The River of Resistance: The 8 Creatures Keeping You From Changing

You have tried to change. Probably more than once, and probably in the last year alone.

You tried the new morning routine. The new diet. The new prayer practice. The new goal, the new business system. You lasted six days, twelve days, thirty days if you were lucky, and then you were back where you started.

Then came the blame. Willpower. The calendar. The season of life. Your spouse, your team, the economy. Everything except the actual thing.

Every man and woman I have ever coached has lived some version of that cycle. In episode one of The Kairos Code, we talked about Chronos and Kairos, the kind of time that runs you versus the kind of time that shapes you. This episode is about the reason you keep trying to change and keep falling short. I want to name something you already know but that nobody has ever named for you.

Resistance Shows Up the Moment You Start

Steven Pressfield wrote a short book called The War of Art. It sits in my top ten reads of all time, and if you have not read it, get it after you finish this. In that book, Pressfield gives a name to the force that has been hunting you your entire life. He calls it Resistance, with a capital R.

Pressfield lists what he calls Resistance's greatest hits, the moments it shows up the hardest:

• The pursuit of any calling
• The launching of any entrepreneurial venture
• Any diet or health regimen
• Any program of spiritual advancement
• Any activity aimed at tighter abs
• Any course aimed at overcoming an unwholesome habit or addiction
• Any act of political, moral or ethical courage
• Any enterprise whose aim is to help others
• Any act that entails a commitment of the heart
• Any principled stand in the face of adversity

The abs one is a little funny. It is also serious. If you have ever tried to get a six-pack, you know exactly what I mean.

Read that list again. Every single thing you have ever tried to start and could not sustain is on it. That is no coincidence. That is Resistance doing its job.

What makes Resistance different from every other enemy you have faced is that it is intelligent. It is active. It knows exactly what you are trying to build, and it shows up the moment you want to start, every time.

My Excuse Was Work

I can name plenty of places Resistance has hunted me. The clearest one is my health.

From about age 25 to 36, I lived in a yo-yo pattern with working out and dieting. I never let myself get so far gone that I could not come back. But I could not stay consistent. And I had an amazing wife who was always consistent with her workouts and her diet, and still is to this day. She was leading by example, and I still could not get it.

My excuse? I have to work. I am building something. I have to be the first one in the office and the last one to leave.

Does that sound like you? Because that was me.

Here is what I realized when I finally paid attention. I had reached the top of the mountain in my work. I was managing partner and owner of a large financial firm, and financially we were doing more than fine. Yet my health standard had slipped. I had always been an athlete, and for eleven years I had not treated my body like one. I had mailed it in.

The epiphany came from what I actually wanted. I want to be the dad who can walk my three girls down the aisle someday. I want to look good for my wife. I want to be an example that people can do this at any age.

It took that epiphany to make a real change: the discipline of showing up at the gym every day and eating well every day. Ten years later, it is habit. I am the person who goes to the gym. I am the person who eats healthy. My identity shifted.

Your identity can shift too. You just have to beat Resistance first.

The River of Resistance

For fifteen years, I had a mentor and coach named John Wright Sr. He is one of the greatest mentors I have ever had and one of the greatest men I have ever known. He is one of the reasons I am where I am today. John shared my love for The War of Art. In fact, he was the one who introduced me to it.

John came up with a concept he called the River of Resistance.

Picture the Mississippi River. If you have ever watched it flow, you know it is mighty. If you have ever been in it, you know it is even mightier. Now imagine every predator known to freshwater or saltwater is swimming in that river, and you are in the water with them.

You are not just floating. You are trying to get to the other side, because on the other side is the person God actually made you to be.

John labeled five categories of predator in that river. Over the years, I have expanded his list to eight, because I have met every one of them in my own life. Every person has one that is their primary hunter. Some of you have two or more. As you read through them, decide which one has you right now, or which one has had you for most of your life. You cannot beat what you cannot name.

The Eight Creatures in the River

1. The walrus: laziness. The walrus sits on the beach. He is comfortable. He sunbathes, eats some fish and shows off his tusks. He is in no real danger, and he will not move. The walrus is you on a Sunday afternoon when you know what you are supposed to be doing and you are not doing it. He is the version of you that says, "Eh, I'll start Monday." The walrus is warm, comfortable, and losing his life one afternoon at a time.

2. The mermaid: temptation and addiction. The mermaid dresses up as connection. She is the second drink you did not need, or in Wisconsin, maybe the tenth. She is the tab you keep open at midnight. She is the woman who is not your wife. The mermaid does not look like danger, and that is the point. She looks like relief, and relief is the most dangerous disguise in the river.

For some of you, the mermaid is pornography. I know this is a touchy and shameful subject, and I want to address it anyway, because you may be that person. I geek out on neuroscience, and I recently saw a study showing that watching pornography has the same effect on the brain as cocaine, with the same areas lighting up under fMRI. It is not good for your brain, and it is certainly not good for your marriage. I have friends who have overcome that addiction. The feeds you scroll also reflect what you lock into. Mine shows me motivation, leadership and the people I follow, because I have worked to keep it that way. You can affect this. I do not want you buried in shame. I want you to get help. Now that you have named the mermaid, do something about her.

3. The crab: naysayers and negative thoughts. Put crabs in a bucket, and when one tries to climb out, the others pull it back down. Every single time. Some of the crabs in your life are people: old friends, family members, co-workers. Your change shines a light on the fact that they do not want to change. Some of them are the voices in your own head that sound like your father, a coach who told you that you would not make it, or a teacher who said you were not smart enough or would never amount to anything. Crabs live in buckets. You were not made for a bucket.

4. The shark: fear. Sharks circle. They do not attack constantly. They watch and they wait, and the moment you stop swimming, they strike. Fear does not attack the person in motion. Fear attacks the person who has stopped. That is why I tell my clients to move, even if the move is small. I had to tell myself the same thing on some dark days. Yes, a real shark can outswim you. I am talking about your life. Keep moving forward, even when you are uncertain of the direction.

5. The library: rereading the negative chapters of your past. This one may be the most dangerous of all, even if the shark sounds scarier. In the library, you are not moving, you are not being tempted and you are not fighting fear. You are just reading the same chapter over and over. The chapter where you failed. The chapter where you got fired. The chapter where a loved one left. The chapter where you felt you were not enough. The library will steal ten years of your life before you notice the sun went down.

I have said it in The Kairos Code, and I will say it again: neuroscience tells us we have around 60,000 thoughts a day, and 90 to 95 percent of them are recurring. So ask yourself what chapter you keep rereading. Is it failure? Rejection? Betrayal? Loss? Then ask harder questions. Maybe replaying that chapter protected you once. What has it kept you from achieving? How does it serve your life now? And more important, how will it serve your life in the future?

6. The cuttlefish: the victim. A cuttlefish clouds the water with ink and slips away. The victim in each of us clouds the truth to avoid responsibility and draw sympathy. You see this all over social media: playing the victim for likes and attention. It's not my fault. They did this to me. If only they had, I would be further along. The cuttlefish is comfortable because the cuttlefish never has to change. The cuttlefish also never gets to the other side of the river.

7. The cleaner fish: the people-pleaser. Cleaner fish spend their lives servicing bigger fish. They remove parasites, and in return they get protection and food. Sometimes they clean when it is not necessary, at their own risk, just to stay in the good graces of the bigger fish. Their entire identity revolves around keeping others happy. Some of you have been a cleaner fish your whole life. You have never asked what you actually want, only what everyone else wants, and you have called that being a good mom or a good man. It is people-pleasing, with you as the sacrificial lamb.

8. The sirens: shiny objects. Yes, they are mythical, and you know exactly what I mean. The sirens are different from the mermaid. They are not sexy. They are shiny. They sing the song of instant gratification, pull you off course and make you forget why you got in the water in the first place. Every entrepreneur I know has been pulled by sirens: the new business idea when the current one needs work, the new platform when the current one needs consistency, the new goal because you did not hit this one, the new relationship when the current one needs repair. Shiny is not the same as important. Sometimes we run enthusiastically in the wrong direction, and we need to course correct back to the original vision, mission or goal.

Name Your Primary Creature

Of those eight, name the one that has hunted you the hardest. Skip the one that is easy to talk about. Name the real one, and tell the truth about how you have fought it.

For me, the library speaks the loudest, which is probably why I hit on it the hardest. Imposter syndrome lives there. Lack, shame and guilt live there, and we tend to carry them our whole lives. I could tell you numerous stories of times I felt lack, and I told some of them in The Kairos Code. I could tell you numerous stories of shame and guilt too.

So what good does shame or guilt actually do? The only benefit I can find is that it can keep us from repeating a mistake. That lesson is real, and I do not want to lose it. But once you have learned it, once you have apologized to the people you hurt and to yourself, what good is it to hang on to? It keeps you from becoming who God intended you to be.

Look at every character in the Bible. Every one of them screwed up. Every one of the disciples screwed up, big time, some worse than any of us. Holding on to shame and guilt as a reason not to become who we were meant to be is nothing more than an excuse.

Here is the truth I want you to walk away with. The moment you decide to build something, expect Resistance to show up. It will, every single time. That is confirmation that you are in the right river and on the right track. If you are not being hunted, you are not building anything real. And if you feel exhausted, the reason is simple: you are swimming against the current.

Action Items From This Episode

1. Read The War of Art. It is a short read. Start with Pressfield's list of Resistance's greatest hits and circle every item you have started and not sustained.
2. Name your primary creature. Write down which of the eight has hunted you hardest: walrus, mermaid, crab, shark, library, cuttlefish, cleaner fish or siren. Then write one sentence about how it shows up in your week.
3. Find your epiphany. My turning point on health was wanting to walk my three girls down the aisle someday. Write down the reason that matters more to you than the comfort Resistance offers.
4. Interrogate your library. Name the chapter you keep rereading, then answer three questions: What has it kept me from achieving? How does it serve my life now? How will it serve my life in the future?
5. Make one move this week. Skip the twelve-step plan. Pick one action that swims against your creature and do it in the next seven days.
6. Measure where you stand. Take the LQ Assessment. It takes six to ten minutes and will help you see what you are swimming against.

Five Bridges Challenges

• Internal: Which creature has hunted you for the majority of your life? Tell the truth about it on paper this week, including the excuses you have used to explain it away.
• Relationships: Identify the crabs in your life, the people who pull you back into the bucket when you try to change. Then identify one person you see more in than they see in themselves, and send them this episode.
• Spiritual: If shame or guilt from an old chapter is still holding you back, make your apology where it is owed, including to yourself, and spend quiet time this week releasing what God has already forgiven.

Spartans, every person on this planet is facing one of these eight creatures. Share this with someone who needs to name theirs. Remember, the good and great are the enemies of possible. Lead like a Spartan today.

Inspire & Impact, Josh