A few weeks ago, my Google account gave me the good old “Your Gmail storage is 96% full” warning.
I had been toeing the line at 95% for the last year or so, but it finally crept over, and it was time to do some spring cleaning.
Thankfully, Google has a good storage cleanup tool, and it was easy to figure out that the majority of the problem was coming from 15+ year-old attachments from when I was running several businesses out of that account.
As I began my Gmail cleanup process, I started reading old emails from when I was first getting started in business in my early 20s….and boy…that is when the fun began!
Because the person in those emails was NOT me.
Or was it me?
Ok, fine, it was me!
But the point is that I don’t even recognize that person anymore.
Who was this clown from the emails? That clown, my friends, was ME.
The Past Version of You
After reading through my old emails for a bit, I realized just how much I have grown not only as a communicator but as a person.
You don’t see it day to day.
But when you look back at your email from nearly 20 years ago, you can see it plain as day.
Day-to-day, that growth is so small, so minuscule, it doesn’t even register.
But compound that over 20 years, and it amounts to a lot.
More communication experience.
More work experience.
More life experience.
And the person you become over time is so different from where you started that you won’t even recognize who you were.
Growth Starts ONE Day at a Time
TODAY, you may not have any experience doing what you REALLY want to be doing.
Be it managing your investments, getting fit, or doing your dream job.
But small incremental gains DO add up.
To grow into the person you want to be, you have to start somewhere.
You may feel like a clown at first. You may know nothing about what you are about to get yourself into.
But it shouldn’t stop you from taking those daily steps!
20 years ago, I was a kid with dreams. I was throwing stuff at the wall.
My emails look insane to me now.
But ya know what? I grew into the person that I wanted to become.
So just start.
Whatever it is you have been holding off on. Start.
Whatever it is you are scared of. Start.
We are all clowns at the beginning. That is entirely the point!
In 5,10, or 20 years, you will look back at yourself and you won’t even recognize that person!