Progress Isn’t Instant — but It’s Always Happening

(soft music) Headspace Studio. (soft music) Hey there, it's Dora and welcome back to Radio Headspace. A while ago I had a personal crisis involving a jar of pickles. It was one of those industrial strength jars sealed with what I can only assume was the power of a NASA engineer. I tried everything, twisting it with my full body weight, running it under hot water. Even the old slam it against the counter and hope for the best technique, nothing. I was at that dangerous stage where I was about to declare I don't even want these pickles anymore. And I gave it one last attempt, and pop, the lid turned effortlessly like it had never been a problem in the first place. It was infuriating and gratifying and weirdly profound because the moment I finally succeeded, it wasn't actually the moment I got stronger or tried harder. It was just the moment that I gave up, 'cause I thought none of my efforts worked. We like to think that effort and progress go hand in hand. The harder we work, the closer we get, the more we push, the more we improve. The longer we try, the better the results. But the truth is, progress doesn't always work like that. Sometimes we're making more progress than we think, we just don't see it until the moment everything clicks. And there's an old story that speaks to this. A stone cutter once had a seemingly impossible task to split a giant rock in half. Every day, he struck the stone with his hammer. Once, twice, 100 times, days passed, he kept striking. Nothing changed. People started to tell him, maybe it's too hard and maybe it's pointless. But he kept going. 999 strikes the stone didn't move. Then on the 1000th strike, the rock suddenly split clean in half. The stone cutter didn't suddenly get stronger, his hammer wasn't suddenly more powerful. That final hit worked because of all the effort that came before it. And we all have our stone cutter moments. You've applied for 10 jobs, and haven't heard back, when you rewritten the same script, essay, or pitch over and over, when you've been trying to communicate your side to a family member and they're just not hearing you. And it's tempting to stop, to assume it's not working because you don't see proof yet. But progress isn't always visible until the moment it is. The stone didn't break on the first hit or the 500, but every strike mattered. Every attempt made the stone weaker, even though he couldn't see it. But when it finally split, it felt instant. But really it was happening the whole time. So today, if you find yourself in a similar scenario like you've been trying and trying with no results, don't stop now, you're closer than you think, because real progress isn't about one moment of success. It's about all the effort that led up to it. And when...