Waiting for Approval…
It’s late at night and I’m refreshing my gmail to see if my daughter Sky’s passport application status has been approved. I check every day. We have a trip planned to visit my family’s cabin in Canada after missing 2 years due to COVID. It’s my favorite place in the WORLD, and I’ve missed it so much. I wasn’t able to apply for her passport right after birth due to a problem with her birth certificate, it took a week and a half to get a callback to correct the error. I didn’t know at the time that you could just bring it to a Vital Records Office to get it corrected.
We have a trip planned in June, and with expedited service, there was just barely enough time to get her passport. At this time it’s still listed as “In Process,” which means it may not arrive in time. So I’m obsessively hitting refresh on my email, hoping to see that it’s new status will be “Approved.” I realize that this is a very 1st world problem, and that we are very fortunate to be able to travel. But it has me thinking, how often are we waiting for approval to do something?
Feeling Prepared For A Task or Job
There is something called the Confidence-Competence Dichotomy, that comes from the book “The Confidence Code: The Science and Art of Self-Assurance” by Katty Kay & Claire Shipman. In the book, the authors reference studies that show the confidence gap is most prevalent in women; that men “consistently overestimate” their abilities, and that women “routinely underestimate” their abilities. This is despite the fact that the performance of men and women is the same.
What this amounts to, is that men say “yes” when asked to complete a task, or do a job, or lead something (even when they feel like they don’t know much about that particular topic or job); and often when presented with the same opportunity, a woman would say “no” unless she felt much more competent to complete that particular task than the man felt.
For example; this is on a small scale, but I think it will demonstrate the point. I was asked to teach Bunny Yoga a couple of years ago. At first, I felt that I should say no. Although I had taught yoga consistently and often for 6 years by the time I was asked this question, my first thoughts were similar to the following… “I should probably say no, I haven’t ever taught yoga with animals, I’m not sure I know how to lead that type of class.” “Adults and kids of all ages attend bunny yoga, I haven’t ever taught those age groups in the same class, I’m not sure I know what difficultly of class to teach.” Etc. Versus a man presented with the same question, with the same experience (and possibly much less experience - as their confidence level is much higher when they have less experience) would just say “Yes.” And he would figure out how to make it work. Hopefully this clarifies how this dichotomy works.
Bunny Yoga at Eden Prairie Community Center
I knew about this phenomenon at the time, so I said yes to teaching Bunny Yoga (even though I didn’t feel confident I could do it), and it went great! Of course I imagine men also wait for approval for certain things, and also sometimes say no when they could say yes. It’s just more common for women to do this than men.
How Often Do We Hold Ourselves Back by Waiting for Approval or to Feel Confident Enough to Say Yes?
Obviously you can’t just cross a border or travel to another country if your passport doesn’t get approved in time. However, surely there are other things in your life that you are waiting on because you don’t feel confident, or that you are up to it, or that you can rise to the challenge. Sometimes (or often!) we need to say “Yes” before we feel confident or ready. Many situations allow you to say yes to something, and then you have some time to prepare. With the example of bunny yoga, I was able to say yes and then I had a week before the class, to plan out what I would teach.
Because I’ve known about this tendency for a while, I push myself to say yes to things I don’t feel confident about almost all of the time. And it’s led to some amazing things, both in my career and also in my personal life.
Climbing a Telephone Pole, and Jumping Off to Catch a Trapeze
When You’re Terrified, and You Do It Anyways
That’s me in the picture above, wearing black, with my arms outstretched, standing on top of a telephone pole. At this moment, I was about to jump off the telephone pole to grab that trapeze bar out in front of me. Spoiler: I jumped, and indeed, I caught the trapeze bar. In the video, it looks like it was no problem for me. In fact, in the video, you can hear my team leader say “Easy!” Because it does in fact look very easy for me.
What you can’t see in the video, is that when they were announcing in our seminar (it was a Tony Robbins seminar on health & wealth), that we would be going outside to do this activity, (climb up a telephone pole, and jump off of it to grab the trapeze) I started shaking uncontrollably and was VERY scared. I absolutely DID NOT want to do this activity. My mom was with me at the seminar, sitting next to me, and she said something like “wow, you are very nervous right now.” I was shaking from the time they mentioned it until we started walking outside to do the activity. Which was probably at least 30 minutes after the announcement.
Now, you don’t HAVE TO do the activity, you can choose to opt out. However, the point of the activity, is that you can push through fear, and do something you didn’t imagine you can do. Of course, afterwards, you have a huge rush and feel amazing, which is also part of what they want you to experience.
My biggest fear is falling. I love heights, but I do not enjoy falling. I hate roller coasters, and I have NO INTEREST in doing activities like sky diving, or bungee jumping. That drop feeling you get… no thanks.
Even though I was terrified, I knew I wanted to push myself to at least try. I told myself, you can always get down at any point, just see how it goes. I stepped up to the telephone pole (by the way, when you’re standing underneath one, they are very tall! Something I hadn’t paid attention to until then). There were these little rungs on the poles; however, they were not large, so when you’re putting your feet on them, they don’t feel big enough. And when your hands are sweaty, they feel slippery. I took one step at a time, and did my best not to look down. When you get to the top, and you’re trying to climb on top of the pole, there are a couple challenges. (By the way, I’m getting sweaty and nervous just typing this).
First challenge: there is nothing above you to grab onto, to help pull you up. When you’re climbing up the pole, there is always another rung above you to grab, to help you ascent. But at the top, there is nothing above you other than air. You just have to rely on balance. It happened to be a windy day, and because you’re higher up, you feel the wind a lot. The poles weren’t super snug into the ground; at the top of the pole you can feel the pole swaying in the wind. Terrifying.
Second Challenge: The top of the pole isn’t wide enough for both of your feet to fit. I don’t have large feet - size 8 women’s. Only a portion of each foot fit on the top of the pole. About half of your foot is hanging off each side. Put all these elements together. A narrow standing area, your pole swaying in the wind, and nothing to hold onto. It’s not super comfortable hanging out on top of the pole.
Invariably, you end up looking down when you’re looking out to the trapeze, which is not right next to the pole. You have to jump out to reach it. Jump out, leave all inhibitions behind, and hope that you catch the bar. Of course, if you don’t catch the bar, you are hooked in and the line will catch you on the way down. However, I don’t like the drop feeling even to be caught by a line (I don’t like rock climbing for this reason), so I was very determined to catch the trapeze to avoid that feeling. It’s a long way down to the ground.
I didn’t want to think about it too long, so I just jumped… And I caught the trapeze! I was still a bit in shock when they lowered me down to the ground. The next few hours after, I felt amazing. Super energized and excited. Pumped up about the rest of the week at the seminar.
What Happens When You Just Go For It
Think about a time in your life when you’ve taken a chance or said yes when you didn’t feel confident or comfortable, and it worked out. Didn’t you feel on top of the world? Invigorating, right?!
Of course, not every chance you take works out and is a success, there are plenty of failures as well. Some of those failures are also excellent teachers though. One thing is for sure, if you don’t ever say yes or try something that makes you a little uncomfortable, you won’t grow and you’ll miss out on a lot of experiences. You can do more than you think you can (ladies especially!), so maybe take a chance, little or large, and see how it goes.
This isn’t to say that you don’t need to put in effort and preparation, and to work for what you want. All of those elements are key. It’s just that we don’t always need every single thing lined up for it to work out. Examples you can maybe relate to are getting married or having a baby. There is no perfect time, but usually you still figure it out!
Need a Little Assistance or Guidance?
If you’re feeling like you’d appreciate some help in this area or if you have a hard time prioritizing things and you want some guidance, contact me! I do health coaching, and the first 30 minute call is free! I’d love to talk to you!
If you need help in the healthcare arena, so that your body can work at it’s best, so you can overcome a health challenge, or to feel better/more vitalized than you do now, contact me! I have many tools in my chiropractic practice healthcare kit! Even if you just have a question, like “Can you help me or my pet with this?” Call me, let’s chat!
