درسنامه تفسیری

Faith Gap – Commentary

Hi, this is AJ. Welcome to the commentary for this month’s lesson.

So there I was practicing a difficult song on my bass. I had the idea that I would become a bass player, that I would learn the bass, the bass guitar. So I was practicing a difficult song by the band Rush.

And in the beginning I enjoyed it quite a bit. I broke it into little, small pieces and I practiced each little piece, just a few notes at a time. I would learn say four or five notes at one time, practice it again and again and again, then go to another four or five notes, practice that again and again, then practice putting the two together.

As I said, in the beginning I enjoyed this. I had a feeling of progress, that I was making progress, that I would continue to improve and, eventually, I would become a master of the bass.

Now, in another area of my life, many years ago, just as I was starting Effortless English, I was looking at our sales and they were very low; in the very beginning, only a few sales. We only sold a few lessons. We had very few members.

I was really sick of my job, because at that time I was also working full time still, teaching at a school in San Francisco. So I would go to work during the day and teach classes and then later I would come home and I would work on the business, on Effortless English.

But it was quite discouraging, quite tough, because the sales were not quite enough.

The business wasn’t making enough money and I really wanted to quit my job. I was totally sick of working for other people. I was sick of having to teach in schools where I was being told how I had to teach. I had to follow all the rules, and I had to live on someone else’s schedule.

So it was tough. It was difficult. It was discouraging. And I didn’t know at that time how to improve the business enough so that it would make enough money and I could quit the job that I was frustrated with.

So what’s interesting about both of these examples from my own life is that in both cases I had a kind of Faith Gap. Meaning, I had a goal, I had a big dream, a big idea for each one.

On one hand, I had this dream, this big idea of oh, I would be a great bass player someday. And on the other hand I had this dream that I would become financially independent, that I would grow this company and have freedom and quit my job.

In fact, my big fantasy was thinking about the day I would walk in to my boss, into his office and say, “I quit, I’m done.” And that I would walk away never to return again.

It was a great fantasy. Both of them were quite entertaining and quite enjoyable just to dream about, but the reality of my life in both cases was very, very different. I was very far, I thought, I felt, from both of those results. With the bass I was struggling and struggling day by day.

Now, in both cases I took some kind of disciplined action. With the bass I was practicing each day working on this difficult song. And with the business I would come home and I would work on the business. I would study business books and try to learn about marketing, work to improve our website and work to improve the lessons.

In both cases I had goals, big dreams as I just mentioned, but also I had specific measurable goals. With the bass my measurable goal for the medium term was to play that song and to play it at the same speed as the recording.

And with the business my goal also was very measurable, which was to make enough money to replace my salary at my job and, therefore, quit my job.

I started with strong motivation with both of these. I was very excited and had a great deal of passion for music, learning the bass and also for becoming financially independent, for teaching the way I wanted to, for establishing my business.

And then I had a moment of truth for each one of these goals. This is that thing we discussed in the main lesson, that Faith Gap. That’s where there is such a big gap between where you are now and where you want to be and even though you’re putting in all this effort and energy and maybe you’re being quite disciplined, nothing much seems to be happening.

With the bass I was practicing and practicing and practicing every day. There were little improvements, but I really wasn’t getting very close to my goal of playing that song at full speed, or certainly of becoming a great bass player.

And with the business the same thing. I was putting in all this work and effort trying all these new things, every day for hours and hours working and working and yet I would look at the sales and nothing much changed, basically, the same.

That’s where you hit that moment of truth for anything in your life. I’m talking about my life, but we all have this experience with any large change that we want to make. With any important big goal that seems far away.

You always will hit this gap, this wall, where you feel like you’re working very hard, you’re doing what you’re supposed to do, but you’re not seeing results. You feel like you’re not getting any closer to that goal.

And that’s where, as we discussed in the main lesson, you have to somehow step in and find that faith, that belief in yourself that it will eventually happen, that you just need to keep on going and that, eventually, you’ll start to see the results.

And the hard thing about this is that it’s an unknown. I think that’s the toughest part. Because you don’t know how long it will take. Because for each skill, it can be a different amount of time. So if you’re learning a musical instrument, then that might take longer or shorter to see results than with a business, as in my case.

Also, each of us has our own strengths and weaknesses. So some things in life will seem to come more easily and more quickly, we’ll see the results happening faster. And other things in life will seem to take a much longer time, where you really need that faith to keep going because you’re working and working and working and you don’t see anything happening.

Now, a common area of life where we see this happen again and again is with health, especially weight loss, people who’ve let themselves get too heavy and then they decide, “ah, I’m going to lose weight, I’m going to lose fat.”

And then they start doing the right things. They start to eat better. They start to do some kind of exercise. And maybe they lose some pounds, some kilos in the first few weeks. But then they hit a point where even though they’re still eating well, even though they’re still working hard and doing some exercise, the weight loss sort of slows down or even stops.

They get on the scale, they look down and the number is basically the same. That’s where, again, they hit that Faith Gap, that gap where they’re doing the right things, but not seeing the results immediately, not seeing the results now.

That’s usually when people quit. They give up. After one week, or two weeks, or a month or a couple months of nothing happening, no changes, people get discouraged.

Perhaps you’ve done this. I’ve certainly encountered this in different parts of my life.

And then, of course, when you quit, when you give up, you go back to the old habits and then you never achieve that result. And what happens with people with weight loss is they get discouraged and then they start eating junk food more and more again, they exercise less and less and less and then the pounds, the weight, the fat starts coming back on again.

So this is tough. There’s no way around this. It’s a very tough thing to develop that ability to have faith when things are not working, not happening. That’s a very important skill in life and it’s something that takes constant effort, focus and determination.

In my own life, with these two examples, I got two different results. With the bass I did not have that faith. I gave up, because day by day I became more and more frustrated. I made a lot of mistakes. I was comparing myself to high-level professional bass players. And, of course, compared to them I was terrible.

And I just lost faith. I started thinking I’ll never do this. This is impossible. I’m not good at this. And I began to feel hopeless about the situation, a feeling of hopelessness started setting in.

I improved only a tiny bit, but it just seemed like it would take forever. I lost faith in my ability to improve, in my ability to achieve the goal, the dreams, the image that I had, so step by step my practice time each day got shorter and shorter and shorter, less and less and less until, eventually, I stopped and quit and, as a result, I don’t play the bass now.

On the other hand, with the business, as you can probably guess, I refocused myself on the moment. I stayed focused in the moment and I had faith that no matter how tough it got that I could do this, that I could achieve it.

I focused on what was working, the fact that hey, maybe I’m not getting a lot of money, maybe not many sales, but I am getting some sales and that’s a great encouraging sign. So I motivated myself with those small results.

I also reduced my goals. I decided I don’t need to be totally financially independent. I don’t need to make a lot of money. I don’t even need to totally replace my salary.

I decided that if we lived really cheaply and cut our expenses that I could make maybe even half as much and still be able to quit my job.

And so I took that leap of faith that we talked about in the main lesson where I decided even though I’m not seeing the results I want, even though nothing seems to be happening, I’m going to have faith, I’m going to have determination and just keep going and just believe that it will happen in time.

And as I did this, I decided to notice just even the tiniest improvements. So I kept working and kept working and, in fact, I was much closer to my goal than I imagined.

That point where I was getting frustrated, it felt like it would be forever until I would achieve that goal, but in fact it only took six more months. It only took six months from the point I started the business to quit my job. So it was much closer.

And this often happens in life, too. You know there’s this saying in English that often when you’re feeling that the goal is really far, that in fact you’re closest to it.

We have this idea that it’s always darkest before the dawn. That’s the saying, it’s darkest before the dawn. The literal meaning is that before the sun comes up that’s when it’s most dark outside. I don’t know if that’s really true, but that’s what we say.

But what it means figuratively, what it means as a metaphor is that your situation in life often feels the darkest, it feels the worst, it feels the most terrible, just before you achieve that big success, the light. Often when you’re really close to achieving something big, you feel the most hopeless. You feel like it never is going to happen.

And it’s a good metaphor. It’s a good thing to think about, because I have found that it’s true in my own life and I’ve seen it happen with many other people where you’re trying, you’re trying, you’re working, you’re working, ha, getting really frustrated.

Nothing seems to be happening. Nothing seems to be happening. Right as you’re ready to give up you just make yourself keep going a little more and then boom, everything changes.

That’s what happened with my business, I kept going through that gap. I kept that faith. I took that leap of faith, kept pushing forward and the success came quite quickly after that.

It’s almost like we’re being tested. Some people who are more spiritual have this idea.

They teach this idea that life tests you, the Universe tests you, God or whatever you want to call it. You will be tested and your faith will be tested so that you will feel the most helpless and hopeless before you are given that great opportunity for success. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but psychologically it certainly seems to happen that way many times.

So what should you do? Your assignment this month, first is to identify a goal in your life where you lost faith, an important goal in your life that you lost faith or that you feel very, very frustrated about.

Now, that might be your ability to speak English or it might be something else, so identify that. And then, second, decide that you’re going to somehow take that leap of faith to keep going, even though you’re not seeing the results that you want to see.

As you do that, as you decide to make that leap of faith and keep going, focus more on the moment now and try to focus on finding even the tiniest of improvements.

Don’t think too much about that big goal because it can discourage you if you’re far away from it. Rather, focus just on the tiny, little improvements. What did you improve maybe even just a tiny bit this week? And get excited about that.

And work as hard as you can to build up your excitement for the short term, for this moment. Sort of brainwash yourself really, convince yourself to develop that faith and that, in fact, your success is much closer than you think.

Have this belief that it’s almost there and that if you just have enough faith, if you just have enough determination that, in fact, it will come quite quickly and that when you feel the worst, when you feel it’s farthest away, that’s when it’s actually closest.

That’s your assignment. What I would like you to do also is go onto our social site and tell us. Tell us what this thing is for you. Tell us this area in your life where you have that Faith Gap that you have to get through. And let the other members encourage you to keep going. I look forward to reading about that on our social site.

That’s your assignment this month. Enjoy it. Good luck to you. See you next time. Bye for now.