“What am I doing?”

It’s a question I find myself asking a lot. The further I go chasing my dream, the more I hear that quiet, critical voice:

Is this the dumbest thing anyone’s ever done?

That’s harsh, but it’s how I sometimes talk to myself. Because the truth is, I feel frustrated. I work a lot, but there’s not always something to show for it. How do you keep going when nothing seems to be working? When your efforts feel invisible?

You start to wonder if there’s anything happening at all.

I always come back to this:

Progress is like putting water in the freezer.

You pour a glass of room temperature water — 70°F — and place it in the freezer. You come back 5 or 10 minutes later. It still looks the same. Still water.

You might think nothing’s happening.

But give it time, and you know what will eventually happen: the water hits 32°F, molecules slow down, structure begins to form — and suddenly, ice.

That’s how progress works.

You feel stuck at first. You put in the time, the effort, the energy… and the glass still looks the same.

But something is changing.

Here’s the part of the analogy I never paid attention to before:

If you drank that water after 10 minutes, it would taste colder.

It would feel different.

You wouldn’t see it yet — but you’d sense the change.

That’s where we often are. The phase of progress where everything looks the same from the outside, but something subtle is shifting inside.

You might not see the results yet — but you feel different.

Maybe you’re more confident.

Maybe you carry yourself differently.

Maybe you wake up early now, when that used to be impossible.

Maybe you stand taller.

Maybe you feel a little more at peace with your choices.

Maybe you light up when someone asks how things are going.

Change is happening. You just don’t see it yet.

It’s quieter than you expect. It’s under the surface. But it’s there.

You can’t change your habits without changing something. Even if you don’t have the big breakthrough yet, your brain, your body, your patterns — they’re shifting.

The key is to stay with it.

You have to leave the glass in the freezer.

You have to sit with the uncertainty.

You have to believe something’s happening beneath the surface.

You have to choose to not quit this time.

That’s what’s different now. Not the doubt, not the fear, not the frustration.

The difference is, this time, you’re not going to give up.

This time, you know better.

So you keep going.You keep going.You keep going.

What’s your version of “the glass in the freezer”?

Share one small shift you’ve felt lately — even if no one else can see it yet.

And if you know someone stuck in the middle of their goal, send this their way. Remind them to keep going.