A Broken Toilet and Borrowed Confidence

It had been a long Friday, and I had no one to blame but myself.

I had stacked my calendar like a Jenga tower—four events in one day, each involving clients I love, and work felt life-giving. But even good things, when piled too high, can become too much.

By the time I finished the final workshop, I was running on fumes. I tore apart my backpack, hoping to find a granola bar. Nothing. I checked my car console. Empty. I even cracked open my glove compartment—a home for forgotten things—still nothing.

So, I drank a massive bottle of water like it was a meal replacement plan and headed home.

When I finally made it through my front door, I knew my priorities: Go straight to the bathroom because, the water. And then, fix dinner because I was hangry. Very hangry.

But before I could escape the bathroom, I heard that unmistakable sound. The toilet was running.

I took off the lid and noticed that the flapper was stuck. That’s an easy fix. I adjusted it, waited for the tank to refill, confirmed all was well, and then, without thinking, I did something spectacularly foolish.

I quickly flipped the porcelain lid back on the tank, except … it wasn’t graceful. It slipped out of my hands, landed on the edge of the tank, and the entire toilet bowl cracked wide open.

This was not just a hairline crack. It was a seismic event. I had created a canyon from the top of the tank to the bottom, and now there was a waterfall cascading onto my bathroom floor.

All I could do was shut off the water, throw down every towel I owned, and silently question the life choices that had led me to this moment.

I was furious at my decision to flip the lid. At my overbooked calendar. At the cracked toilet. And at myself.

So, I did the next right thing. I ate dinner.

And at the end of that meal, as my humanity slowly returned, I faced the real problem: My house has one bathroom. One. And plumbing emergencies don’t have the decency to occur during business hours.

I knew I had two choices. I could pay a plumber triple-time to come on a Friday night, or I could fix it myself.

Doing it myself felt like a gamble. I am not a plumber. I know enough to adjust a flapper—but this would require an entire toilet installation. It felt absurd to even think about this option.

But then I did what all modern humans do, I searched YouTube.

Turns out people replace toilets all the time. Regular people. People with no plumbing degree. People with average video skills who record every step.

I wasn’t yet convinced. So, I texted a group of college friends, briefly explained my situation, and asked, “Am I capable of replacing a toilet?”

The responses came in fast. They were confident and encouraging. Not one of them hesitated.
They believed in me more than I believed in myself.

So I drove to a home improvement store, where I met Larry, who has lived more decades than I have. He was genuinely thrilled at the opportunity to help me.

I showed him a picture of the shattered toilet and told him I wanted the exact same model. He nodded and tracked down that model. But before loading it onto the cart, I paused and asked, “Larry… please be honest with me. Do you think I can actually do this?”

And Larry—who had known me for all of five minutes—suddenly became my personal confidence coach. He talked me through every step, explained every part included in the box, and convinced me that I could do this.

I went home with a toilet in my trunk and a heart full of internet strangers, a handful of longtime friends, and one enthusiastic retiree cheering me on.

And guess what happened next? I installed the toilet. It took WAY longer than it should have! But I did it. And on that night, I was reminded of two important life lessons.

The first is that sometimes we need to borrow other people’s confidence. I needed the YouTube hosts, my college friends, and Larry to believe I could do this because I did not believe it myself. Their confidence was like scaffolding. Steady enough for me to climb until I could finally stand on my own.

As a Coach, I often did this for others. There were countless times when a player would tell me they were struggling with their confidence, and I would find myself saying, “Oh, I am very confident in your abilities. Borrow my confidence until you have your own.”

That night, while installing a toilet for the first time, I found myself on the other side of that conversation.

But the other important reminder for me was this: we often don’t feel ready to do something until after we have done it. I did NOT feel ready to tackle that project, but after doing it, now I feel ready.

We often wait and wait and wait to feel ready before we act. We think, “I’ll do it once I feel ready.” Or, “I’ll take action once my fear settles.” But what if readiness isn’t a prerequisite? What if readiness is a result?

There may be something in your life or leadership right now—something you want, something you need, something you keep pushing to “later” or “someday”, because you don’t feel ready. But what if the only way you’ll ever feel ready is to do the thing you want to do?

The moments that nearly break us are often the ones that invite us to borrow the confidence of others and remind us that feeling ready may come after we do the thing we don’t feel ready to do.  

And the next time you aren’t feeling ready to tackle a task, just log on to YouTube. You will quickly discover a world of confident people who–qualified or not–are doing the very thing you want to do.