It started at 2 am
I had a bit of a eureka moment a few weeks ago.
I was wide awake at 2am and my brain was whirring away (the joys of perimenopause). As I lay there staring at the ceiling, I found myself thinking about the individuals and teams I’ve worked with over the years.
On the surface, they were all quite different. Different ages, genders, backgrounds, industries and goals.
Yet they also had a lot in common.
They were capable people. The sort of people who don’t sit around waiting for life to happen. They set goals, take action and generally know what good performance looks like. They’re ambitious, motivated and intelligent. Most are pretty good at getting started.
For those who find starting harder, it’s rarely because they lack motivation. More often, it’s because they’re so ambitious they struggle to decide where to begin. There are simply too many possibilities competing for their attention.
But as I reflected on the many conversations I’ve had over the years, I realised something.
Very few of these people came unstuck at the beginning. They all seemed to come unstuck in the same place.
The middle.
Where progress gets quieter
Not the exciting beginning where everything feels new and progress is obvious.
Not the end where they can celebrate the result, tick another goal off the list and move on to the next challenge.
The middle.
The place I’ve started to call “The Quiet Middle“.
It’s the stage where the signs of progress become harder to see.
At the beginning of any change effort, feedback is often immediate and encouraging. You start exercising and notice your energy improve. You begin a new project and make rapid progress. You introduce a new habit and feel proud simply because you’re following through.
The progress is loud. It’s visible. It’s reassuring.
Then something changes.
You might have a slower week or two. Progress continues, but it’s less obvious. The gains become harder to measure. The excitement of doing something new starts to wear off.
With a bit of prompting, most people can still identify evidence that they’re moving forward. They can usually find bright spots and signs that what they’re doing is working.
But it takes more effort. The feedback isn’t as immediate as it once was.
Are we there yet?
They push through that initial dip and often find their “second wind“. Until they don’t and instead it can feel like they’ve “hit the wall“.
Suddenly they find themselves in a place where everything feels slow, no matter which way they look. It’s a bit like those dark mornings in the lead-up to the shortest day (winter solstice). You know the seasons will change eventually and the mornings lighter, but from where you’re standing it can feel like daylight will never arrive.
Or like children in the back seat of a long road trip asking: “Are we there yet?”
They’ve travelled too far to turn back, but they’re not close enough to the destination to feel they’ve arrived.
That’s the Quiet Middle.
Although if I’m honest, perhaps it should be called the “Mean Middle”. Because while the external signs of progress get quieter, the internal dialogue often gets louder, and far less kind. It can get mean!
When we start misreading progress
I should be further along than this. Why am I not there yet?
Am I doing enough? Am I doing it wrong?
Maybe this isn’t the right approach after all. Maybe I should try something different.
They’re reasonable questions. In fact, they’re often good questions.
But more often than not, the problem isn’t the action itself. It’s the interpretation.
One of the things we know from psychology is that when feedback becomes ambiguous, our brains tend to fill in the gaps. Unfortunately, those assumptions are often more negative than they need to be. Research into behaviour change has repeatedly shown that visible progress plays an important role in maintaining motivation. When progress becomes harder to detect, it’s easy to assume progress has stopped altogether.
The myth of linear progress
Yet human progress was never designed to be linear.
We often expect it to be because that’s how progress is presented to us. We see project plans, performance measures and graphs moving neatly upwards from left to right. We imagine improvement as a straight line. Real life rarely behaves that way.
Human beings are wonderfully complex, messy and unpredictable. At any given moment there are countless factors influencing our performance. Energy levels fluctuate. Priorities shift. Unexpected events arise. Relationships change. Stress comes and goes. Our environment changes constantly, often without us even noticing.
All of these factors influence the pace and visibility of progress.
At the beginning of a journey, we’re usually highly aware of what we’re doing. We pay close attention. We deliberately structure our environment to support success. We’re focused on every small sign that things are working.
Over time, the behaviour becomes more familiar. Less conscious effort is required. What once demanded our full attention starts to become part of our routine. That’s often a good thing. But it can also mean we’re less aware of the subtle signs of progress that are still occurring.
And when progress becomes harder to see, we can begin to misread what’s happening.
When Trust Starts to Wobble
For now, I simply want to introduce the idea of the Quiet Middle. The place where many capable people start questioning themselves and the process – not because anything is necessarily wrong, but because progress has become harder to interpret.
The Quiet Middle isn’t usually where performance breaks down. It’s where trust starts to wobble. Trust in ourselves and whether what we’re doing is working.
And when we misread normal variation in progress as failure, we risk breaking trust in ourselves and the process long before the results have had time to compound.
The Quiet Middle doesn’t just affect our relationship with progress. It changes the way we think, feel and behave.
In my next article, I’ll explore what happens when capable people begin to internalise the Quiet Middle, and why self-doubt often follows long before performance actually declines.
A reflection for the week ahead
If you’re currently working towards something important, ask yourself: Have I actually stopped making progress, or has progress simply become harder to see?
Before changing direction, look for evidence.
- What can you do today that would have been harder six months ago?
- What feels normal now that once felt challenging?
- What small signs suggest movement is still happening?
Sometimes the most valuable thing you can do in the Quiet Middle isn’t change what you’re doing. It’s recognise that you’re further along than you think.
Supporting your next steps
If the Quiet Middle feels familiar, it can be a frustrating place to sit in alone. Sometimes what’s most useful here isn’t doing more, it’s having a space to make sense of what’s already happening, before changing direction too quickly.
If you’re in that space right now, and it would be helpful to talk it through with someone outside of it, you’re welcome to reach out.
About the author
Josie Askin is a coach, speaker, and founder of Spring Coaching. She works with leaders, business owners, and teams navigating the space between starting well and finishing well – the part where consistency is tested and interpretation often matters more than effort.
Before coaching, Josie spent close to two decades in government and advisory roles, where she became increasingly interested in why capable people lose confidence in their own performance long before anything is actually going wrong. That question has become the foundation of her work.
Her approach blends behavioural science, practical coaching tools, and lived experience as an endurance athlete, with a focus on helping people make sense of their progress, sustain their energy, and build trust in themselves over time.
Keen to stay connected?
Follow Josie on LinkedIn, or head to www.spring-coaching.com to book a free Action Game Plan session and explore ways to work together.