The Consequences of Inaction

“Nah, I’m good. I have a lot of other things to do.” I arrogantly told myself.

Up until recently, I’ve came up with every excuse in the book not to join Mikey B and Brian for Social Gym; a social training program where they approach a vast range of random people during the day, at any venue and try to build a real, genuine connection. No lines, no routines and you have to do it sober.

Dun. Dun. Dun.

People don’t take the first step if it seems to big. They get overwhelmed because they don’t know where to start so they end up not doing anything at all.

Over and over again, I fell into that trap.

I’ve been going out for quite some time now and a lot of people already know me. I’ve engineered my social environment so I’m always getting social proof and validation anywhere I go. At any given night, I take comfort in the fact that I’m going to run into someone I know. I felt like I’ve reached a certain level of success in my life at that point. I was socially pampered and I started getting comfortable. My ego was validated by language and it will do everything to protect itself. The I’ve-made-it mentality gave me an unrealistic and inaccurate image of who I was. The process has been neglected because of my fear of having an experience that will not support my current, self-inflated image of myself.

I didn’t want to push my comfort zone. I know if I get destroyed and rejected, my ego is invalidated. I didn’t want the smog of negative and distorted thoughts to pollute my brain. I know if that happens, I’ll have a negative mental snowball of unreasonable self talk.

“I’m such a piece of shit.”

Every time you see an opportunity and choose not to act on it, you’re training your indecisiveness. This is a big lesson that I’m still learning. If I’m just going about my regular day and see someone that I find interesting from my core, I have to act and tell them. Whether it’s an older gentleman with a style that’s on point or an absolutely drop dead gorgeous bombshell and everything in between. Every time I don’t, the wrong muscle is being developed and my decision making muscles are slowly atrophying. This may not happen overnight, but overtime things do add up. Inaction and procrastination can stunt your growth. Much like going to the gym, what you’ve accomplished up to this point is meaningless if you stop taking action. If you don’t keep sparking the flame, eventually the fire will go out.

Your body is built for survival and adaptability, it will only expend energy on things that is being used, and will eliminate and cut off parts that are not. That goes the same for your social skills.

There’s no need to beat yourself up and feel bad. In every moment, you either get better or you don’t. You don’t just coast through life and stay neutral. If you decide to act now then all your previous failures have been negated. Continue acting and you’re developing your social muscles to grow through a variety of interaction, not just exclusive to hot girls. You’ll feel good internally every time you make that decision to act based on logic, despite of how you feel. This is being process oriented opposed to being dependent purely on results. Every decision you make is one more rep in your social workout which brings you one rep closer to being socially fit.

By acting and doing things anyway, you’re creating a new mental anchor on how you filter the world. Now, you’ve attached good feelings to growth and negative feeling to inaction. Rejection is now viewed as feedback. Weigh the pros and cons. Yes, there are risks involved with acting and getting rejected but have you ever considered the risk of inaction? Reflect on all the things that you’re missing out. Not pushing for growth will save your ego for sure, at the same time limiting all your options for the kind of people you meet and everything else in life. We’re creatures of habit and how we do something, is how we do everything.

The only way to keep growing is think of yourself as a student and learn everyday. Keep your ego in check by putting yourself in situations where you could fail. Take that failure as feedback and analyze where you went wrong. Do an honest moral assessment so you can act accordingly next time you’re faced with a situation similar.