I’m not overly technical but I figured I could handle my new Bluetooth headset. The people at the store set it up so I didn’t have to do that part and the first time I used it it worked wonderfully. Then it didn’t work. And I had no idea why. Because I have a tendency to put off technical things I poked the three buttons on the headset, recharged it and when it still didn’t work I went back to my headsets. I’m not certain what I thought would happen – perhaps that it would suddenly work by itself? So after five days of it not working I read the instructions. I thought I understood them. I poked the three available places to poke one more time. I went online to get instructions and gave up immediately in an overwhelm of choices – I just wanted a person to fix it for me. You know the feeling. So I gathered up the headset and the instructions and the phone and went back to AT&T where a really nice guy showed me that all I needed to do was press one button and hold it for 5 seconds!!! 5 seconds had kept me from making it work. And it made me think.
What have I been putting off that another 5 seconds of persistence would fix or make happen or resolve?
I’ve been putting off making videos because I need to relearn Camtasia – that’s not even about starting from scratch, that’s about re-learning. And I haven’t even opened the program to see how fast I can remember it.
I’ve been putting off putting my latest books on Kindle and Nook not because I don’t know how, but because I have to decide on a price. One decision, one commitment, one answer and I’ll be unstuck.
What would happen if you stuck with it just a little big longer?
Will one more read through of your blog post make it ready to go up? Will five minutes choosing the three things you will accomplish this day take the pressure off the rest of your day? Will spending 20 minutes exploring new software help you see how it could help you? Will writing another chapter of your ebook move it along? Will making one phone call open up new opportunities?
The decision to be more persistent is a bit like doing one more push up or walking another half a block – or whatever it is that asks you to push a bit more, to go a bit further, to learn a bit more.
5 seconds is no time at all but it can make the difference between something working or not.
© 2011 Cara Lumen
