Persevere or quit?

“The Dip is the long slog between starting and mastery. A long slog that’s actually a shortcut, because it gets you where you want to go faster than any other path.”

~ Seth Godin, The Dip

Seth Godin talks about The Dip and the Cul-de-sac in his book, "The Dip". The Dip helps us do extraordinary things by persisting through the tough phase where we keep putting in efforts but nothing much happens. The Cul-de-sac is the dead end, where things remain more or less the same, day in and day out. The key idea is to choose the right dips and persevere and quit the cul-de-sacs that we are stuck in.

The challenge is that when you are in the middle of it, a dip and a dead-end may feel the same. You keep putting in effort and nothing much happens. Things don't get significantly better. Things don't get significantly worse.

The only way to figure out whether you are in a dip or a dead end is to define what is the turning point in your journey. What needs to happen to turn the trajectory exponentially upwards?

For a struggling movie actor, it can be getting signed up for their first movie. For a podcaster, it could be getting a certain revenue either through ads or premium members which makes it sustainable.

When we know what we are shooting for, we can take action to reach there. We can put a timeline to it. We can also put ourselves on the hook by saying that if we don't get there within the timeline, we move on. The timeline doesn't need to be months, it can be decades too. But it's a decision.

If you are assuming that you are going through the dip without actually knowing what will turn it upwards, you are most likely stuck in a cul-de-sac. It may warrant putting in the effort to get off the curve.

Another question you can ask which can help is: if I was starting this project today, would I still sign up? If the answer is no, you need to find a way to get out.