How to Stop Procrastinating On Your Dreams

The solution is simpler than you think

"Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog" by Caspar David Friedrich (1818). Public domain.

What is something that you know you really want to do but keep putting off?

For me, it was becoming a content creator. I knew I wanted to pursue this career path, but it took me years of 'preparation' before I finally decided to start.

I watched hundreds of tutorial videos and guides about content creation for beginners. It made me feel productive at first, as if I was learning a lot and familiarizing myself with the field. After all, I need to know all of these before I can start, right?

I was wrong.

I realized that I was falling into the trap of productive procrastination. Learning is productive, but only when we actually take the next step of applying it. Otherwise, we're merely procrastinating and putting off the actual work that needs to be done.

What inspired me to finally take action is this advice I encountered from one of Ali Abdaal's YouTube videos: "Start before you're ready."

Don't wait until you feel fully 'prepared'—that time will never come. Even the most successful people deal with uncertainties and self-doubt; what makes them different is that they have a bias toward action and start even before they’re ready.

"Starting is the Great Separator. It separates…

• The doers from the do-nots,

• The haves from the have-nots,

• The winners from the whiners, and

• The successful from the unsuccessful.

If a desire were enough, then everyone would be a success. But success is like a book, and starting and finishing are the front and back covers. Until you open that front cover, you can’t experience anything from the pages within."

— John Maxwell

I decided to finally start building my writing portfolio—not just brainstorming, taking notes, and writing incomplete drafts, but actually publishing my work online, one small step at a time.

These are the things I've come to realize:

1. The best way to apply what you’ve learned is to have an output or a concrete project to work on (e.g. starting a blog or newsletter, etc.).

2. You don't wait until you're ready; you just start and figure things out along the way. You can make so much more progress in 1 hour or less by simply taking action, compared to 100 hours researching and trying to 'prepare' yourself.

3. An imperfect start is much better than not starting at all.

Go from “one day” to “day one.”

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P.S. If you’re a newbie creator reading this, please do reach out! I’m also new here and I’d love to connect with you. 💌

Let’s support each other and grow together on this journey! 🌿

— Alea