knowing, really knowing, and having absolutely no idea how to make it happen? That’s a whole different story.
Okay, so now what?
Everybody talks about having a vision. Dream big, figure out what you want, imagine your future.
And I agree with all of that. You know how much I believe in having a vision.
But I remember thinking, okay, I know what I want. Now what?
Where do I even start?
There were so many things about my life that I wanted to change. And every time I thought about one of them, another five would come to mind.
I would get overwhelmed before I even did anything.
And the worst part was that I knew I had it in me. I wasn’t sitting there thinking I wasn’t capable. I knew I was. I just couldn’t figure out how to go from the life I had to the one I wanted.
I think that’s what made it hurt so much.
I wanted to figure it all out before I started
Looking back, I can see how much pressure I was putting on myself.
I wanted to know exactly what I needed to do. How I was going to do it. How long it was going to take. And, of course, whether it was actually going to work.
Basically, I wanted all the answers before I even got started.
And you know what? That was okay. I just didn’t know yet. How was I supposed to know any of that? I’d never done it before.
I can look back now and understand that I was trying to figure things out with what I knew at the time. I didn’t have the experience I have today, and that’s okay too.
But that’s where my head was.
I was looking at this huge life I wanted and comparing it to where I was standing. And the distance between the two was so big that everything felt impossible.
Even the things I could have started changing seemed so small that I wondered what difference they would make.
So I kept thinking. And thinking. And getting frustrated.
And not really going anywhere.
What finally started to change
I wish I could tell you there was this one moment when everything clicked and suddenly I knew what to do.
There wasn’t.
It was more about realizing that I couldn’t keep waiting until I had everything figured out.
I had to start somewhere.
And I had to stop looking at every single thing I wanted to change all at once, because that was exhausting.
I started paying more attention to what I could actually do with the life I had, the time I had, and the circumstances I was in.
Not what I wished I could do. What I could do.
And I started making little changes.
Some worked. Some didn’t. Sometimes I had to change direction. Sometimes I got frustrated all over again.
But at least I was moving.
And something interesting started happening. Things that had once seemed so impossible didn’t feel quite as far away anymore.
Not because my whole life had changed overnight, but because I was slowly creating a different one.
I still don’t know how I’m going to do everything I want
And you know what? I still feel that way sometimes.
I still have this big vision for my life. There are places I want to go, things I want to create, experiences I want to have. And some of them? I have absolutely no idea how I’m going to make them happen.
But I don’t freak out about it the way I used to.
Because now I know that I don’t need to have the entire thing figured out.
I just need to know what I’m working toward and pay attention to the choices I’m making today.
And that’s something I wish I had understood years ago.
Because I spent so much time feeling overwhelmed by how far away my dream was that I didn’t realize I could start building toward it from exactly where I was.
Maybe you’re in that place right now.
Maybe you know exactly what you want. You can picture it, you can almost feel what it would be like to live that life, but when you look at where you are today, you just can’t see how you’re ever going to get there.
I know that feeling very well.
And I want to leave you with something to think about.
What if the problem isn’t that your dream is too big? What if you’re just trying to figure out the whole damn thing before you’ve even taken the first step?
Think about it...
With so much love, always
Gaby