The other day I sat out in the sunshine to read and felt like the sun had no impact on me at all. But when I took off my sandals that evening I saw lines where the straps were, clearly indicating that the sun had worked its magic that morning.
When you’re undergoing a change effort — whether a system-wide innovation or personal slog like trying to lose weight — it often seems as if no progress is being made. Harry Beckwith wrote about “selling the invisible” and the difficulty of marketing services that you can’t touch, hear or see. The phenomenon also applies to creating change, where without any tangible evidence, the impact feels negligible and unworthy of the discomfort.
Take a lesson from being in the sun and create your own version of a sandal to show evidence of your efforts, even when it’s not immediately apparent that there is any. Having that little line of proof may be all you need to keep going.
Selling the Invisible: A Field Guide to Modern Marketing by Harry Beckwith, 1997.
