Heavy Assignments

Junior year. English. Another dreaded reading assignment. You could feel the whole class groan silently as the title is unveiled—Beowulf. 

Beo-who?

It didn’t help that it came right on the heels of Jane Eyre; another book that rarely makes the list of “Most Popular Books for Teenage Boys.”

It felt like my English teacher was trying to prove to me that I didn’t like reading. Yet, there I was at night, my clip-on bedside reading light aglow, engrossed in some medieval fantasy featuring a knight on a quest to save civilization. Usually with a feisty dwarf in tow. 

I did like to read. I just didn’t want to read that.

The Gravity Problem

As adults, we do this to ourselves all the time. We pressure everything to be significant. When we want to change, we shoot for the biggest things. Our health. Our relationships. Our productivity. Things that matter.

And they do matter. But sometimes that’s the problem.

Because with importance comes gravity. Big changes come with high stakes, and high stakes make everything feel harder before you even start. It causes hesitation, procrastination, or even refusal to begin at all. 

If high stakes prevent you from getting going, after repeating the pattern a few times it feels personal. It’s not about the changes anymore. It’s about you. Your capacity. Your follow-through. Whether you’re someone who changes or someone who just thinks about it.

“I don’t like change” is a reasonable conclusion to draw. It’s just not the right one.

Built From the Bottom Up

The requirement for change to be significant is a trap. We convince ourselves that change has to matter. That it has to be the right thing, done the right way, or it doesn’t count. Because of this, we only attempt to change big things. But that isn’t how skills are built. Skills are built from the bottom up. Through drills and repetition. Through practice.

So what’s the skill behind change? 

Let’s look at what it asks of us: Being comfortable doing something different. Familiarity with being in unfamiliar territory. Accepting unknown outcomes. 

These are difficult skills to train on their own, especiallys during big, high-stakes changes. Suddenly you’re not just uncomfortable—but uncomfortable when it really matters. You’re expecting yourself to be at your best under the most challenging circumstances.  

Maybe you’re not bad at change, you just haven’t done enough drills.

Practice When it Doesn’t Matter

So how do you drill change? 

Like a basketball player standing at the free throw line in an empty gym, you practice shots—but you practice when it doesn’t matter if you miss.

In real life, this might mean you try brushing your teeth with the opposite hand. Open Spotify and find a song in a genre you know nothing about. Listen to it intently. Learn a sentence in a foreign language. Find someone who speaks that language and try the sentence on them. Make a dinner you have no business attempting. Japanese puffer fish, anyone?

None of these challenges are significant. And that’s the point. If you fail? So be it. It isn’t about taking a step toward a goal or achieving anything. They’re just reps. Opportunities to get comfortable doing something different. That’s the skill. 

Any Book Counts

If I think back to what my bookshelf at home looked like in my teens, there wasn’t a literary classic to be found. Instead, it was books full of adventure, zany stories, and silliness. I wasn’t in it for the growth, I was there for entertainment. I didn’t know then that the same muscle I was building with those adventure books would serve me later in life when I wanted to tackle something more substantive. 

Turns out reading books, any books, simply makes you a better reader.

As always, thanks for reading. I’m truly happy you’re here. 

All the best,

Nate