When spring comes after long winter, people make resolutions and challenge as if they are waking up from hibernation. College students restart studying a foreign language or a course for a license to get closer to their dreams, and workers who are busy with tight schedules try to make time for self-improvement.
Even if they can’t keep their resolution more than three days, just the fact that they have made a plan and given it a try is meaningful. It is because quite often people don’t know what to do, and even if there is something they want to do, they can’t even conceive the idea of starting it, not knowing from where and how to start it.
Generation Maybe floats on the sea of uncertainty
‘What is my dream? Is there even anything I really want to do? What do I need to do now for my life?’
It is said people have at least one thing that they are good at and that they like, but quite many people are worried and confused, not knowing what they are good at and interested in. They compare themselves with those who live their busy lives fruitfully, and sigh with a sense of shame. They are unconfident, thinking, ‘Why am I like this, unlike all the others?’
Oliver Jeges, an Austrian journalist, calls today’s people who have this concern Generation Maybe1. They are called so because they always answer “Maybe” to every question, without confidence in themselves and in what they do.
1. Oliver Jeges explains that Generation Maybe indicates “young adults who are captivated with the idea that they don’t need to do anything, although they have a good education, a good relationship with other people, ability to speak different languages, and a global mind.”
A lot of TV shows say nothing is impossible, and numerous books on self-development shout, “You too can do it!” Despite that, people say, “Maybe.” Why is that?
One of the obstacles that impede making decisions and taking action is the fast change of society. The digital revolution, which started with the Internet propagation, has changed the global village into an online world within decades. This has provided a bigger diversity of jobs, but the durability of the jobs has dropped remarkably. In the situation where their future is unclear, it is hard for them to know what they need to do and what they want to do, and so they keep postponing making a decision and putting a decision into action. This is so-called indecisiveness.
Entertainment, of which the range has become larger beyond our imagination, incites indecisiveness even more. You can forget your concerns temporarily when focusing on thrilling sport games or on elaborate video games that look real. You can save movie or soap opera files on your computer and watch them whenever you have time; they are so many that you can never finish even if you watch them all your lives. So can you do with music files. On TV, hundreds of channels wait for viewers all day long. In the culture where provocative games develop, people feel like forgetting their concerns and postponing taking action.
Inner chains that catch up with action
Let’s suppose you have overcome the temptations of external environment and have decided to do what you want to do. Although you have made up your mind, everything won’t go the way you want. From the moment you take your first step forward, you feel uneasy about the mistakes you might make anytime, anywhere, and you face the fear of failure.
We can say that the external environment such as a fast-changing society and the variety of entertainment gave birth to Generation Maybe, and then their inner emotions such as anxiety and fear are the chains that hold them back. No one would like making a mistake or failing. Our vague resistance against mistake or failure is bigger than what we think. When you hear a person say about his hard time caused by his unintentional mistake, you may think, ‘Well, it’s nothing too serious!’ However, when it happens to you, it’s a whole different story. If a friend of yours says that he got a score less than the average, you may say, “Well, that could happen,” but if it happens to you, you will feel discouraged, thinking, ‘I’m so ashamed. How can I see my friends now?’
Robert Ronstadt at Babson College in the United States studied the graduates who finished the MBA courses, and found out that less than 10% of them became successful. What decided their success or failure was their action. Those who were successful built their businesses in actuality, while the remaining 90% of them said that they were waiting.
It is not only the case of 90% of talented people from prestigious schools. Just as the term Generation Maybe proves, most people just wait for a perfect situation to be made; they postpone taking action, saying they will challenge when the optimum time comes with the guarantee of a good result. People with this kind of mindset make excuses, “I don’t have time now. It’s not the right time yet,” even though the situation gets better; they deliberately turn away from numerous opportunities.
How can you overcome all these obstacles and take action?
Two mindsets at the starting point of action
You need two mindsets for immediate action. First, think that mistakes and failure are neighbors that you meet once in a while, not gangsters whom you never want to meet. Second, regard the current situation as the most perfect situation where you don’t need to hesitate.
Just as Al Franken, a writer and politician, said, “Mistakes are a part of being human. Precious life lessons can only be learned the hard way,” you grow and improve, making mistakes. Failure is the same. Failure is definitely a sad experience, but sometimes there are more things you can gain than lose; failure gives tolerance to sorrow, and helps you go forward to a better direction, based on those experiences.
When you accept mistakes and failure positively, all these become a process for growth and improvement. However, if you easily give up or do not even start, it becomes real failure. J. K. Rowling wrote the Harry Potter series, which became the fastest best-selling book series in history, but before she had it published, she was turned down by publishing companies twelve times. However, no one remembers her as a writer who failed twelve times. If she had given up after failing seven or eight times, she would have indeed become a failed writer.
The best way is to be ready to accept trial and error humbly and to start in the circumstance you are in, not with the conditions you want. Although a bad result is expected due to the unfavorable and poor conditions right now, once you start, you may see some other ways or meet unexpected luck. What is important is that you won’t know the result unless you try. If you do not give up on your own, the door of opportunity is always open.
Once you make up your mind to put something into action, start from a trivial thing. Put into action small things that make you even wonder, ‘How can a thing like this help?’ The small thing wouldn’t have much external dependency and wouldn’t arouse much inner burden or fear. If you just make a big goal pompously, you will be tired soon because of its distance from reality.
Let’s take studying a foreign language for instance. If you want to speak a foreign language well, it is better to make a small plan such as “memorizing five words or one phrase a day” and to put it into action right away than to make a big and vague goal such as “I will study hard to talk like a native speaker before this year passes.” If you get used to putting your small plan into practice and keep increasing the time and the amount of study, you will find yourself speaking a foreign language much better.
There are so many things you can do even if you don’t make a grand decision or have powerful motivation as long as you overcome a little laziness. If you repeat things that don’t seem great right now, you may have a great gift beyond imagination later on. On the contrary, even if you want something very eagerly, unless you take any action, even a trivial one, nothing will happen. What changes life is not a big thought, but a small action.
Dream and hope of the gospel will be accomplished through small actions and practices
The gospel of the new covenant is spreading quickly according to the prophecy, “This gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations” (Mt 24:14). Under the mission to preach to people all around the world, the number of those who come to Zion throughout the world is increasing dramatically. At this time, the Elohists who are standing at the center of the prophecy want to live without any regrets, doing meaningful work for the completion of the prophecy.
Although you are eager to do it, you may not know what to do, where to start, and how to start. What is important is to start from a small thing rather than just thinking and worrying about it. If you lack confidence and courage to carry out the gospel work, just take action that can fill what is lacking. Since God said, “Faith comes from hearing,” listen to the words of the truth and read the Bible every day. Since God said, “Ask whatever you want, then it will be given to you,” ask for the same thing at the same time every day.
It may sound disappointing because it is theoretical and simple and not special. You may think, ‘Can such little things make any change?’ However, if you keep repeating it, you will definitely see a change. Above all, God regards small efforts and sincerity as big, and gives you greater talents.
Peter and John who were fishermen, Matthew a tax collector, and Simon the Zealot! They are the disciples and the apostles who followed Jesus and preached the gospel of the new covenant 2,000 years ago. What they had in common was not some special ability or knowledge. They simply put God’s word, “Follow Me,” into action. Through them, the gospel spread across Israel, Corinth, Galatia, Philippi, and Rome.
“Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much.” Lk 16:10
What we need is a small action. While growing in faith by repeating small actions, we will soon have strength to spring up and walk, and while challenging for the work that requires more courage and faith, we will find ourselves running towards the finish line of the gospel. There will be trial and error, and sometimes negative thoughts and emotions will shake our minds until we get there, but we need to admit that mistakes and failure are a process that can happen, and start with small actions even though we will be followed by anxiety and fear. When we do that, we will get a result beyond our imagination in God. Moreover, we are living in the prophetic age when the completion of the gospel work is near at hand. What will happen if our little actions are accompanied by the air current of prophecy? Amazing things that make our hearts pound with excitement just by thinking about them will happen.
Your beginnings will seem humble (small, KJV), so prosperous will your future be. Job 8:7
- Reference
- Oliver Jeges, Generation Maybe: the Signature of an Epoch (in German, Generation Maybe: Die Signatur einer Epoche), Haffmans & Tolkemitt, 2014
- Stephen Guise, How to Be an Imperfectionist: The New Way to Self-Acceptance, Fearless Living, and Freedom from Perfectionism, Selective Entertainment, LLC, 2015
- Kim Min-tae, I Only Tried Once (in Korean, 나는 고작 한 번 해봤을 뿐이다), Wisdom House, 2016
- Wada Hideki, How To Worry Constructively (in Japanese, 惱み方の作法), Discover 21, Inc, 2012