The Thing You Keep Almost-Doing

You know which thing.

It's been on the list for three months. Or three years. The shape is consistent: every two weeks you decide now, and every two weeks something else costs less attention, and the not-doing wins by default. The not-doing always wins by default. That's the whole architecture of not-doing — it doesn't have to be chosen.

You think you'll do it when work calms down. Work will not calm down. Work's calm has been promised since 2019 and is still in the mail.

You think you'll do it when you have more energy. The energy you're saving for the doing is the energy that not-doing is consuming. Every two weeks of not yet is paid for in the same currency you'd spend doing it. The bill is identical. You're paying for the seat without watching the movie.

You think you'll do it after one more conversation, one more piece of information, one more sign. The signs have been very clear for a long time. More signs is not a strategy. It's a stalling tactic dressed as research.

Here's what's true. The thing you're putting off is not waiting for the right time. It is waiting for you to age out of it. That's a different kind of waiting. Time is doing the deciding for you, slowly, and you will be relieved of the choice eventually, in the worst possible way: by becoming someone who never had it.

That's not hope. That's the floor. Stay with it for a second.

The hope: the decision was never which way to go. The decision was always whether to decide. Which way mostly takes care of itself once you stop letting time do it. Not always — sometimes you decide and you're wrong. That's fine. Wrong-decisions can be re-decided. The thing that can't be re-decided is the decade of almost.

So: this week. Not the perfect week. Not when you're ready — ready will not arrive. Not after one more conversation. The thing you've been almost-doing — the conversation you've been almost-having, the email you've been almost-sending, the appointment you've been almost-booking, the resignation you've been almost-writing — pick it. Today. Not because the moment is right. Because the moment is now, and the only difference between now and the next not-yet is that this one is the one you noticed.

If you don't do it today, do it tomorrow. If you don't do it tomorrow, this letter is a coward and should be ignored.

But you do not get to keep both: the thing you want, and the not-doing of it. The not-doing is making the choice for you. Stop letting it.

The first move is small. Aging out is large. Pick the small one.

— Linn