I got an email the other day in response to the “Becoming A Warrior” episode of the podcast (episode 457).
If you’d rather listen to this blog than read it, please click play. Otherwise, keep reading below.
Here’s part of what the email had to say:
Elizabeth,
I enjoyed your podcast about being a warrior. I want to be a warrior, but it’s so much easier to be a victim.
I get it. I understand. You know what it made me think of? The most random thing ever…
Learning to type. Did you have typing class in school?
Prior to this class, I used the computer regularly. Sure, I hadn’t been taught to type, but, I’d hunt and peck on the keyboard with reasonable efficiency.
Learning to type “the right way” felt so hard – much harder than continuing to do it my way. As I went through the drills in class I remember saying things like, “This is slower! It’s harder! I can go faster my way!”
Initially, doing things correctly was both slower and more difficult. It took more focus and energy. It felt hard.
But that’s the wrong comparison.
These days, I realize how painfully slow it is to hunt and peck. If someone at the post office or store is using “hunt and peck” to enter my information, I always wish I could take the keyboard from them and do it myself. It’s infinitely faster to type properly. It’s infinitely easier to type properly.
But, I had to put in the practice and the work to get to that point. And that’s really the only true, honest comparison.
You have to put in effort and practice to get to that new level of efficiency and ease.
I have lived as a victim, giving in to every temptation, overeating and breaking promises to myself. It was awful. It was a hard, unhappy life. It certainly wasn’t easier than the way I work to live now.
I’ve also made many gradual improvements over years of effort. The change was, at times, a lot harder than saying “yes” to a cupcake. But, even then, it wasn’t harder than being depressed and hopeless.
It is infinitely easier to go through life and make great food choices when I’m not chronically hungry and when I’m not facing overwhelming cravings.
It’s infinitely easier to go through life making choices that make me feel amazing than making choices that make me feel awful.
But to be able to get to that place, just like with my typing class, you have to do the work. You have to put in the practice, even and especially when it feels harder and uncomfortable.
That’s the only way to ease.
If something feels hard, it means you need to practice more. Practice makes things easier, not quitting.
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