We start any project with an ideal in our head. An image of what the end might look like, whether it’s a finished product or a final draft. A feeling of motivation and control comes over us when we indulge in our vision. Our ideas are untarnished and pure. But once they leave the safety of our minds and take shape in the real world, they quickly become something else.

When our ideas become tangible, they suddenly become subject to reality. They may not fit exactly with what we had in mind. Eventually, we reach an impasse where we must choose between upholding that vision, or adapting to what the present moment asks of us. The latter is usually harder because we find ourselves attached to that sacred ideal we’ve mentally constructed.

In pursuit of our goals, that vision quickly becomes a source of idolatry. We worship this imagined reality and, without realizing it, slip into the mindset that things must be a certain way in order for us to succeed. We cling to it because it’s safe, and crave the predictability that it provides. So we exalt this ideal above what’s directly in front of us, and the cycle of pain begins.

The cycle of pain is a trap I’ve walked into countless times. In cognitive behavioral therapy, this exact pattern is mapped out as the OCD cycle: Obsession, Anxiety, Compulsion, Relief. An obsession takes root, triggering a wave of anxiety, which drives a sudden compulsion to act—offering temporary relief before the entire loop resets.

This framework was specifically designed to target perfectionism and its recursive nature. Perfectionism functions less like a means to an end and more like an end in itself. Perfection, as we all know, is not something you can actually reach. It’s a subjective state that we decide. There is no way to objectively measure if something is perfect or not. This open endedness lends itself to the cyclical behavior I’ve found deeply troubling in myself.

Before we can break the loop, first we must understand how each phase takes hold of us:

The Cycle of Pain

1. Perfection

2. Imperfection

3. Discomfort

4. Correction

Perfection

This is the state we find ourselves in before we begin any meaningful task. Our minds are a vacuum sealed chamber of potential, and thus, our ideas are totally isolated from the messiness of reality. We’ve placed our mission on such a high pedestal that we can’t get close enough to actually execute it. We do this to avoid the chaos of the creative process. A defense mechanism we deploy because we register the work as an active threat. The disorder is seen as an affront against our potential, so instead of leaning into it, we try to extinguish it. But disorder cannot be extinguished. Not for long, anyway.

Imperfection

Every issue you find will be replaced by another. Perfectionism is like a hydra in this way. When you cut one head off, two more will grow back. That’s what happens when you entertain this loop. It’s not a fight you can win, despite your mind’s best effort to convince you that you only need to change one more thing before you can officially start your project. Everything is still in “beta.” Imperfection is simply not something we are equipped to tolerate. We’re not comfortable with the mess that comes with real experience.

Discomfort

We feel discomfort because of the mismatch between what we envisioned in our heads, and what we are experiencing in the real world. This painful discrepancy puts us in a state of cognitive dissonance. We desperately try to reconcile that feeling by micro-managing and editing every detail we can find that gives us what we believe is a legitimate excuse to avoid the actual work we’re terrified of doing. Everything revolves around fear.

Correction

Eventually, we fold. The stress of holding that dissonance becomes too much to bear, and we ultimately submit to our compulsions. Instead of channeling that energy into a productive session, we use it to try and eliminate any trace of insecurity or doubt we have in our project. We believe that we’ll only have confidence in our work if it’s perfect. So we continue tweaking our plan, font, color scheme, branding, platform, and gear because we have not given ourselves permission to actually get some dirt on our hands.

The work we produce is an extension of ourselves. It’s a reflection of our identity and soul. Perfectionism isn’t a simple preference for order, it’s a clever rebranding of fear. It hides in plain sight, camouflaged as high standards when it’s really an avoidance tactic to shield us from failure. The irony is that all the time we spend trying to avoid failure is what decisively cements our failure. We have to move forward no matter how uncomfortable it might be.

There is only one way out of the cycle of pain. It really sucks, but it’s the only way out as far as I’m aware:

We must sit in discomfort.

Caging the Hydra

To break out of the cycle, we must refrain from moving to the final phase: Correction. Instead of acting on that discomfort, we sit inside it and do whatever it is that we’re actually supposed to be doing. Not the compulsion, the tasks that we know are responsible for moving the needle.

I call this caging the hydra.

This will likely feel extremely uncomfortable for you. Like you’re leaving an itch on your body without scratching it. It’s almost painful to ignore this impulse, but it’s the only way we can get something done in the real world.

You will feel it underneath the surface of your skin. It’s deeply embedded in your nervous system. It will feel like you’re defying something ingrained in your biology.

Our instinct is to attack the hydra. Leaving it be just feels wrong. When we choose to step away from the fight and focus on what matters most, we are subtly retraining our minds. We’re telling our brain that it’s safe to move forward despite leaving the hydra alone. The hardest part is learning how to take that first terrifying step.

The only way out is through.

There’s no such thing as a free lunch. If you’ve ever heard that expression, it was likely in the context of discovering a fundamental principle in free market economics. Like how “free snacks” on an airplane aren’t really free. There isn’t some magical machine in the back of the plane 3D printing peanuts and chips out of thin air. The cost of your snacks is bundled into the price of the ticket itself.

The concept of “free” is merely a marketing ploy. It’s an illusion. Everything has a cost. Every cause has its effect. Every action, an equal or opposite reaction, to quote Newton’s third law of motion.

In other words, anything we want to obtain in life will with a respective cost. The more valuable the thing we want, the greater the cost will be to acquire it. A house is obviously more costly and thus harder to acquire than a pack of gum.

Transformation is priceless

The most valuable things in life are often priceless. They don’t have a monetary cost, and yet they are undeniably valuable. Transformation is the most valuable thing you can acquire in life. We can spend money to help move the process along, but personal transformation doesn’t have a strict dollar amount attached to it.

Becoming someone smarter, stronger, and more capable than we were yesterday comes with a specific cost. Whether it’s reading books, lifting weights, or practicing a certain profession. It requires us to move from one state to another. From somebody who isn’t well read, to somebody who is well read. From weak to strong. From incompetence to competence.

Becoming smart will cost us the luxury of simple entertainment. Becoming strong will cost us a lifestyle of comfort and indulgence. Becoming capable will cost us our pride so we can learn from others.

Any movement from a current state to a desired state requires us to shed an old version of ourselves. Actually no, it requires us to wrestle that version of ourselves to the death. The cost of transformation is blood. We are moving through certain patterns, behaviors, and cycles that are already natural to us. These movements are familiar, and familiar is comfortable.

Change is violent

That’s why transformation feels so violent. We are quite literally wrestling with a version of ourselves we’ve already been for years. Possibly our entire lives. Real change requires a funeral for the person we used to be, and that person never goes quietly.

We can’t win a fight against someone or something we don’t understand. Which is why we need to know what we’re up against. We have to study our enemy, which is really just ourselves. Or at least the parts of us that get in the way of the life we actually want to have and the work that is necessary to get there.

Originating from Greek antiquity, the maxim ‘know thyself’ has been relevant for centuries. That’s because it’s a fundamental building block for anybody who is seeking meaningful and lasting change. If we don’t know who we are, why we do what we do, and what actually matters to us, how can we expect to change our circumstances in a way that we could reasonably call an improvement? We don’t even know what the baseline of our reality is. We’re building on quicksand.

Audit your desires

To gain anything in life requires us to understand the cost of what it takes to get it. The most powerful thing we can do for ourselves is ask what we are willing to sacrifice to get what we want. We need to know what it is that we are willing to pay to get what we want out of life, otherwise we may end up with buyers remorse. This isn’t to give ourselves an excuse out of the necessary work that needs to be done, but to make sure we’re fighting for the right thing in our lives. To ensure that we are prepared to pay the price of whatever it is that we are looking to acquire.

Some things are just too expensive. The reason why some people never quite change is because whether they know it or not, they are not willing to pay the blood cost of wrestling a new version of themselves into existence. It’s a balancing issue. They run the numbers and find that change is simply unaffordable. They are not willing to trade their current reality for something that may turn out to be even better. It’s not worth it to them. They have become domesticated by the familiar.

This isn’t inherently a problem, some people just like the way things are. If this isn’t you, then you need to get comfortable with the idea of paying a price to achieve a meaningful change in your life.

In sum, there are no free peanuts. Every single thing that we have in our lives has a respective cost. When we look at the world in this way, it helps us confront the most difficult part of any transformation; the sacrifice we must make in order to get what we want.

If we ignore the price tag on the things that we want, we either won’t be able to purchase them, or we will regret having paid too much. There are fundamental principles in this world, and when we pay attention to them it makes our lives easier to navigate. Understanding the cost associated with our desires provides an unmistakable texture to the decisions we make every day.

What price are you willing to pay for the life you want to live?

Trust. Any feat of creativity or greatness in general requires an implicit trust in what we’re doing. It’s a leap into one’s potential. You are moving from one state to another without fully understanding what the result of that leap will be. It’s a secular form of faith. A belief that what you’re working on is worth executing despite not fully knowing what it even is. You must believe that, because the alternative is convincing yourself that things need to make sense before you begin, and this is obviously a trap.

Trust and doubt are simply two sides of the same coin, pointing toward the same thing: total uncertainty. Trust tells us that something good waits at the end of the tunnel. Doubt reminds us that we don’t know what’s on the other side.

It’s not that doubt is bad. It’s our brain’s way of telling us to keep our wits about us. To keep our guards up because back then, uncertainty often meant the difference between life and death.

That fight or flight anxiety is biologically ingrained in us. It evolved inside us for approximately 300 million years, and it was originally designed to ward off predators in the midst of night. It’s a bit overtuned for the modern age. Same hardware, different times.

That’s why the fear is so palpable. It’s tapping into those same ancient pathways in the human mind. The kind our ancestors would feel when they were faced with the literal possibility of death.

Taking a creative stake rubs against our biology in another crucial way. When we express ourselves in any creative capacity, we’re making an attempt at distinction.

When we do this, it makes us feel as though we are exposing ourselves in the crowd. It threatens the conformity of the herd. Something that could get you exiled at best, and killed at worst.

Drawing a picture is rubbing shoulders with death. In that simple act, you confront the same raw mixture of curiosity and terror our ancestors felt while staring into the black of night.

You’re tapping into something primal. Something sublime. It’s the same feeling that staring at the night sky might evoke in you. The possibilities are overwhelming, terrifying even.

When we choose to create, we are dancing on a fine line between wonder and fear. It’s the uncertainty of the act that brings out this odd concoction inside us. Recognizing it becomes a sort of creative currency. Legal tender in the imagination.

There is strength and even virtue in the ability to sit inside these emotions voluntarily. There is a known concept that talks about this called “negative capability.” It was coined in a letter written by an English Romantic poet by the name John Keats in December 1817. He defined negative capability in the following way:

“...when man is capable of being in uncertainties, Mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after fact & reason.”

Keats pointed to Shakespeare as a quintessential example of this trait. His characters had many dimensions to them and they didn’t fit neatly into a single moral framework. This made each of them complex, and it’s why they felt like real people, not just caricatures for the stories he would write.

Reality is messy, ambiguous, and generally open ended. Shakespeare knew this better than anyone. And Keats understood that embracing this made for the best possible creative work. Those who didn’t arrive prematurely at their conclusions could sit inside the discomfort of uncertainty and make truly boundary pushing work.

In order to get the best from ourselves, we must actively pursue that which is uncertain. Naturally, this is a very uncomfortable process because our brains seek the comfort of certainty. We like to see patterns that we’re used to because it subconsciously resembles safety. The lizard brain enjoys safety. It’s that ancient survival instinct kicking in for us when we need it least. It’s a vestigial instinct for us now. The world is still dangerous today, but fear paralyzes more people than it saves in our modern lives. It’s necessary, but overcalibrated.

While it may seem like a hindrance, we can actually use this instinct to our advantage. Negative capability can be tapped into intentionally when we notice ourselves pushing up against the boundary of our own potential. David Bowie understood this intuitively. In 1997, he had this to say during an interview:

“If you feel safe in the area you’re working in, you’re not working in the right area. Always go a little further into the water than you feel you’re capable of being in. Go a little bit out of your depth. And when you don’t feel that your feet are quite touching the bottom, you’re just about in the right place to do something exciting.”

Bowie thrived in uncertainty. He adopted all different kinds of personas, identities, and alter-egos. His most notable character was Ziggy Stardust. He constantly shredded his own identity to see what else he was capable of becoming. What some people would consider “detours” in his career were actually his bread and butter. In another interview in 2002, he said this:

“We create so many circles on this straight line we’re told we’re traveling. The truth is, of course, that there is no journey. We are arriving and departing all at the same time.”

Negative capability was a bedrock philosophy for Bowie. He well and truly embodied what it means to embrace uncertainty and become changed by it. The phrase, “arriving and departing at the same time” sounds like death and rebirth. The “...rubbing shoulders with death…” line from earlier in the essay feels a little less hyperbolic now. Death is the ultimate question mark. When we change ourselves, we’re essentially experiencing a micro death. We shed our old identities and confront the unknown.

The uncertainty of life itself is transformative. It seems that all we really need to do is make way for that observation without grasping at false certainty. To sit with the discomfort of honest doubt and be changed by whatever comes of it.

This means letting go of old ideas, deeply held beliefs, and even identities that no longer serve us. There’s no sense in whiteknuckling an answer if it may not be the right answer. We must be open to the truth even when it’s uncomfortable. Especially when it’s uncomfortable.

This willingness to reject certainty isn’t exclusive to art; it is the fundamental engine of scientific discovery. Legendary physicist Richard Feynman honored this philosophy not only in his work, but in his own life as well. He said this during an interview with BBC which aired in 1982:

“I can live with doubt and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it’s much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong.”

This is someone who has not only mastered negative capability, but sees uncertainty and ambiguity as his personal playground. He revels in the idea that he doesn’t stake any strict and dogmatic claim on reality. If life reveals something to him, he’s open to experiencing it, even if it contradicts his entire model of existence at that moment. His worldview is flexible.

Doubt isn’t just part of the creative process, it’s part of life itself. When we attempt to root this out in favor of false certainty, we deny a part of ourselves that makes us human. There is virtue in wonder. It makes for better art, better science, and better writing.

So next time you second guess yourself, just know you’re in good company.

Enter Gravity is a platform with a single mission:

To help you navigate reality more effectively by changing your relationship with it.

I believe the only way to achieve lasting change is to start from the ground up. You can’t layer advice on top of a faulty model of existence. It will crumble. My goal is to provide a space where you can question old paradigms and shift them in real time. If you’re prepared to take this radical approach, subscribe below and strap yourself in.

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A bit about me

I’m Tony DiGe, a writer and purveyor of bold ideas. If you’ve read this far, I’m sure you’re interested in expanding your mind and pushing your boundaries. If so, you’re the reason I created Enter Gravity—to have meaningful dialogue with like-minded people. Together, we can learn a lot. Let’s see how far the conversation takes us.