Forming Habits: Overcoming the Fear of Starting

What is it about a blank paper that paralyzes us? In the midst of endless possibilities, angles, nuances, and outlines, the simple act of starting feels like a monumental task. I remember back to the Teaching Assistant version of myself, 12 years younger, urging students to free write, even type gibberish, on the top of the page to help break this fear of starting. Why? Because it’s so much easier to keep going once we have taken the first step.

When I write I begin where I left off—literally. I open the same word document, titled the same as my first blog post, place the cursor before the title of my most recent post, which is at the top of the page, hit enter several times, move the cursor back up to the top of the page, and begin to write in the blank space I have created.

It grounds me somehow—this writing through remembering where I wrote before. Taking a pause at the point where inspiration previously coursed through my fingers takes the pressure off starting. Often, there is so much fear in the starting.

I remember feeling this way too about missional living—being afraid of taking that first step. I remember the dichotomy pulsing through me of knowing, wanting, yearning to live missionally yet knowing I had walked past so many neighbor’s houses for years without stopping to say hello. I felt the pull towards living an open, invitational, vulnerable, gracious life, and simultaneously heard the self-doubting voice negating my vision with the all too familiar thoughts of insecurity, insufficiency, inability. These thoughts felt like a mile-high blockade keeping me from starting.

Can anyone else relate?

Have you ever stared at a blank page—a blank page in your life—and felt small in the face of all the possibilities? Let your past decisions bully the right-now decision you make? Been afraid of the starting?

For me, the starting is often the hardest. I’m learning that the concept of inertia is so true of me—once I start, the next step, and the next, and the next each becomes increasingly easier. Maybe it’s my enneagram 9-ness coming out, or maybe it’s a little true of all of us.

Personality-wise, I straddle the line between introvert and extrovert. It’s this sometimes awkward, often uncomfortable feeling, or feeling hesitant in that first step, of wishing away idle small talk, yet knowing that a good conversation or a large gathering full of lots of good conversations energizes me more than alone time does. But I must remind myself of this when the starting feels hard—because the starting, at least for me, is always the hardest.

This morning I showed up at my 6:30 writing appointment, head foggy from too little sleep. I muddled through words that may or may not end up in the final version of this post. But what I did do is show up. Tell myself that this is important enough to me to make a habit of.

Establishing a consistent writing practice. Betty Rocker-style workouts. Spending daily time alone with God. Changing my diet to eat only what is life-giving for me. Living missionally in our neighborhood. What do these all have in common? They began with a goal. But it wasn’t until I started, until I took that first step, and then the subsequent next steps, that I began to form a habit.

Goal-setting is forward-thinking—necessary for casting vision, sparking inspiration like a flame within our souls. Yet to achieve those goals, we must place one foot in front of the other and keep going in the same direction. We must form a habit. We must let inertia do its work.

“We are what we repeatedly do.” Ann Voskamp shared Aristotle’s poignant words in the forward she wrote for Ken Shigematsu’s book Survival Guide for the Soul. I am also holding onto Voskamp’s words in the forward: “Habits are the small gears that leverage your life — and if you change your rhythms, you can change anything into a possibility.” If we change our rhythms . . . Oh, what could happen if we only dared change our rhythms!

When I form a habit, I take away the power of the starting to grip me in fear.

Habit-forming brings rest to my stressed and striving soul.

Surrendering to the pull of a habit helps me say yes to the things I want to, even when sometimes the no feels easier.

The rhythm of a habit-formed life is an invitation to a life-giving one.

Our first stroke on the keyboard—our first step towards missional living in our neighborhoods—doesn’t have to be monumental. It doesn’t have to be the life-altering truth we’ve searched the world upside down for, something that’s never been voiced before, brilliantly poetic, or memorably witty. Sometimes scrambled letters with no meaning at all is able to launch us into the paper we need to write.

What does this look like in terms of missional living? For me it may start with something barely out of my comfort-zone. It may be looking up to smile at a car driving past when I am picking stubborn grass from the mulch around one of the front yard trees. It may be saying hello to a neighbor out walking their dog. It may be being the first to say hello, spending more time out in my front yard—visible—so there are more opportunities to be the first to say hello.

And then what’s next?

I keep showing up. I let go of my preconceived ideas of what this is supposed to look like and focus instead on simply being present. I keep going, moving towards this thing called missional living, towards the heart of God. I open up and let others in. But perhaps most importantly, I don’t stop and let the fear of starting overtake me again.

As I keep showing up, letting inertia do its habit-forming work, I’ve found a few questions helpful in propelling me towards loving a little better, being present a little more truly:

• Do I appear rushed and ready to move on to something I need to do?

• What does my body language communicate?

• How might I need to relax and let the conversation linger?

I’ll leave you with a couple final questions to ponder:

How has the fear of starting held you back from living missionally in your neighborhood?

What excites you about letting inertia do its habit-forming work in you?

Dearest Lord, please breathe into us what is worth overcoming the fear of starting for. Show us your heart. Show us the way you love our neighbors. Gently remind us that you are with us in the starting, with us as we take the next step, and the next, and the next—that you are with us every step of the way. Please root us in your love as we form life-giving habits of living missionally. In your precious name we pray, amen.

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