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One of the things I like most about writing a personal development blog is I get to write about new tips and tricks I’ve found. Part of the fun is finding nuggets of advice from the things around me from friends to movies and everything in between. Then I get to write them down, not only for myself but, to share with anyone interested in reading what I have to say. Every time I find something to write about I find several other follow up posts as well.
I’m not just taking things I’ve found, repackaging the content, and turning it into a post but I try my advice. This has led to some interesting little experiments and new things I enjoy doing. Wim Hof’s breathing practice, meditation, and journaling are a few things I enjoy doing.
The problem with personal development is it can be overwhelming. There’s always something new to do, new to try, and a new variation on an old idea. There are so many people out there trying to help it’s easy to feel overloaded. I know for me, the more I read, the more I want to implement all at once, and the more I fail. Working on two-week experiments are great, in theory, but it can be difficult to implement in real life, especially when there’s so much to try.
As anyone who’s tried making a New Year’s Resolution, the easy part is starting, but once the real work begins it’s easy overwhelmed, disappointed, and quit. Initially, we are riding high and are untouchable. Soon we hit a speed bump and we start to wobble. After experiencing this amazing high from our life changing idea, we feel the depressive low from the wobble. Few speed bumps later, and we throw in the towel because we “can’t” do it.
What happened? How did we go from “I’m on top of the world to my life sucks” and “I’ll never accomplish anything?” We’ve landed in the “Trough of Sorrow.”
“What is this fancy, nonsense term you’re using this time, Joe?” The trough of sorrow is a term coined by Y Combinator founder Paul Graham, and his partners, to explain the point in a start-up’s life cycle where the “new car smell” wears off and the real work begins. As seen in the diagram, first start-up founders get excited about how they will change the world. Then the novelty dies off and all they are left is the grind of making it work. Sometimes a start-up can spend years in the trough waiting to see if their idea will work. This is where most start-ups either persevere, pivot from their original idea, or quit completely.
The trough of sorrow is what we experience when life gets in the way of our personal development goals. We miss a day or two working on our new habit or skill and we start to spiral. Soon a day turns into a week, turns into a month, and turns into forever. We’ve failed so we must be failures, right?
This has been the issue I’ve had the last several months. I’ve started and quit several habit changes and projects in the last several months. Every time I try to start something new life gets in the way, I hit a few speed bumps, and I give up. When I hit the trough of sorrow, I tend to hit it HARD. I try to take on too much all at once and wind up sucking at everything until I give up and feel like a failure. Not the good kind where I learn from my experiences but the bad one who throws himself a pity party.
Most days, all I really want to do is hide under my desk or go full Emo, crying alone in the corner of a dark room. I feel sorry for myself because my expectations are not matching up with reality. I suck and there’s nothing I can do about it.
This is why I wanted to write this post. I want to show I still have a long way to go in my personal development journey and I’m writing these posts to help me as much as I want to help others. Somethings I need to remind myself I am doing a good job, my feelings are normal, and I’m not the only one going through this situation. Here are some things I plan on using to help get me out of the trough of sorrow:
Dealing with the Trough of Sorrow
Concentrating on our Emotions:
Many times, we feel like we are the only ones who are failing horribly. We see friends and influencers on social media showing us their perfect little lives and it’s easy to ask ourselves, “what’s wrong with me?” The thing is we all go through the trough of sorrow. Everyone has their low points.
We need to remember change is difficult. It is were easy everyone would be doing it all the time. We are going to fail time and time again. It’s okay to fail, especially if we are willing to learn from our mistakes.
Steve Kamb of Nerd Fitness has a great article on starting over or, as he calls it, respawning. In it he suggests three steps to help us get closer to success when we decided to try something again.
- Separate yourself form the Old You: Every time we start over we do it as a new person. It doesn’t matter what happened yesterday. It’s in the past. We can take what we’ve learned and put it towards making today a success. Today is a new day, we are new people, and we can do it
- Capitalize on Momentum: Every time we start over we are filled with excitement and passion. We need to take this time to make plans and changes we will be forced to continue when we hit the trough.
- Fail Differently: Now, we might not succeed in this attempt either but that’s okay. By doing things a little differently, this time, we will fail differently. This means we will learn more, which we can use for the next time we try again. The more we try, the more we learn, and the more likely we are to achieve our goals.
Working through our Problems:
Once the initial excitement of starting something new and we get to the trough it’s easy to get frustrated. It’s helpful to take some time here for introspection. We should ask ourselves why are we failing? What are the issues we are encountering? What is triggering our regression? Looking into why we are having issues allows us to plan around them.
A lack of or poor planning is another reason many of us stumble. Initially we get excited and dove right in. We knew what we want our end result to be, but we haven’t made a plan to get there. Since there’s isn’t a plan, we bail. When planning to start our new habit, skill, or project it’s important to think of these three things:
- Keep it simple: Figure out the bare minimum we can do and still be successful
- Celebrate Small Wins: Build small wins into the plan and celebrate them.
- Build a Team: It’s important for us to have a team to help keep us accountable. Family, friends, co-workers, hire a coach, or find someone off the street. Anyone who will help us to keep going.
We must Perseverance:
When we start something new it’s easy to feel like we can take on the world. “Ain’t nobody gonna break my stride, ain’t nobody gonna slow me down. I’ve got to keep on movin’!” Then the resistance realizes we want to change the status quo and it freaks out. The resistance pushes us head first into the trough.
The resistance doesn’t want us to grow. It doesn’t want us to change. It tries to trick us into thinking we “can’t” do it and won’t make it. It knows one of our basic instincts when things get tough is to run away. In fact, it’s counting on it.
It’s not that we don’t want to change but it’s easy to feel “it’s not the right time.” Maybe I’ll let things in my life die down and start again. The problem is life rarely slows down and something always gets in the way. As cliché as it might sound, unfortunately, perseverance is the only way to get through the trough.
The thing to remember, no matter how many times we quit, start over, or try something new it will always be difficult. The trough of sorrow isn’t a unique or special circumstance. Being extremely passionate about a project, skill, or habit change doesn’t mean we will skip out on the struggles. The struggle will always be real, and we will need to deal with it, eventually. If we want to make real, lasting change we need to persevere when times get tough.
I think the important things to remember are we are not alone, it’s okay to fail and start over, it’s important to have a plan and a support network or group, and the only way past the trough of sorrow is through it. It’s never easy and we are going to stumble many times along the way. As long as we pick ourselves up and try again we will eventually make things happen.
Chen, Andrew. “After the Techcrunch bump: Life in the ‘Trough of Sorrow’”.
