We’ve All Forgotten One Powerful Truth, And it’s Holding Us Back

Have you ever dreamed of being good at something, but you just aren’t? You walk through a museum and think “I wish I could paint.” You walk into a friend’s perfect home and think, “I wish I was good at organizing and decorating.” You see someone’s flourishing garden and think, “I wish I was good with plants.” But, alas, you aren’t. So you just admire, or envy, what someone else can do from a distance.

But what if you could learn to paint, organize and decorate your home, raise a bountiful garden? What if you can master new skills? Even things you used to be bad at?

There is a very important belief, a glowing, guiding light inside of us, that we all had as kids but slowly forgot or rejected as we grew up…

We can learn new things.

I know, it sounds too simple. And most of us don’t realize we have rejected this thought. But when we forget this, we make our world very small. We close ourselves out from a world of possibilities.

But First, A Disclaimer

This is not to say we can become a true master at everything. But I believe we can master, or at least become competent, in a lot more than we think. This is also not to say it’s always bad to say you’re not good at something, or to admire the abilities of others. The point here is to challenge the way we allow ourselves to to believe we are not and cannot do so many things. It makes our lives and opportunities so much smaller and less colorful than they have the potential to be.

Something is Wrong With Me

I believe there is a catalyst that helps us reject and forget that we can learn new things. This catalyst primes our mind to reject learning new things. It is the belief that something is wrong with us. Everyone else has something magical that lets them do that, but whatever it is we don’t have it. In other words, we can’t learn ABC because we’re not XYZ.

• I could never paint, I’m not creative.
• I could never have a pretty home, I’m too messy and I’m bad at interior design.
• I could never have a beautiful garden, I have a brown thumb, I’m a plant killer.

Typically, when we’re not good at something right away, we assume we’re just not made to do that thing. Instead of leaning in to the opportunity to learn and grow as a person, we accept that we are the way we are and can’t change. We cast aside the thought of ever being good at or understanding whatever it is. At some point, we reach a peak in our development where we’ve tried many things and anything we weren’t good at, we’ve decided we won’t be good at for life.

But what if we could do more? What if we aren’t stuck with whatever we have? What if we could grow and live in a bigger world than we have pigeon-holed ourselves into?

Why We Do It & What We’re Missing

It’s extremely tempting to fall into this pattern of thinking. Why? It’s the same reason we fall into the majority of psychologically unhealthy habits: the unreliable promise of protection.

This habit claims to protect our tender ego. It’s safer and easier to find our lane and stay in it for life, forever doing the few things we happened to be good at right off the bat. Don’t stray, changing lanes is dangerous.

But why do we think we’re safer this way?

#1: No one can make fun of us.

The Fear: If I’ve adamantly stated how not good I am at something and regularly make self-deprecating jokes, no one else can put me down. (Because I’ve already put myself down.)

The Reality: Criticism is damaging, no matter who it comes from. Criticizing myself for being bad at something still hurts me.

#2: We can’t fail.

The Fear: I hate feeling like I failed. I hate trying something new and seeing it crumble at my feet. If I don’t try new things, I don’t have to see the results of my failure.

The Reality: Failure is healthy. Not only for my ego, but because I learn what to do by learning what not to do. Failure doesn’t actually hurt me like I fear it does.

#3: We can stick to the status quo.

The Fear: Everyone else stays in their lane and does their one thing. I don’t want to be uncomfortable, stand out, and go out of my way to do something different. I’ll just stick to the stuff I know. (No, of course there’s no Disney musical reference hidden in there…)

The Reality: If I’m always following everyone else, am I really living my own life? Do I like what I’m doing or do I just do it because everyone else is? Maybe I’m missing out on some great opportunities and exciting experiences.

#4: It’s too much effort with no real promise of reward.

The Fear: Why would I learn to ABC? I have to put in so much time learning how, when I don’t even know if I will be good at it, if I will like it, or if it will be of any use to me. What’s the point?

The Reality: No matter what happens, I learn something. I learn what comes easier to me and what I need to spend more time learning. My reward is either the fruit of my efforts (I succeed at what I tried to learn and receive the result) or the knowledge I gain (what I try doesn’t work but I learn how to for the future)

The Good News

Remember that guiding light we had as children? The idea that we could learn new things? Even more so, we knew this deeper truth:

We can be bad at something and still learn and grow to be good at it.

The reality is, with minor exceptions, we’re always bad at something before we’re good at it.

• We fall maybe a hundred times before we learned to stand
• We learn to drive in parking lots for safety before hitting the highway
• We would drown while learning to swim if not for someone beside us to catch us

And we think nothing of being bad at these things before being good. So why is it that we…

• Try raising one plant, or even five, and when they die declare we can’t raise plants?
• Try painting, and when the results are always a messy indistinguishable blob, say we can’t paint?
• Try styling our hair a few times, and when it becomes a tangled disaster, say we aren’t good with hair?
• Try baking a few fancy desserts, and when it comes out flat instead of fluffy, declare we can’t bake?

The second set of examples are conceptually the same as the first. But we treat them differently. We allow ourselves to fail and get back up again and again with the first because we are younger and accept the process of failing before learning, they are necessary skills, and we have others beside us guiding us as we fall. The second set are activities we often try when we’re older and have lost that guiding light, we’ve learned it’s easier to quit and stay in our safe lane than fail one hundred times before we succeed.

Yes, You Can

Hold onto that guiding light. Remember what you once accepted without hesitation. That you can learn new things. Lean into that cake that fell in the middle and ask: what can I do differently to fix this problem next time? Practice patience, and don’t rush through new things you don’t understand yet. In other words:

Take the pressure off. You can fail and get back up again. You can go farther than you think.

Remember how many times it takes a baby to fall before it stands? Not once, twice, or three times. So, give whatever you’re learning more than a few tries. You may not become an expert, even after a dozen attempts. But if you do this, it’s impossible to not learn and grow. And your life will be colorful, your mind stronger, and your world open.