Stuck Before a Breakthrough? Gina Mollicone-Long on Connecting the Dots
Updated: Oct 29
Gina Mollicone-Long teaches people how to shift into the greatness they already have the potential for. She trained as a chemical engineer, wrote her thesis on process control and feedback design, and has worked across large companies, small businesses, nonprofits and high tech. Everything she teaches centers on the process of change, and on one point in it, the breakthrough. That is the moment all your faculties come together and you finally produce the behavior you want. For a founder or CEO who feels stuck, her claim is direct. If you want something you don't have, the wanting itself shows you are ready. What is missing is the connection, and you can't make it from yesterday's idea of who you are.
Inspired by Paper Napkin Wisdom Episode 1 with Gina Mollicone-Long.
Why wanting something is a sign you are ready
Gina uses a baby learning to walk. A one-month-old has no desire to walk because the muscles, bones, balance and brain are not ready. The day the baby shows that desire, usually by pulling itself up, is the day everything needed is in place.
The dots are all there, but they are not yet connected. Connecting them takes trial and error until the right connection is made. Once it is, that pathway gets stronger until it is mastered.
She applies the same logic to adults. The simple fact that you want something you don't have is the indication that all systems are go. You haven't connected the dots yet because you have never done it before.
She knows people hear this as motivational talk. With her science background, she says she doesn't like to claim things she can't explain, and she treats this as neurological.
Why giving it everything still falls short
People tell Gina they gave it everything they had. Her reply is that they gave it everything they had yesterday. They gave it everything they thought they had.
The trap is trying to do something new from an old paradigm. Who you are today is who you have been. Who you will be tomorrow is decided by who you choose to be today.
She uses skiing as the picture. You can read books on skiing, watch videos, buy the gear, go to the resort and walk around in ski boots. You are not skiing until you strap them on at the top and start moving down the hill. That is the part most people dislike, because nobody wants to look foolish.
For a leader, this is worth noticing. The plan, the reading and the preparation can all be done, and the breakthrough still has not happened. It happens in the doing.
How to learn from someone who has already done it
Gina's first board break came during training in a concept called modeling. The idea is simple. If you want to do something you've never done before, find a model of excellence and replicate it.
The instructors did not teach the group how to break the board. Each person had to extract the model from someone who had just done it. What became clear was how vague people are when they gather that information.
It is not enough to copy the outline of someone's routine and expect their results. You have to understand what they are thinking, seeing and hearing in their mind, what they believe, how they breathe and how they stand. Gina kept extracting detail until she could become the person who had demonstrated it. When she stepped up, she did exactly what that person did, so she got the result that person got.
That is a useful discipline for any owner learning from a peer or mentor. The detail is where the result lives.
What going first does for a team
Gina's first experience of this kind was breaking an arrow pressed against her throat. She was in a group of about ten people, the only woman. When it came time to choose who would go first, everyone looked at the floor.
She went first, mostly because standing there thinking about it was more painful than doing it. What she noticed afterward was the effect. Her going first created energy and belief in the group, and everyone else followed quickly. She called it an interesting paradox around leadership.
The board break works on a similar principle. Once you put the board on the blocks and stand in front of people, you don't really have a choice. Giving yourself no way out lets you dig down and find what you didn't know you had.
Is stress bad for you, or getting you ready?
I raised a TED talk by Kelly McGonigal. Her point was that stress may be your body getting ready for a challenge, and that what people believe about stress shapes how it affects them.
Gina added a distinction. That only helps if you are conscious of the stress in the first place. Most people are not aware of what is happening in their body moment to moment. They walk to the store ruminating about a fight from hours ago, and their body runs a stress response for no purpose. That is the kind of stress that hurts.
When you are aware of it, you can funnel it into courage. Otherwise it works against you.
How to apply this in your business this week
Name one thing you want for your business that you don't yet have. Treat the wanting as a sign you are ready, not as a gap to feel bad about.
Find one person who already does that thing well. Ask them for detail. What were they thinking, what did they believe, and what did they do first? Keep asking until you could step into their shoes.
Notice where you have been preparing and not doing. Pick the smallest real step and take it before Friday.
If your team is hesitating on something hard, consider going first.
And once a day, check what stress you are carrying. Is it getting you ready for something, or replaying something that is already over?
Related Insights
If you want peers who will push you to take the step you have been preparing for, this is where that work happens. Build the Field
Wisdom Weekly. Get Wisdom Weekly, a short Sunday letter on leading what you have built. Subscribe to Wisdom Weekly
This conversation is part of the Limiting Beliefs Growth Hub. See every Growth Hub.
🎙️ Listen to Episode 1 of Paper Napkin Wisdom
▶ Spotify
Comments