The Hidden Power of Starting Before You Feel Ready

People tend to procrastinate because they just aren’t ready to take action. They wait until they have their perfect time, more knowledge or complete confidence before they begin a new thing. But in reality, readiness is not something that you feel ready for, it’s something you become ready for through action. If you begin before you are ready, it feels strange and uncomfortable initially. You make mistakes, get confused, and sometimes you get in doubt. But it is at this stage that real growth starts. Confidence is not gained from preparation alone; it comes with experience. Even if it doesn’t go the way you want, you still get feedback that is useful and helpful to you to get better and further.

Waiting for “the right time” can often just cause you to become lost in a cycle of overthinking and preparing without making any progress. You can have a lot of knowledge and learn a lot of things from theory but if you don’t use them it’s just a waste. The opposite is true however, when you take action – even at a small level – early on, you soon realize what you do need to know. This provides clarity and direction, which cannot be achieved in any planning.

Beginning before you’re ready creates momentum. You can start and then easily keep going, making adjustments and improvements as you go. Practice makes for skills, not mistakes. Don’t get confident in advance of doing something, you get confident because you did it. That’s why action beats waiting. Well, that’s not true, no one feels ready all the time. Those that grow do; those that don’t don’t.