In this episode:

why waiting until you ‘feel ready’ can be a form of procrastination and being a perfectionist
how starting before I felt ready has helped me

I’m a recovering perfectionist. I used to obsess over the tiny little details, making sure everything was perfect before I hit that publish button.

It’s not a bad thing to have that attention to detail and desire to ensure the content you make and put out into the world is of a good standard - because after all, it represents you and your brand, right?

The problem is when we let that perfectionism stop us from moving forward. Have you held off from posting something or launching something because you just need a little bit more time to perfect it? If you’re anything like me, that “little bit more time” can turn into months of inaction.

The hard truth that I had to learn was that: publishing something faster, even when it’s not ‘perfect’, can be much more valuable than posting it months, or years later.

This is not to say that it’s quantity over quality or that quality doesn’t matter, but if you’re the type of person to obsess over perfecting the last 0.01% of your project, then you’re probably not going to get much done.

How much impact will ‘perfecting’ that 0.01% have? Rather than just hitting publish, learning from it, and moving onto the next thing? Is that really the best use of your time and efforts?

Part of me is still in denial about shipping something that’s not ‘perfect’, but I when I have challenged myself to get more comfortable with the concept of ‘done not perfect’, I have learnt and grown so much more as a result.

If I let perfectionism get in the way, I would not have started making studio vlogs when I did. I would’ve waited until I had the right studio space.

I would not have launched this podcast when I did and would have kept putting it off until I felt more confident (but it’s only by doing these episodes that I get more confident!).

From personal experience, I have been able to accomplish and improve what I have because I started before I was ready. I felt the fear, pushed through it, and did what I wanted to anyway. I didn’t let it stop me because I knew that it was just insecurity and self-doubt that stopped me from taking action, and that’s not how I wanted to live.

So my question to you is: are you putting something off because you’re actually afraid of taking action? Are you procrastinating by focusing on the little details that don’t really matter? Will you be glad you started a year from now?

Hey guys, welcome to episode 2 of the (un)planned Podcast.
First of all, thank you so much for your kind and supportive reception of the first episode. It was really scary and exciting at the same time but I am glad I put it out there and it kind of brings me to the theme of this episode which is to start before you're ready because honestly I was not ready at all.
I felt like I could've prepared a lot more, I could've done a lot more behind-the-scenes work before I launched but I've gone through enough moments in my life and business now that I really value the importance of starting before you're ready so I want to dive into that a little more to help you especially if you're a perfectionist or you just have insecurities or fears that hold you back.
First of all, it's really important to identify why you're putting something off or why you're not jumping into a project and just getting started.
There are a number of different factors that could be stopping you from starting something or even just launching something.
So a really good example that I see happen to a lot of people is they're trying to launch their website, whether it's for their shop or just a personal portfolio.
What people tend to do is really spend a lot of time working on their website.
It's an important part... making it look pretty, making sure you have the right copy and images but people tend to spend a lot longer than needed on the website and they're so set on making sure that the website looks and feels a certain way before they launch.
I'm not saying that you shouldn't do that but I'm talking to the people that use it as an excuse not to launch and this applies to anything, not just a website, I'm just using that as a specific example but I know people that will not launch because they want to work on the website a little more, make this font bold or make it a little bit bigger, but in the grand scheme of things, like if you take a step back and think about it, those things aren't completely essential to whatever you're launching.
I think it's much more beneficial and valuable to launch faster than to spend that time instead trying to perfect the website when these tiny little details don't always make the biggest difference.
I think we have a bad habit of procrastinating in ways that we think we're being busy but we're actually not, we're just delaying the scary big thing that we don't want to do and a website is one of those.
A personal example of mine is when I wanted to start a YouTube channel, it's technically my second but we're not going to go into that, it was really scary for me. I wanted to do studio vlogs.
Did I feel ready? Absolutely not because I was working out of my mum's garage. It was really dark in there, it was really messy, I didn't really have many products to list in my shop, I didn't have many products in my shop and I felt like my day-to-day was really boring, I didn't really have anything to show on my studio vlogs but there was this nagging feeling - I honestly at the time said to myself, I'll do a studio vlog, like I'll start making studio vlogs when I move out, when I have my own studio, then I'll do it because it'll be nicer, it'll be more interesting for people, people don't want to see me work in a garage where it's really dark and it's really boring but you know, the rest is history, obviously I did do it but the reasoning behind that was: there was this nagging feeling of… I can learn so much more if I start now, rather than push it off till later.
And I started to reframe it as: okay, my life's not perfect, it's never going to be perfecteven though I think "Oo once I get my studio, it's going to be perfect" and I thought that that was the ingredient I needed in order to make studio vlogs but it was just an excuse I was telling myself so I reframed my studio vlogs to be more of me documenting my journey.
And some of you that have watched me from the beginning, you know that that's exactly what I've done and if I didn't start making studio vlogs when I did, in my mum's garage, I probably would not be here where I am today.
It has been a really important learning experience for me. I have learnt so much along the way from the very beginning than if I had just waited until I felt ready.
And what I've learnt in hindsight from a few other similar experiences like that is that most of the time, probably all the time, you'll never feel ready.
There's not going to be that one lightbulb or switch flipped moment where you feel absolutely ready to take on the project that you've been avoiding.
If you've been avoiding and procrastinating and being busy but not really productive, then most likely you're not going to feel ready.
And from personal experience, from other similar moments when I have started before I was ready, when I launched before I was ready, I have never regretted that decision because I had the advantage of time. I might not have been ready but if I didn't launch or I didn't start this one project until a few months later or a year later, that time period, those few months or that year, was an opportunity for me to learn and grow and get better and improve because nobody starts something absolutely perfect the first time.
That's a big thing that holds people back. They don't feel like they have the right space, they don't really have the right equipment but they forget that everyone starts somewhere.
No one's first video, well hardly ever, does anyone start something and they're amazing the first time and I think that's really important to remember.
You need to remind yourself: everyone starts somewhere. My first video? Pretty terrible.
But I'm proud of it because I took that scary step of starting and just doing it. And have I improved since then? Absolutely.
So I don't want you to look at my vlogs now and think that that's the standard for starting because I've had over a year experience and that's what people forget. They might compare themselves to artists on Instagram who are on a very, very different journey, who are at a very different time of their life and they forget that there are years of experience and learning and mistakes and failings behind that, that you don't necessarily always see, it's not always obvious.
So I think it's important no matter what you do, to remind yourself that everyone starts somewhere and everyone is at a different stage of their journey and their life, everyone's journey looks completely different and that you're just going to get better the more that you do something.
Here's another example of mine: for this podcast, I was not really prepared. Not really! I had enough to just kind of get started but because I have the advantage of hindsight and I know how my previous projects have went, I had the belief that I could figure it out as I went. And that's exactly what I'm doing.
You've got to start to practice trusting in yourself, trusting in the process and trusting that: no matter what the outcome will be, you will be okay and you will learn so much along the way. And that nobody is perfect when they first start.
When I did my very first podcast for my Patreon, it didn't sound like this, I didn't talk like this, it took months and months of practice before I felt like I could talk in a complete sentence. And I still remember very vividly when I first started talking on camera in my studio vlogs, I struggled a lot to talk to the camera and to keep eye contact.
And some of you know that, and some of you remember that part of my journey but it's easy to forget when you only see where someone is at a different stage of their life.
And it's easy to put so much pressure on yourself but you need to allow yourself to just start somewhere. Start before you're ready.
Obviously, do some preparation, do some planning, but don't be excessive about it. Don't spend months and months delaying and procrastinating and being busy and not really launching or doing that thing that you really want because you're scared.
And we'll go into, in a future episode, more about your fears and the self-limiting beliefs that are holding you back but I want this episode to be a reminder that everybody starts somewhere.
Nobody is perfect the first time they do something... If they are, they're an anomaly. They're not the standard, they're the exception.
So it is perfectly normal to do something for the first time and be completely bad at it. That's fine, that's called growing! And the next time you do it, you'll get a little bit better and it might take some time but then you need to allow yourself to just start somewhere.
So I hope you found that useful, that little bit of tough love, that little kick in the butt to get you started if you've been holding off from doing something.
Next week, I'm going to answer a question.
We're going to be alternating so this week was my ramble, my personal little ramble, but next week we're going to do a Q&A and we're going to keep alternating that way.
Thank you so much for listening and for joining me this week. I'll be seeing you the same time (I hope) next week.
Don't forget that you can send me voice messages through my Anchor link or through my email.
Thank you for listening and good bye!