There is something incredibly convincing about the sentence I’m not ready yet.
It sounds thoughtful. Responsible, even.
I need to learn a little more.
I need to figure a few things out first.
I’ll do it when work settles down.
When the kids are older.
When I have more confidence.
When I know exactly what I’m doing.
I’ve been thinking about that word ready a lot lately, because Jessica and I are kicking off Season 6 of Chasing Brighter with a theme that feels especially relevant to where we are right now: Becoming, Not Arriving.
And the question we started with was simple: What are we waiting for before we allow ourselves to begin?
The more I researched it, the more I started wondering whether “ready” is sometimes the wrong goal entirely.
Maybe We’re Not Waiting for Readiness. Maybe We’re Waiting for Certainty.
There are plenty of legitimate reasons to wait.
Sometimes we need more information. Sometimes the timing really is terrible. Sometimes we need training, money, childcare, support, capacity, or an actual plan.
I don’t want to turn “just start” into another piece of advice that ignores real life.
But there’s another kind of waiting that looks almost identical from the outside.
It’s the waiting where we keep moving the starting line.
We learn one more thing. Research one more option. Rewrite the plan. Decide January will be better. Then March. Then after summer.
Nothing is technically stopping us. We just don’t feel ready.
That’s the part I keep coming back to.
Because maybe what we’re really asking for isn’t readiness.
Maybe we’re asking for some guarantee that beginning won’t make us uncomfortable.
Why Waiting Can Feel So Good—At First
One thing I wanted to understand better after our conversation was why avoiding something can feel strangely relieving, even when it’s something we genuinely want to do.
Psychologist Fuschia Sirois studies procrastination, and her work helped this click for me. Procrastination isn’t necessarily a time-management problem. Often, it has much more to do with managing the uncomfortable emotions attached to a task.
If something makes us feel anxious, uncertain, frustrated, bored, or worried about failing, putting it off gives us something immediately: relief.
For a little while, anyway.
The thing hasn’t gone away. But the uncomfortable feeling gets quieter because we no longer have to confront it right now.
And that makes me think differently about all the very reasonable-sounding things we tell ourselves before beginning.
Sometimes “I need more time” probably does mean I need more time.
But sometimes?
It might mean: I don’t want to feel what starting this is going to make me feel.
That is a much more interesting question.
“I’m Scared” and “I’m Not Ready” Are Not the Same Thing
Jessica made a distinction during this week’s conversation that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about.
Feeling scared doesn’t necessarily mean you’re unprepared.
Those are two different pieces of information.
Fear can tell us that something matters. That there’s uncertainty. That we might be seen trying. That we can’t control the outcome.
It can also tell us to stop.
The problem is that fear doesn’t always know the difference between this is genuinely a bad idea and this is unfamiliar and I don’t know what’s going to happen.
So I’m starting to think there may be a better question than:
Am I ready?
Maybe it’s:
Am I willing?
Am I willing to be new at this?
Am I willing to learn some of it while I’m already doing it?
Am I willing to be uncomfortable without immediately interpreting that discomfort as proof I made the wrong decision?
Am I willing for the first version to look like a first version?
That feels very different from convincing myself that I’m fearless or perfectly prepared.
There Is No Perfect Starting Point
We talk a lot at Chasing Brighter about choosing real over perfect, and I’m realizing that applies to beginnings too.
A perfect beginning assumes perfect conditions.
And real life is not particularly interested in providing those.
There will always be another busy month. Another reason the timing could be better. Another piece of information we could gather.
We explored something similar earlier this year when talking about creating systems that work in actual life rather than only under ideal conditions. One question from that conversation keeps fitting into more places than I expected:
What’s the smallest version of this that would still move things forward?
Maybe beginning works the same way.
Not: How do I execute the entire plan?
Just: What counts as beginning?
Sending the email.
Opening the document.
Making the appointment.
Signing up for the class.
Writing the first paragraph.
Having the first five minutes of the conversation.
The smaller the beginning becomes, the harder it is to argue that we need an entirely different life before we can attempt it.
But I Also Don’t Want to Turn Waiting Into a Character Flaw
This matters to me.
I don’t think every delay needs to become evidence that we’re afraid, self-sabotaging, or failing to believe in ourselves.
Sometimes you’re tired.
Sometimes you genuinely don’t have capacity.
Sometimes you aren’t ready because you actually need something you don’t have yet.
We’ve talked about capacity before at Chasing Brighter because I think women are especially good at turning legitimate limitations into personal shortcomings. I don’t want to do the same thing with starting.
So maybe the goal isn’t to force ourselves to begin everything we’ve ever postponed.
Maybe it’s simply to get more honest about why we’re waiting.
Is there something concrete I need before I start?
Or am I hoping that if I wait long enough, the vulnerability of beginning will disappear?
Because those situations deserve very different responses.
The Question I’m Trying Instead
This week’s Brighter Move on the podcast is almost ridiculously simple: name the thing you’ve been saying “not yet” to.
No five-step plan.
No commitment to change your life by Friday.
Just name it.
I like that because naming something doesn’t require us to pretend we’re ready. It only asks us to stop hiding the thing from ourselves.
Then maybe we can ask:
What would I do this week if being scared were allowed?
Not if I knew it would work.
Not if I suddenly became more confident.
Not if everyone approved.
Just if fear were allowed to come along without getting the deciding vote.
That’s the experiment I’m interested in.
A question to sit with
What are you waiting to feel before you let yourself begin—and is that feeling actually required?
You don’t have to answer quickly.
It might be worth noticing what comes up.
Where I’m Landing—for Now
I’m not convinced that readiness is a place we finally arrive.
At least not for the things that ask us to grow.
Maybe sometimes we prepare as much as we reasonably can, look around at the imperfect conditions of our actual lives, feel the discomfort that’s still there and begin anyway.
Not because we’re certain.
Because we’re willing.
That feels like a fitting place to begin Season 6.
This season is called Becoming, Not Arriving, and all September we’re exploring what happens when we stop treating some future version of ourselves as the woman who finally gets permission to start.
This week’s podcast conversation goes deeper—and more personal—into the things we postpone, the fear underneath “not yet,” and what beginning before you feel completely ready can actually look like.
And next week, we’re pulling on one very specific thread: Why do so many of us keep collecting more experience, credentials, qualifications, and proof before we let ourselves believe we belong in the room?
Apparently, “ready” has a few disguises.
We’re going to talk about them.
Related Article Links
Why we procrastinate and what to do about it, with Fuschia Sirois, PhD
A helpful explanation of procrastination as an emotion-regulation issue rather than simply poor time management.
Frontiers | The ABC of academic procrastination: Functional analysis of a detrimental habit
A research-based deeper look at avoidance, negative emotions, and why the immediate relief we get from postponing something can reinforce procrastination.
American Psychological Association — Procrastination: What It Is, Why It’s a Problem, and What You Can Do About It, Fuschia M. Sirois
APA’s overview of Sirois’s research-based book on procrastination, emotions, and behavior change.
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