Are we waiting too long to be ready?

How many times do we postpone something we want because we are waiting for the fear to disappear, for circumstances to improve, or to finally be completely certain of our decision? The problem is that complete certainty usually never arrives, and while we calculate how much a wrong decision might cost us, we rarely calculate the cost of the one we never made.

There are decisions we postpone for months, sometimes years. A job we want to leave, an idea we want to try to realize, a city we would like to live in, a relationship we want to start or end. Planning a pregnancy, planning a vacation, planning additional education, all of it waits for us to be 100% ready. In the meantime, we gather information, make "pros" and "cons" lists, ask friends, colleagues, acquaintances what they think, and wait for the moment when we will finally be sure. The problem is that the certainty we imagine often never comes.

It is not uncommon to be guided by misconceptions when making important decisions and taking the first step. They provide us with comfort and reasons to remain in the embrace of our routine, which often isn't particularly good, but is at least familiar. We know what to expect from it, we've learned to live with its flaws, and, perhaps most importantly, it doesn't ask us to risk what we already have for something we don't know if we will ever get.

Misconception No. 1: Someone else is already doing it better

Today, when social media and easily accessible superficial information make it seem like everyone leads perfect lives, the fear of making a mistake easily disguises itself as rationality. It is not the right time yet. We should have more money. The children are too young. The competition is too big. Someone else is already doing it better.

And then come the questions. What if it fails? What if it succeeds, and then I realize it isn't what I wanted at all?

Most major life decisions come with neither a trial period nor a money-back guarantee. We cannot know in advance whether a new job will turn out better, whether a project will succeed, or whether in five years we will be thanking ourselves for leaving or wondering why we needed to do it.

And yet, we often act as if complete certainty is a prerequisite for action. And so what we call waiting for the right moment sometimes becomes a very polite way of doing absolutely nothing for years.

Misconception No. 2: We can get a guarantee that we won't make a mistake

We have never had so much information at our disposal before making a decision. Before we book a hotel, we can read hundreds of reviews from people who slept there before us. Before we buy a fifty-euro cream, we will check TikTok, Reddit, the ingredients, and user ratings. Google Maps will show us what the street we are traveling to looks like, and Instagram the restaurant where we haven't eaten yet.

When it comes to important things, we do the same. We read the experiences of people who changed careers in their forties. We research how difficult it is to start our own business. We check apartment prices in the city we are considering moving to. We ask friends, our partner, parents, a therapist, and, increasingly, Chat GPT.

Gathering information is naturally useful, but the problem arises when we expect something from information that it cannot give us: a guarantee that we won't make a mistake.

We can read one more article, ask one more person, make one more spreadsheet... At a certain point, however, we no longer learn anything new. We know enough. We just don't like the fact that we will ultimately have to decide without the ability to see the consequences in advance.

Misconception No. 3: Familiar discomfort sometimes seems less dangerous than an unknown possibility

Psychology has a name for our tendency to stick to the current state: status quo bias. People actually disproportionately choose the existing option, even when offered alternatives.

That is why we can be dissatisfied with a job, a relationship, or the way we live for years, while what we already have still seems safer than the alternative. At least we know its flaws.

We know how much the boss annoys us, how much we earn, what Mondays are like, and how long it takes us to get to the office. There is also loss aversion, one of the best-known concepts in behavioral economics. We tend to give more weight to a potential loss than to a comparable gain.

When thinking about quitting a job, we can quickly list what we lose: a steady salary, familiar colleagues, status, routine. What we might gain is much more abstract. More freedom? A job we love more? Higher earnings? A better life? All of this has yet to be realized.

Even when it comes to a toxic work environment or a job we can no longer stand, what we are leaving behind remains concrete. What we are heading towards has yet to become reality.

And sometimes we are paralyzed by something else: a deeply rooted idea that perhaps we don't even deserve more, better, or happier. That our current dissatisfactions are actually just proof that we are not grateful enough for what we have.

But that is a topic for another article.

Misconception No. 4: If I don't make a decision, my options are still open

Not making a decision is also a decision. There is no clear moment after which we can say: there, I just decided. We simply continue living as before.

A year spent at a job we want to leave is also the consequence of a decision. Just like five more years in a city we no longer want to live in.

An idea we never tried to realize also comes with a price, only it isn't payable immediately. It appears later, in the form of wondering what would have happened if we had tried.

This, of course, doesn't mean we should quit our jobs, move to Portugal, and open a ceramics studio just so we won't have regrets one day. When assessing the risk of a decision, we analyze the cost of action very closely, and the cost of inaction much less.

What will happen if I try and fail?

What will happen if I don't try for another three years?

Sometimes "I am not ready" actually means "I AM AFRAID"

Of course, there are situations where we are genuinely not ready. We cannot declare every fear irrational and romanticize every risk as courage. If we don't have money for rent, quitting without a plan isn't necessarily an act of personal liberation. If we lack the knowledge required for a job we want to do, maybe we really need to learn something first.

The problem lies in distinguishing preparation from endlessly preparing for the preparation itself. We can complete another course. Save a little more. Spruce up the portfolio some more. Wait a bit longer for the children to grow. See what happens at work first. Spend another year developing an idea before showing it to anyone. There is always something more we can do before we start.

Sometimes for months, sometimes for years, and sometimes for so long that eventually we don't even know if we are truly waiting for a better moment or if we have simply grown accustomed to waiting.

Courage is much less spectacular than it looks from the outside

We usually imagine courage in retrospect. Someone left a secure job and founded a successful company. Moved to another city and found their life there. Sent a manuscript that was rejected ten times before someone published it. Changed careers, left a bad relationship, started over. When we already know the end of the story, the beginning acquires a meaning it did not have at the time.

The decision looks brave because we know it succeeded, yet the person who made it did not have information about the ultimate success.

They only had what we all have before important decisions: some data, their own assessment, a desire to change something, and a fairly long list of everything that can go wrong.

Courage therefore doesn't have to look like the moment fear disappears. It much more often looks completely routine, but persistent: we send an application, arrange a meeting, voice an idea out loud. We admit that we no longer want something. We take the next step even though we still aren't sure exactly where it will lead us.

How much does waiting cost us?

We like to talk about wrong decisions because they are visible. We can point to them and say: I made a mistake there. It is much harder to point to a life that didn't happen.

We won't know how a career we never tried to build would have ended, what life would be like in a city we didn't move to, or what would have happened to a project left saved somewhere in the notes on our phone.

And this is, actually, what we have the hardest time making peace with: there is no amount of preparation that will completely remove uncertainty from a serious life decision.

We can gather information, make a financial plan, we can talk to people we trust. We can assess what we might lose and whether we have a way to recover if things go wrong. These are all good reasons not to make decisions impulsively.

Sometimes waiting will be the best decision we could have made, but if we have been waiting for years to stop feeling fear before doing something we want, it is worth asking ourselves another question, how much has waiting to be ready cost us so far?

How to make an important decision more easily?

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What am I actually waiting for?

If we are waiting for a concrete thing, to save a certain amount, finish an education, or resolve a family situation, postponing can make sense. If we are just waiting to wake up one morning without fear, we could be waiting a very long time.

What is the worst realistic scenario?

Not the worst scenario we can imagine at three in the morning, but what can genuinely happen. Can we lose money, return to our old job, change the plan? And, more importantly, could we recover from that?

How final is the decision, really?

We often preemptively give major decisions the weight of something that will define our lives forever. Some truly do have large and hard-to-reverse consequences, but many still allow for course correction.

What do I get if I change nothing?

We usually know how to answer this question very quickly: safety, a familiar routine, stability. It is worth immediately adding a second one: what do I lose by doing so?

What would I advise someone else in the same situation?

We recognize much more easily when a friend stays at a job that exhausts her, when someone talks for years about a project they never start, or when a person we love convinces themselves that it isn't the right time yet.

We often see other people's problems more clearly because we aren't emotionally invested in them. Stepping back from our own situation can show how much we have magnified certain risks simply because they apply to us.

Will I have some important information in six months that I don't have today?

If we will, waiting has a purpose. If in six months we will have the same information, the same arguments, and the same fear, then time itself will probably not resolve the dilemma.