My 14-year-old son Jaxton — Jax to everyone outside the family — is starting high school in less than two weeks, and he's also playing tackle football for the first time in his life.
The good news is he looks the part. He's 6'2" and weighs 205 pounds. He's bigger than some of the Seniors on the field who are almost four years older than him.
But this football season hasn't come without anxiety, as he's already a highly anxious kid. Now add starting high school, a new school, and a new sport with coaches and kids he hasn't met. It's a lot.
Football was his idea. He came home in the spring and said, "I think I want to play football." So when summer practice started, his nerves set in hard. He couldn't even eat lunch before his first day. His second day, he started the "I don't feel good" routine in the morning, and by his third day he was wondering if all of this was for him.
But something stood out to me each day I picked him up from practice. He walked out of the locker room with a smile on his face, a hop in his step, and a little more confidence each and every day. The coach told him how impressed he was with his strength and how much he'd improved since he first showed up to summer workouts in June.
Jaxton went from nervous enough to vomit to full confidence in just a matter of days, and it wasn't because he started doing anything different. It's simply because he started. He showed up. He made the effort. He put himself out there.
You already know where I'm going with this. Are you doing this today, or are you shying away from the opportunities? We all have options when it comes to the things that stretch and develop us. We all have options when it comes to the business ideas we want to launch or the goals we have in our careers, but they all require showing up, putting ourselves out there, and being willing to be uncomfortable along the way.
Jax wanted to quit after day one. Why wouldn't he? It was hard, it was new, it was borderline scary for an already highly anxious kid. But he kept going. If you quit before you even get a chance to prove if it is right for you, you'll never get there.
It's hard to do something new. It's hard to put yourself in a position of discomfort. But when we do it, we not only achieve, but we learn about ourselves. You can't achieve, you can't learn about yourself, and you can't fulfill the goals you were meant to fulfill if you never get over that barrier of fear.
At the end of the day, the only way through fear is forward. Confidence does not show up before you start — it shows up because you start. So whatever your football field looks like right now, stop waiting to feel ready. Get out there, take the hit, stumble through the first reps, and trust that every step you take in discomfort is one step closer to the version of yourself you are meant to become.