Been thinking about this lately and wanted to share in case it helps anyone here...
so for the longest time i was consuming everything. podcasts, courses, mentorship calls, books... learning constantly. but my actual business results? barely moved for several years, just stayed stagnated.
took me way too long to realize i was treating an internal problem like an external one.
heres what i mean...
theres basically two types of stuck. i call them BOULDERS and FOG.
boulders are external obstacles. real barriers. you push harder, you get results. more effort = more progress.
fog is internal. limiting beliefs, fear, mindset stuff. and heres the thing... you cant push through fog. pushing harder just exhausts you.
the trap most of us fall into is we keep adding more tactics, more strategies, more hours when the actual problem is we cant see clearly
the symptom that tells you its fog? effort isnt producing proportional results. youre working 60+ hours but people with seemingly less effort are getting better outcomes. thats usually a sign.
for me it was the belief that i was "smaller" than I am - long story short, I grew up in a third world country run by a dictator for 24 years, couple with an overly critical and punitive father, and that gave me a shame-based self identity of smallness for a very long time. I wasnt even aware it was running my decisions until i really looked at it
once i spotted that the issue wasnt more information or better tactics but something i couldnt see because i was IN it... everything shifted
what actually helped:
stopped and asked is this fog or boulder? if effort isnt working its probably fog
got external perspective. others can see what you cant see when youre inside the fog. this community is good for that tbh
traced the belief back. where did i first learn this? usually childhood. does that source deserve to run my business decisions today? usually no lol
gave myself permission to try the easier path. sounds dumb but some of us literally cant let ourselves succeed without suffering first
the revenue growth i got in 6 months after this was more than the previous 3 years combined. same skills same market. different internal operating system
curious if anyone else has experienced this kind of shift? where you realized the thing blocking you wasnt a strategy problem at all?