Ep #7: Hero’s Journey Series 4 of 11: Crossing the Threshold

Hello, my friends. I am excited to talk to you today about this next topic, because it’s all about walking through the damn door. And we have to do this multiple times in our lives, walk through the damn door, and mustering up the courage to take that first step out the door of our comfy house of where our brain feels safe and we know things are secure. And things are every day and there’s a routine and it’s predictable, and shaking that up and deciding after we’ve already seen in our previous steps, knowing that there’s an adventure out there waiting for us–that there’s a call to adventure, we want to go towards it.

But taking that first step can be so hard. It can be paralyzing and this can crop up in our lives, in our professional lives—crossing thresholds—and it pops up in our personal lives as well. Going on new adventures and getting started, sometimes that can be the hardest part. But I’m going to help you learn today why taking that first step, crossing the threshold, is so important to you being able to become the person that you want to in different areas of your life. And so many people don’t do it but I’m going to help you because I’m going to give you two easy questions to remember that you can ask yourself and do a self-audit, to know whether it’s a threshold that you want to walk through or not.

This is something that our students have found very helpful. You walk through these two questions. If the answer to them is that you do want to, gosh, to cross the threshold, then you do it. And I’ll get to that in just a moment but first, let’s talk a little bit about what the threshold is, and why crossing it is important. So it’s literally like I said: crossing the threshold. Think of you being in your house, your apartment, your condo, you know, it’s safe, you know the terrain, you know everything and when you take that first step out the door, anything can happen. And when you’re going on a new adventure, when you’ve heard the call to adventure, and you’re thinking about becoming a new person in a different way, whether that’s personally or professionally, of course, it’s going to be a bit scary. Sometimes it might be extremely scary. And here’s the thing: we don’t always get to choose to cross the threshold. If anybody’s like me and it’s ever been fired from a job, then you know that sometimes you’re pushed through a threshold and you’re just going to have to go on the adventure, whether you want it to or not. Because I don’t think your access card works to get into the building anymore.

So there are times where we’re pushed through a threshold, and when we choose to go on adventure through a threshold as well in our lives, and that can be really risky, and it can feel overwhelming. In fact, that’s what my brain starts to do a lot of times is it starts to immediately go towards starting to solution, like, and seeing how just how big this journey might be. And I’ve had that happen to me and my life with crossing the threshold in my personal life. For instance, lately, I have been on my own track for specifically growing my friend group. And as a 45 year old man, it’s a dad, and a business owner, that I haven’t made all the time that maybe I feel I should have in order to cultivate and maintain the friendships that I have. And so one of the things I’m purposefully doing this year is I am trying to actively become a better friend, not only to the people that are already in my friend group, but asking new people to be friends. And I gotta tell you, it’s harder when you’re an adult. I’m finding that some of those same feelings, though, that I had when I was a kid about hoping that someone might want to be my friend when I see someone—“That is a really cool guy and I want to have more male friendships in my life,” and so I’m pursuing that, specifically, going and asking that person if they want to hang out. And if they, you know, asking them about themselves and putting yourself out there that is crossing a threshold, that is putting yourself out of your comfort zone in order to become a future version of yourself that you would like. I would like to be this person that has more friends, and that specifically is a good friend, and cultivate more male friendships.

But I there’s risk involved. I have to cross a threshold in order to go on that adventure and to get the result that I want. So that’s just one small example of something that in your personal life, you might be crossing a threshold for, but moving from the familiar from the comfortable, even if you don’t like the situation, can be hard. But crossing that threshold is worth it.

Now, professionally, I already hinted at before, like, lots of us have been fired in our lives at some point, and you’re pushed through a threshold but you might also be just be looking at starting your own business, or going after a new opportunity if you’re an entrepreneur or growing a new line of business, or making a career move. Maybe there’s a really attractive job that has been offered at your organization at the company you work for and maybe it’s a level or two above the one that you have right now. And what do we automatically start to do to ourselves? And that I’ve seen my clients do as well, you, you start to think of all the reasons your brain, your lizard brain, as we like to call, it starts to think of all the reasons how this could not work out, all the reasons why crossing the threshold might be a bad idea, because there’s risk involved.

Maybe my colleagues will think we’ll find out that I’m applying for this job and they’ll think that I’m underqualified. Maybe my boss will find my current boss, we’ll find out that I’m applying for a job on another team and maybe they’ll get mad. Maybe my friends will feel a certain way if I make this career move, because it’s not what I’m doing currently…there’s all kinds of things and reasons that your brain will come up with in order to keep you safe, to keep you behind the threshold in the land of safety in the ordinary world, as we call it. But if you want to go on to your adventure, there’s going to be that time when you need to take that first step. And your brain is doing its job! It’s telling you all the reasons and cataloging all the things that could go wrong, but it’s not a reason to not go on the adventure. And if you want to get the end result, if you want to get to the new version of yourself, crossing the threshold and taking that first weary step is something that you’re going to need to do.

And once you do it–that once you get on the path, it gets easier and easier to take the next step and do the next thing and the next thing. And so I was gonna give you two questions, and here are the two questions that I would recommend that you ask yourself in order to really know if you want to cross the threshold, and to stop your brain from constantly spinning on those things that might it might be thinking of with your lizard brain. So those two questions are these. They’re very simple and if you answer them and honestly for yourself, then you will know the answer whether or not you want to take the step or not. It doesn’t mean it’s not going to still be scary to a degree. That’s okay, that’s natural, it’s fine and you will overcome that. But these things can really help you.

So number one, ask yourself, “What is the worst that could happen?” I know, right? You didn’t expect me to say that but really, what is the worst that could happen? I want you to meticulously think out, use that lizard brain to your advantage and think of the worst case scenario. “I am going to cross the room and I am going to ask this person who I think is really cool, if they would like to go get a coffee, because I think that I’d like to attempt to get to know this person better and make them my friend and become friends with them” so what is the worst-case to happen? The worst thing that can happen is I walk across the room and I smile awkwardly and my handshake is not that great, it’s like you know kind of a limp fish handshake, I do it wrong, or maybe we match up wrong and it’s a little bit awkward. And then I stutter a little bit while I ask if you know what their name is or if they have some time, maybe they’d like to go get some coffee or something and maybe they think I’m actually hitting on them and then that’s super awkward and then they they hedge and they say no, and I feel really embarrassed. And then I awkwardly exit the conversation, they walk back across the room and I feel embarrassed probably for probably five minutes. Then, and then I feel embarrassed a little bit in the car later on the drive home and then I probably will replay it in my brain when I’m going to sleep that night and feel a little bit embarrassed about that.

So that’s worst-case scenario. if I put myself out there, if I do my own small crossing of a threshold out of my comfort zone in order to make a new friend or to attempt to get to know somebody better, that is the worst case scenario. Do I think that I will live if that happens? Yes, I think that I probably won’t die. I won’t like it. it’ll be uncomfortable, but if that’s the worst-case scenario, I think that I’m ready for question number two. I’ve thought through everything bad that can happen so lizard brain can be cool. I’m like, I’m green with my lizard brain right now. That could happen, that could absolutely happen, but let’s go into question number two: Would the person I want to become let this stop them from starting from doing this thing that gets me across the threshold, from walking across the room and introducing myself? Would the person I want to become in the future—my future self, would they stop and not do this? Would they let this stop them?

If the answer is no, and really, you can sit with it for a moment, think of that future self, where you’ve successfully walked across and you’ve talked to that person, and they’re a friend with that future version of you tell you that you’re being silly and that you’d maybe should go ahead and take it, take a step and try it out. And that maybe this person, maybe it will go horribly wrong but that person later on, after this introduction doesn’t go well, that you will do it a couple more times and you will find the person by doing this. The first time crossing this first threshold, you will start to build up that risk tolerance to the point where you do make a friend.

So does your future self-find that important? If the answer is yes, then I think by answering these two questions, you’re going to be able to overcome any fear any hesitation you have and cross that first threshold.

So there you go, that’s it. Those are the two questions, number one, what is the worst that could happen? And think through every single thing that could go wrong. I really mean it. Really go there, think of all the awkward, weird things that you might think, or that you might feel. Think through those feelings that you might feel. You might even start to feel them a little bit.

Okay and then number two: would the future self with the person that you want to become let this stop them? That worst case scenario: would they let that stop them from going ahead and doing it anyway, even if that happens? If you’re able to answer both of those questions, truthfully, and you still want to do it, then you should do it.

That’s the crossing of the threshold. And this can be applied professionally and it can be applied to your personal life as well, but if we don’t start on a journey, even if it’s going to be a long winding journey, if we don’t start out the front door and cross that threshold, we never get to where we want to go. Sometimes you might be pushed. You might find yourself in a situation on a Tuesday that you did not think that you’re going to be in and you are on a new adventure now. My friend, but you can deal with it, you can do hard things. And starting on a new adventure is always going to be a little bit scary. Sometimes it’s going to be terrifying. But that future version of yourself is on the other side and I can’t wait for you to meet that person.

All right. Talk to you next time, my friends. Have a good week.