Overcoming Obstacles – Take the First Step

I hope you all are ready to overcome some obstacles with me!  Last week we talked about overcoming obstacles and I shared some of the biggest obstacles that we are facing as a family right now with going green.  Now it’s time to tackle our obstacles head on!

I don’t know about you, but I am the kind of person that can get easily overwhelmed.  If I look at something as a whole, thinking about how much time and energy it will take, it often is enough to make me too overwhelmed so I just walk away.  That’s why I am a big fan of baby steps, and why I use small changes to lead to bigger overall change in my life.

But, even in order to take baby steps, you still have to take the first step.

I want to encourage you to take 5 or 10 minutest (at the most!) today thinking about the first step that you can take to overcome an obstacle in your life.

Not a huge step, not tackling everything all at once, just a small, first step.  It could be an easy step, or it could be a little more challenging step, but at least it’s a step forward, in the right direction, toward change.  That’s what matters.

Write down the first step and put it on your fridge or on your daily planner. And then, by then end of the day today, act on that first step.  You don’t have to complete the first step, if you do – awesome, but mostly, you just have to act on it.

Newton’s Law of Motion states that a body at rest will stay at rest unless acted on by an outside force.  This first step is the outside force needed to act upon ourselves and force us into motion.  And once in motion, it often seems that momentum will take over and we will stay in motion – we will keep moving toward our goal.

For me, my first step is going to be about reducing my water usage. So, I will not pour myself a glass of water at night before bed anymore.  I will drink water at the sink, pouring only what I need, and if I have any left over I will use it to water my indoor houseplants.  Also, I talked to Jer about getting a low-flow shower head, and we will work on that next week.

What is your first step going to be today, or this coming week?

Photo by Lachlan Hardy