Sarah's Thoughts: How to Keep Believing in Your Dream When You Can't See Results

**Sarah Grynberg** (0:02)
As a mindset coach, one of the most common things I hear from people is this, I know what I want, I'm doing the work, but I can't see anything happening, and I'm starting to wonder if I should just stop. So I want to talk to you about this today. So what is actually going on when you feel that way? Because I think this is one of the most misunderstood moments in the entire journey of building a life that you love.
So not the beginning, when the dream is new and the energy is high and everything feels possible, and not the end, when you're standing in the life you built, the story makes total sense in retrospect. I want to talk about the middle, the part where you cannot see the outcome, where you have been working and hoping and showing up and nothing has arrived yet because I know we've all been there. So this is where you start to wonder if you got it wrong, if the dream was ever real, if you should just stop. I have been there, I know that feeling intimately.
So what the neuroscience and the psychology and every honest conversation I've ever had in a coaching room has taught me is this. The middle is not evidence that it's not working. The middle is part of how it works. Here's what's actually happening in your brain when you're in this uncertain, uncomfortable space between where you are and where you want to be.
Your brain is pattern matching constantly, scanning for evidence of progress, safety and certainty. When it can't find clear evidence that things are moving in the right direction, it generates anxiety, it generates doubt, it generates this very loud, very convincing thought that maybe you should stop. That's not intuition. That is your nervous system trying to protect you from the discomfort of not knowing. But here is the thing about dreams. They really rarely announce themselves in this straight line. They arrive through a series of moments that only make sense once you're on the other side of them. The door that closed that led you to the one that opened. The thing that fell apart that cleared the space for something better. The delay that felt like failure but was actually preparation.
You can't see that from where you're standing, but that doesn't mean that it's not happening. And I want to give you three things to hold on to when you're in the middle. The first thing is this, action is an act of faith. You don't need certainty to keep going. You just need to take the right next step. Not all the steps, just the next one. The path reveals itself in motion, not in stillness. That's really important for you to know. The second is this, look to evidence for growth, not just evidence of arrival. Are you better than you were a year ago? Have you learned something that you needed to learn? Have you become someone slightly more capable or more resilient or more clear? That is not nothing. That is everything. That is the dream being built from the inside out. So make sure you take note of that. And the third thing is this one that I come back to the absolute most. Trust is not the absence of doubt. Trust is the decision to keep going in spite of it. Every person who has ever built something meaningful has had moments where they could not see the outcome. I promise you of that. Where nothing was guaranteed, where giving up would have been the easier choice, the difference between the ones who made it and the ones who didn't is almost never talent or luck. It is the willingness to stay in the room when the room is dark. I want to say that again. It is the willingness to stay in the room when the room is dark. So your dream, it's absolutely still there, even when you can't see it, especially when you can't see it.
Please, what I'm telling you today is, do not give up on the life that is being built for you on the other side of this uncomfortable moment.
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