Should You Quit Or Commit? 2 Ways To Find The Answer

Too legit, too legit to quit, too legit, too legit to quit.

Hey, it’s Marie Forleo and you’re watching Marie TV, the place to be to create a business and a life that you love, and I love that you’re here with me today. You know why? Because it’s Q&A Tuesday, one of my favorite days of the week, really. It’s all about Q’s and A’s, and today’s question comes from Juliana, pretty name, and she writes, “Hi Marie, how do I know when the obstacles are just part of the game, or it’s just too hard? You have to be pushed sometimes, right? But how do I know when it’s the right time to push and recommit or if it’s just time to give up and quit? Thank you so much, Juliana.”

Juliana, this is the big juicy question, and the truth is there are so many factors that make every situation unique. Sometimes the smart thing to do is to quit, and we’ll talk about that in a minute, but other times you got to dig deeper and recommit. While I don’t have all the answers, I do have some tips that will help you find yours.

First thing is that quitters do win. You know that old saying that quitters never win and winners never quit? Total BS. It’s just not true. To stay with something just because you’re afraid of feeling like or looking like a loser is not a smart strategy. So I want to give you a reframe, it’s called the Power Of Positive Quitting. This is what happens when you realize that you’ve gone as far as you can go with a particular project and it’s actually not smart to keep going. You should cut your losses and redirect your time and your resources into a new direction.

So let me give you an example from my own life. A few years ago I had spent a lot of time and money and energy building this beautiful custom online membership forum. So it was going great, it was awesome, we had opened up the membership. A lot of people paid us and they came in and guess what happened? The whole thing frigging crashed and burned. It was a nightmare. Now, what I did is took a look and said, “Okay, all this money and time and energy I spent, I’m pulling the plug. We’re getting out of here.” So of course I took care of my customers, we changed platforms, everything was fine, but the point is I took a look at it and I said, “This is the right thing to quit because I’m not going to win going any further.”

So I 86ed that whole thing, which brings me to my next point. Number two, you got to fork over the Freedom Fee. So here’s what I mean by this. Sometimes we got a lot of money or time or ego invested in the project, and we feel like there’s a ton of sunk costs and we don’t want to let it go. I get it. But you got to reframe that. Just like when you’re trying to switch cell phone companies and they make you pay that big fee to get out, that’s what it’s like sometimes with a project. If you start to think about just letting this thing go and you get all kinds of mental and emotional bandwidth, it’s going to make it a lot easier to eat those costs.

Number three, Hard Happens. Look, things in life get hard. I mean, we can all agree on that, right?

Yes.

But seriously, do not get caught up in the myth of flow. Yes, sometimes things do flow, but not always. Very often, you know what? Things do get hard. So don’t believe anybody when they tell you, “Oh, if it’s really right for you, it’s so easy and it flows and it’s a natural unfolding of your you-ness.” Natural unfolding my badonkadonk. You know what unfolds naturally? A bath towel. Kind of.

So I’ve had lots of projects that are totally worthwhile and you know what? Hard things actually pop up. So when that happens for me, I realized I got to dig in deeper and push through. Sometimes it means I take a little break or sometimes it means I changed my approach. But the point here is obstacles don’t mean you should quit, sometimes you really got to push through. Now I know in this whole question we still haven’t helped you decide whether or not you should quit or commit. So here are two strategies that will help you find clarity.

First up, the 10 year test. Now we’ve talked about this before on Marie TV, but we’re repeating it because it works. I want you to ask yourself, 10 years in the future, will you regret quitting this project right now? So going back to my example, when that website crashed and burned, I asked myself, am I going to regret 10 years from now just giving this whole thing up? Not at all. It was one project. It taught me a lot, but that was it, I wasn’t going to cry over it. So that’s the same thing I want you to do. I want you to recognize whether or not this project or whatever you’re working on, is it a true soul goal or is it just something on your journey that’s taking you to something bigger?

So Juliana, get connected. Really ask yourself, how will you feel in 10 years? Tap into your heart and really pay attention to how you feel. This isn’t just a useful test, it’s actually a tweetable. “Your feelings will guide you if you have the courage to tap into them and listen.”

Second, you want to ask for guidance. So whether you meditate, or you pray, or you have another spiritual practice, the point is you’ve got to plug in to a higher power. Ask for some help. I do this all the time and it is amazing. You got to be open though to receiving the signs. So maybe that looks like an email, or maybe a call from a friend, or maybe you’ll get an intuitive flash, but the point is if you don’t ask, you will not receive.

So Juliana, these are all the things that work for me. I know it’s a big hairy topic, there’s a lot of things to consider, but if you want another resource you might want to consider checking out Seth Godin’s book The Dip, it’s all about how to figure out when to quit and when to commit. So that was my A or Q, I really hope it helps.

So now I would love to hear from you. Have you ever struggled with when to commit and when to quit, and if so, what helped you decide? I would love to hear about it in the comments below. Now, as always, the best discussions happen after the episode over at marieforleo.com, so come on over and leave a comment now.

Did you like this video? If so, subscribe to our channel, that would be awesome, and share it with all of your friends. And if you want even more incredible resources to create a business and a life that you love, plus some personal insights from me that I only get to talk about in email, come on over to marieforleo.com and sign up for email updates. Stay on your game and keep going for your dreams, because the world really needs that special gift that only you have. Thank you so much for watching and I’ll catch you next time on Marie TV.

B-School is coming up, want in? For more info and free training, go to joinbschool.com. Like this. Like this. So I need to do this first section first, right? Should we just do it with Zach in the frame? Greasyallover.com is like a slip and slide, is a real good time. It’s yours, my gift to you. Start a business. Go for it.