Burn your boat

In my blog Doubling Down, I talked about how we can’t cross a chasm in two steps, that letting go of the old is the only way to go all in on the Big Idea.

The subtle variation on that is the story of the Vikings. When they invaded a new land (by the way, I loved Norsemen on Netflix, outrageously funny in a very Nordic way), they would burn their boats on the beach. This meant the only way they could get home was to pillage and colonize the territory so that they could build replacements. They added a little twist by taking their firstborn so that the only way the children would see their mothers again was if they were successful with said pillage. 

Deciding to do without something is a good way of forcing you to find something better. Kicking away the crutches is sometimes the best way to learn how to walk again.

Even though our beast of a motorhome on our South Island odyssey had two TVs, we decided (Okay Franceska decided and I agreed) that we would not watch TV while we were away. We read, talked, listened to music, talked, watched the sunset etc. etc.

That’s not to say I won’t watch the new season of Norsemen, but it’s no longer our default setting. In its absence, we are finding higher value things to do. And we’re not missing it.

What could you let go of, stop doing, cancel, burn? You don’t need to know right now what would replace it, you just need to know that whatever it is, it will be a whole lot better.