Taking the first step

Posted on June 05, 2021 by Jon Wichett, One of Thousands of Life Coaches on Noomii.

What do you need to do before you are able to take the first step? Answering this question is quite possibly the single most effective way to take action.

The first step is when you move from a thought in your head to action. If you’re the sort of person who says “I can never seem to take action”, start by giving yourself some credit! You take action, maybe not all the time, but some of the time in the right context – you decided what to wear today (or maybe you decided to be naked!), what to eat, to contact a friend, or to take up a new hobby. You take decisive action and commit to 100’s of decisions a day. Other decisions may feel harder to make, it can feel overwhelming to ensure we make the right choice and you end up with a paradox of choice.

I have been paralyzed by choice before, I have a tendency to overthink some things and as I have become older I seem to be getting more cautious. I am thankful to my wife who so often focuses on the why rather than the why not, and my coaching career for allowing me to change my perspective and discover new, more resourceful strategies.

Some big decision I am able to dive straight into – I invest a decent chunk of money into stocks without really understanding much at all, I try to cook without a recipe, and have built a snow cave that I slept in by myself after watching a YouTube video. Admittedly, all of these could have worked out much better and I would not say this was the best strategy for ensuring success, I just happened to be lucky enough to get away with it (so far..).

However, for picking my mountaineering routes, my holidays, or what car to buy, I have a fairly long check list to tick before I am able to commit to action. The thing with climbing a mountain is there are a lot of factors to take into consideration and the consequences of getting it wrong are potentially quite high. My short list of knowledge requirements before committing involves the climbing difficulty, my partner’s capability, the approach, camping options, rock quality, glacial travel, avalanche danger, weather, equipment, navigation, possible descent options, approximate time estimates, exposure level, food & water supplies, first aid and emergency procedures. As with everything in life, there is absolutely an inherent risk in mountaineering that cannot be fully eliminated and must be accepted. With age I have become more cautious, I need to check more boxes before I take my first step, and sometimes this does stop me from ever trying.

I have been paralyzed by choice before, I have a tendency to overthink some things and as I havee older I seem to be getting more cautious. I am thankful to my wife who so often focuses on the why rather than the why not, and my coaching career for allowing me to change my perspective and discover new, more resourceful strategies.es.egies.gies.ies.es.s.that year, and I was the most experienced in the group. With the wrong mindset it would be so easy to list all the reasons why we shouldn’t go for it, after all there are so many factors outside of our control, what happens if I put in all that effort and then the weather turns bad? What if the glacier is impassable? What if the route is too exposed and I change my mind half way up? After all, it’s not only me that my decisions affect.

All of our concerns, questions and fears serve an important purpose – they help us to prepare and avoid unnecessarily dangerous situations. However, if we allow our concerns to paralyze us, we may end up unintentionally avoiding pleasure too. So if you’re like me and overthink all the outcomes, what’s the best way to take the first step?

Some people simply push their concerns aside, try to ignore them and force themselves to just do it, but I have to say in my years leading people in caves & on mountains this is not (in my opinion) the best approach. So what is?

I believe it is all to do with how you commit to the first step, what exactly do you think you are committing to? After researching the route I knew I wanted to climb Pigeon Spire one day, but the first step to action for me would be simply booking the hut and time off work. There were so many what if’s and I simply couldn’t know every outcome, what I did know was I wanted to try. I was not committing to making the summit, I had simply decided I would begin moving towards it, looking forward to learning on the way whilst remaining flexible in my plans and objectives. My commitment was to go to a new place, have an adventure with friends, and attempt to reach the summit if it feels right to do so. The summit is simply my inspiration, it is not the entire point (unintended pun) of the trip and I know there will be hurdles to cross en route.

As expected, not everything went to plan on this trip: my wife was part of the group but half way up the approach an emergency meant we had to take the 2hour hike and 3.5hour drive back home. I missed the first day and a half, had no way to contact the rest of the group, but decided to head back out alone to the hut and hopefully join them again. I had so many reasons to not head back up the mountain (and I very nearly decided not to!), but take a look at the video below and you will see I was so grateful I pushed on and got to share this amazing experience.

Turn thought into action! Top tips for taking the first step:

• Write down what you are thinking about (changing career for example)

• Recognize your inspiration and all the reasons you would like to change (I can see myself happier & more content in another job, plus have more time with my family). Stay with this process and make sure you see, feel and hear the vision that is attracting you to the idea of change.

• Appreciate your concerns are an important part of making the right decision (my current job is secure, I might earn less money, I will be letting my colleagues down by leaving) but reassure them that you will build options and exit strategies into your plan, and will listen when it is appropriate.

• Write down all of the consequences of not taking action. Where will you be in one, five, ten years if you do nothing? Make sure you think about the positives and the negatives of not changing, both in avoiding pain / risk and moving towards pleasure / success.

• Write down the outcomes of what life will be like in one, five, ten years if you have taken action. Not only what you have to gain, but what will you lose out on? Remember, if there was nothing to lose the change would be easy!

• After all of this, if your desire to change is greater than the desire to stay the same, ask yourself: “What is the very first step I can take to move towards my vision?”

You do not need to see the finish line to start a race, or the top of a mountain to start walking forward, you simply need a direction to move in. With the first step you are simply committing to moving, exploring, growing, and changing.

Thanks for reading, and enjoy the journey.

Jon Wichett