Go Back to 1st

My daughter is learning to drive a stick shift.  Remember that?  That hair-rising time while you’re learning to choreograph two feet and three pedals certain that you’re never going to get it. Experiencing the terror of stalling out on a hill with a line of cars behind you all in a hurry to get someplace.

The important thing about driving a stick is learning what to do when you stall out. Make no mistake about it.  Whether it’s in driving or in life, you will stall out.

It happens.  You’re hummin’ along, windows down, music crankin’, and wind blowing through your hair.  Then you hit a hill or an unexpected stop and you stall out.

Hoping the car starts on its own won’t work.  Wishing for a sprinkling of fairy dust to grant you NASCAR superpowers won’t help.  Slapping a “For Sale” sign on the window while you’re stalled on the side of the road probably won’t attract many buyers.  At some point you have to get back in gear and get where you were going.

No matter how much experience you have or where you are on the road when you stall out, the solution is the same.  Go back to 1^st gear.

Go back to 1^st.   I just love how the perfect lesson drops in my lap when I’m open to it — often from a surprising place.  “Go back to 1^st” was exactly the spark I needed to kick start me out of a deep summer stall.

We all have our own 1^st gear.  It’s the quality, practice or tool that you can rely on – in any situation – to get you out of a stall.

Curiosity is my 1^st gear.   Following whatever it is I’m curious about breaks the spell of inertia and gets me moving again. When I don my curiosity specs, the judgmental self-critic fades away.  I have more energy, creative juice and possibilities available.  Maintaining your sense of humor helps grease the gears.

So what do you do when you stall out?  What’s your 1^st gear?