“It’s a terrible thing, I think, in life to wait until you’re ready. I have this feeling now that actually no one is ever ready to do anything. There is almost no such thing as ready. There is only now. And you may as well do it now. Generally speaking, now is as a good a time as any.” — Hugh Laurie
It is 149 days to New Year’s Day 2020. That’s still a fair wait for new resolutions, and so sometimes I look for other good milestone dates to make changes to my life.
“Starting 1 August, I’ll cut down on eating out…” I might tell myself.
“I’ll return to exercise classes after the visitors leave.”
“I’ll wait until my birthday.”
“Christmas.”
“2020.”
Harvard Business School researchers, in studying entrepreneurs, have found that they more likely start out poor than rich. In fact, Professor Howard Stevenson of HBS defined entrepreneurship in 1983 as “the pursuit of opportunity without regard to resources currently controlled.” (It’s still widely quoted today.) In other words, entrepreneurs don’t feel constrained to pursue opportunities “just because” they lack resources like time, contacts, and money. It is precisely because they are used to the lack of them that they are comfortable making do.
They want it, they go for it, they make do along the way. They “figure out the best conceivable option and then make it available.” If you want something done, they say, ask a busy person.
Isn’t it strange (and a little presumptuous of us) how we always assume we’ll have “later”? Whatever is on our “later” list, won’t we be glad a year from today if we start now?
