A LETTER FROM CHRIS SUAREZ

DON’T BE A QUITTER

This week I have been talking with our organization quite a bit about quitting.  Wait, what?  Why talk about something that seems so negative? Why bring up something like quitting instead of just talking about the positive?

By talking about quitting I hope to prevent someone from doing it - quitting on their goals, on themselves, on their people, on their partners, on their preferred future. Challenges and obstacles and difficulties and struggles tend to feel unexpected when they show up. But they are anything but that. When we decided to create something better for ourselves, we agreed knowingly or unknowingly to open ourselves up to all of those things. The unexpected should have always been expected. Acknowledging the desire to quit as an expected feeling or emotion is part of the solution and prevention of actually quitting. It normalizes it and pauses the action of hitting the eject button or signing the resignation. Talking about quitting and why we feel like giving in or giving up at times allows us to expect those feelings and know what to do when they show up. 

There is a long list of things that can lead us to want to quit. That quitting might be quitting our job. It might be to quit building a business. It might be quitting a relationship - personal or business. It might be to quit moving towards our goal. It might be to quit on what we wanted as our preferred future. 

Remember, almost all quitting is rooted in fear. 

We are scared of the emotion we are feeling, so we quit anything that causes that emotion.  

We are scared of being uncomfortable, so we quit any activity that causes discomfort.

We are scared of how we measure up to others, so we quit what we are building since someone else seems to be building something better.

We are scared to fail, so at first sight of a possible failure, we quit and find something simpler to do.

We are scared of what others think of us, so we quit anything that might put us in front of others or open ourselves up to others’ negative opinions.

We are scared of someone’s reaction, so we quit communicating about what really matters to us.

We are scared that we might not be exactly who we want to be, so we quit working on ourselves to avoid a bruised ego.

We are scared to go backwards, so we quit making needed changes in our business and decide to keep doing what we’ve always done, even when we know it’s not the best thing that could be done.

We are scared of how long something might take to build, so we quit building it because we are just impatient and unwilling to wait.

We quit mostly out of fear.  

Of course, no matter who we are, we can not eliminate fear, and so that feeling of wanting to quit will show up from time to time.  

Remember, we uproot fear with a shovel.

Dig into the emotions we are feeling and run towards them instead of running away. Emotions are what give our lives substance and depth.

Dig into why we are uncomfortable. The reason behind that discomfort has the power to be a massive unlock for us.

Dig into who we measure ourselves against and why we chose them in the first place. Often we are using the wrong measuring stick to begin with.

Dig into your fear of failure. If we learned from each past failure, we’d welcome the next one. After all it just means your present-self is wiser than your past-self.

Dig into why we think we might not be who we thought we were. Often we are trying to be who someone else wants us to be.

Dig into your fear around time. Good things will take time. Don’t be afraid of playing a long term game with the right people on your team.

Be willing to dig.

Begin to uproot the fear that leads us down the path to resignation and quitting. 

More than anything, show honor to those that have pulled you, poured into you, pushed you, and never quit on you. 

Don't be a quitter.

Don’t quit on your people. Don't quit on your partners. Don’t quit on yourself.

Chris Suarez