Start Before You’re Ready

“Start before you’re ready. Don’t prepare, begin.” These words of Mel Robbins have been pressing on my heart lately. How many times have we heard “I don’t think I’m ready” when we see why someone isn’t chasing after a big desire? I’ve heard it and I’ve been guilty of saying it. But when you take a minute to process those words, in reality, they’re only holding you back from your potential.

A friend came to me to ask advice about starting an entrepreneurial venture about a year ago, and the words from her mouth were “I don’t know if I’m ready, maybe next year.” My response was: “What makes you think in a year you’ll be ready?” In truth, we tend to put off what we really want because of fear. Fear of failure. Fear of disappointment. Fear of the unknown. We waste time because we think that if we gather all the resources first then we can perfect that thing, but in the end, all we did was waste time. You’ll wish you would have started sooner. A friend of mine was afraid of leaving her full time job and venturing out on an entrepreneurial opportunity , and thought “maybe I should just wait.” I’m glad that she decided not to do that, because now, her business is growing because she took a chance and chose to start before she was ready. Don’t miss out on your opportunity because you’d feel better waiting. Don’t make decisions based on your feelings, they will come and go, and you will be left wondering why you let that slip through your fingers.

We’ve all heard the saying “If you wait until you’re ready you’ll be waiting for the rest of your life,” and it’s so true. You’ll never just wake up one day and think “okay, now I’m ready.” You will, however, wake up and regret an opportunity missed because you waited too long. I know this is especially true with relationships. Relationships require two different people to share one vision, and if your goals and values aren’t headed in the forward direction, you will become complacent in the wait. Too many people that I know have lost people dear to them and I always hear “I wish I had more time with him/her.” Which begs the question: what are you doing with the time that you have? Are you waiting for the “opportune moment” to ask her/him out? To get engaged? To get married? To have kids? Please understand this, there is no such thing as an opportune moment. There will always be another excuse, another thing in the way…so what are you waiting for? Take that leap now. From a Christian perspective, we believe that God has perfect timing for everything. We know that He will bring something/someone into our in His timing and not ours, so we shouldn’t try to force anything.  But let me ask you this, if God declared it to happen and delivers it in your path, and you try to take matters into your own hands to stop it from happening, isn’t that the same?? Being ready isn’t determined by you, it’s determined by God.

Readiness requires growth, and you’re always going to need to grow. Everything that you have right now qualifies you to be ready for the next thing, but that doesn’t mean you’ll stop growing along the way. You most likely aren’t the best at whatever it is that you want to do, and that’s fine. You will always be growing and getting better. If you’re not growing, what are you doing? On that note, you should not be half-growing. If you’re getting better in your job or slaying at the gym but your personal relationships are faltering, it’s time to fix your priorities. Growth requires the best of you in every area of your life.

The right kind of growth will always be centered around relationships. Who do you have in your corner? When you think that you aren’t ready to handle something, who is speaking into reminding you that you can? If you have been told by people to “take your time,” “don’t worry about it,” etc., those aren’t people that are pushing you to the next level. You need people to tell you to take the risk, go out and get it, change your attitude towards something, who encourage and support you. I’ve had someone tell me that their friend said “well that’s not like you” as they were growing in their character and not acting like the old them. That is not a healthy friendship. If someone is holding you to the standards of your past, cut them loose. You are supposed to change. You are supposed to grow. In growth, your character will change. Priorities will change. You may not be the same person your friends knew and that’s okay. I for one am so different now than 5 years ago, and I make sure when anyone says “oh you’re different now” I exclaim a big “thank God.” Relationships move your readiness forward. You will either have people telling you that you can’t do something, you should wait, you’ll be fine, or you’ll have people telling you that you can do it, you have this amazing opportunity, and you are destined to succeed. Proverbs 27:17 says “As iron sharpens iron so one man sharpens another.” Who is sharpening you?

James Clear said one of my favorite things about this in speaking on successful people on his blog: “If you’re working on something important, then you’ll never feel ready. A side effect of doing challenging work is that you’re pulled by excitement and pushed by confusion at the same time. You’re bound to feel uncertain, unprepared, and unqualified. But let me assure you of this: what you have right now is enough. You can plan, delay, and revise all you want, but trust me, what you have now is enough to start. It doesn’t matter if you’re trying to start a business, lose weight, write a book, or achieve any number of goals… who you are, what you have, and what you know right now is good enough to get going. We all start in the same place: no money, no resources, no contacts, no experience. The difference is that some people — the winners — choose to start anyway.”

Start before you’re ready. Don’t lose your opportunity. The world will always keep moving, the people around you will keep moving. If you wait too long to do something, don’t expect it to still be there in the end. I want to think about what in your life you’ve been putting off exclaiming that you’re not ready. How are you preparing for that thing? Because saying you’re not ready and not doing anything to get ready isn’t going to help you at all. But understand that most things just require a leap of faith. Now please use your discernment here, don’t go buying a house without any money. But that business that you’ve been too fearful to start? Start it. That workout plan that you keep putting off? Begin. Don’t prepare, begin. Believe that if God brought you to it He will bring you through it.