What I’ve Learned In One Minute…

Hi Friends,

It was a Monday morning and I had just done the burpees part of my morning routine, and when I finished I stood there and realised something had changed. Ten weeks ago, when I started this morning routine at the beginning of the year, I dreaded that part. I would slow down before them, negotiate with myself, wonder if I could swap them for something else. On Monday I did not think about any of that. I just knew I had to get to twenty and I did.

That small moment kept coming back to me for the rest of the day.

What Was Actually Different

It was not that I had grown to love burpees. And it was not that I had pushed through some wall of discipline. The difference, as far as I can tell, was that I had stopped "feeling" about them. I knew the start point. I knew the end point. I knew what had to happen in between and emotion had no job to do.

That got me thinking about why some things feel so much harder to stay consistent with. When I am working towards something where the outcome is uncertain, where I cannot draw a clear line between the effort and the result, feeling starts doing the work that clarity should be doing. I second-guess the method. I wonder if what I am doing is even right. I change approaches not because the evidence says to, but because emotionally I need to feel like something is working. And in that constant shifting, nothing actually gets the chance to.

The Love and Hate of It

I used to think love and hate were opposite responses to a task. That if you loved something you would show up for it, and if you hated it you would not. But they both seem to lead to the same place. When you love something deeply, especially something new and unproven, you wait for the right conditions. You tell yourself you will start when you are ready, when the moment is right. And when you hate something, or dread it, you delay for completely different reasons but you still delay. The outcome is the same. Nothing gets done.

Both are emotional responses to uncertainty. And both cause inaction.

The Faith Bit I Did Not Expect to Connect

This showed up somewhere I was not expecting. In my faith, there are times when I find myself waiting to feel God before I act. Waiting for a sense of confirmation, some feeling of closeness, a signal that I am moving in the right direction. And when I do not feel it, I have sometimes interpreted that as meaning something is wrong. That I am not connected enough, not doing the right things. And so I pause, or I second-guess, or I start wondering if I should be doing something differently.

But that is the same trap. Letting the presence or absence of feeling determine whether I move. Faith, at its core, is movement without certainty. It is showing up even when you cannot feel the ground beneath you. The burpees, of all things, reminded me something about that.

What Indifference Actually Means

I want to be careful here because indifference sounds cold. I do not mean not caring. I mean not being governed by the emotional state of the moment. There is a version of showing up that is not motivated by how you feel about the task, not fuelled by passion and not dragged down by resistance. Just movement. Quiet, consistent movement.

I am still figuring out how to hold that in the areas of my life where the endpoint is not as clear as twenty burpees. Where the outcome is uncertain and the method is unproven. That uncertainty is where emotion rushes in and fills the space. And I do not have a clean answer for it yet.

I just noticed, on a Monday morning, that the burpees got easier when I stopped asking how I felt about them.​

TL;DR

Love and hate are the same side of failure.

QUICK HACK

The If/Then Method

Before starting something new or something you know will test you emotionally, write down the specific moments where you are likely to lose the plot. Then decide in advance how you will respond. If I feel overwhelmed and cannot think, I will go on a walk without music. Simple, decided before the emotion arrives, so you are not making the call in the middle of the storm. It works especially well if you tend to overthink or get led by how you feel in the moment.

WINS & LESSONS

Wins

1. I got a haircut. Long overdue and genuinely needed.
2. I have been learning how to appreciate doing less, and I have started going back to old essays I have written when I am not in the best place. There is something in that, using your past self as a guide when your present self is struggling. Sometimes looking back is how you move forward.

Lessons:

1. The oat milk you get actually counts. After trying about six different types in my coffee, my current recommendations are MOMA and Oatly. That is genuinely all you need to know.
2. Writing this essay taught me something I did not expect. Not just about the topic but about myself, and how much I still let my emotions tell me whether I am on the right path or not. I am working on that.

QUESTION FOR YOUR THOUGHTS

When was the last time you let how you felt about something determine whether you showed up for it, and looking back, was the feeling actually telling you the truth?

Alright that's it from me.

In a bit,

Motheo