My life changed forever when my wife and I had our first child.
Becoming a dad has been one of the most defining moments of my life. It’s as if my life is divided into two parts: before I was a dad and after.
But there’s more to the story. Before Noah was born, my wife and I had been pregnant with our very first Baby Blanc. But near the end of the first trimester, we miscarried that child.
I still remember everything so clearly. The joy and excitement of finding out I was going to be a new dad. The pain and bewilderment of losing that baby.
It was a huge jolt to my life that gave me some fresh perspective. It got me asking questions and thinking about my life in a way that brought about more clarity.
This all happened at Christmastime in 2010.
I remember being home with my wife, just days after the miscarriage. Anna and I were having dinner and talking about what we hoped the future would hold for us and the hopes of getting pregnant again one day and starting a family.
In the midst of all this, there were things that had seemed so important at the time suddenly felt not important at all. And things that had merely been side passions now seemed immensely important.
So many of my “priorities” got uprooted. The vision and goals of my life were changing right beneath my feet.
And I knew that it was time to quit my job of 10 years and try my hand at something new…
Sometimes You Need a Jolt to Help You Make a Choice
It sounds so “bold” to say that I quit my job on the cusp of starting a family.
But it wasn’t boldness at all. In fact, it was one of the easiest decisions I’ve ever made. And once I made the choice to quit my job and to start writing my website as my new full-time gig, everything else fell into place.
Do not underestimate the power of decisiveness and action.
Decisiveness brings motivation for action.
Action brings clarity.
And clarity helps us make future decisions.
Why does this matter?
Long-time readers may know just how much I love to geek out over things.
I have a propensity to spend hours and hours (and hours) researching something to death before finally making a decision.
When I want to make a change in my life, or when I want to invest in something that I know will be a critical part of my everyday life, I can obsess over it. Researching, thinking, and talking with people about it. It can literally take me months or years to make a decision (if ever).
My love for learning about and sweating the details is one of my greatest strengths. But it can also be a weakness.
Oftentimes, what we must do is this: Make make the best decision we can, with the information we have, and then get moving.
Once you finally make a choice, the clarity will follow. Not the other way around.
Action brings clarity.
Because I have this propensity to think things to death, I leave a note out for myself at the end of each work day.
By doing this, my “current self” is taking the role of coach or mentor, and I’m helping my “future self” by telling him what to do. If I didn’t do this then I might never get any writing done.
When you’re in that state of indecisiveness, being told what to do can snap you out of things and get you moving.
And then, once you’ve begun moving, the action brings clarity.
So often we want it the other way around. We want to have perfect clarity first, and we assume that the clarity will lead us to action.
Sometimes You Need a Mentor to Help You Make a Choice
As I mentioned, sometimes it takes a tragedy or other type of wake-up call to give us the push we need to get moving.
And there are other times where what we need is to shut up and let someone else tell us what to do so we can just get started already.
In part, that’s exactly what The Focus Course is… It’s a guided and systematic approach that gets you taking action in order to find the focus and clarity you so desperately need.
You could go your own way to get clarity on the principles and action items found within the Focus Course. In fact, I have nothing to hide: I’ve listed out all of the books, articles, podcasts, white papers, and other resources I read as part of my research to create The Focus Course.
But Peter Drucker says that “the greatest wisdom not applied to action and behavior is meaningless data.”
Wisdom alone does not create change. Knowledge does not equal action.
Which is why The Focus Course is about far more than just head knowledge — it’s an introduction to experiential knowledge.
Without any hyperbole, I mean it when I say that The Focus Course can change your life.
However, I’m not here to try and convince you of the power of the Focus Course.
I’m also using it as an example to encourage you that not every decision or project should be researched to death.
If there is something you’re putting off because you think you need to research it more, consider if it’d be better to just start now with the easiest point of activation. And then, let your experiential knowledge bring clarity about what to do next.
Sometimes the best way to get started is to start.
Oftentimes what someone calls “research” or “prudence” is actually just procrastination.
And procrastination left unchecked will gain momentum…
The longer you put something off the easier it becomes to keep putting off.
And, speaking of procrastination, here’s a free gift…
The Procrastinator’s Guide to Progress
This ebook is all about kicking procrastination to the curb.
- Learn what’s feeding your tendency to put things off.
- Start making intentional steps in the right direction.
- Discover the number one, super-duper important thing that can turn you into an unstoppable force. (I’m totally serious about this one.)
- Even learn about the times when you should be listening to your procrastination because it might be telling you something.
All this and more inside just a dozen short sections that cover the areas I have found to be most helpful in my own endeavors to show up every day and do my best creative work.
Over 10,000 people have downloaded this free guide, The Procrastinator’s Guide to Progress. And you can, too.