I Am Done Waiting to Be Ready

am done waiting to be ready. I am done waiting to get everything perfect. I am done waiting to be perfect. I am going live.

May 20 2012 was the original launch date of this blog. The closer I got to the day, the more pressure I put on myself to get it right. The less the words flowed. The further I got past the date, the more scathing and self-loathing the inner voice became. I shut down and the words stopped.

The blog I envisioned was going to be perfect. The words were going to flow and the prose was going to be lyrical. Then the writer’s block hit. Then the fears of no one reading the blog. The voices started getting louder. I fell pray to their arguments: I cannot do this; my words are not interesting enough. And then the ultimate defeat: I questioned the dream of starting the blog in the first place. What’s the point – who am I to share my life story?

My inner critic was partnering with the idealist in my head – and I was letting them both win. I spent months dismantling a deep desire to share my experience and learnings with the world, a dream that still sends electricity down my body. A desire that’s deeply connected to my purpose in life.

I give birth to this dream – and I was killing the mere possibility of it. I was getting in my own way. It’s a pattern of thought that has realized itself over and over in every corner of my life. I have deep, body shattering desire, and I get energized. I go into planning mode, designing how the outcome will be. I get attached: “It will be perfect and grand,” I say to myself.

Then something does not go according to plan. It always does: writer’s block, discouraging comments, a missed deadline, and on and on. I start using these failures as evidence that my desire was not good enough in the first place. And I blame myself: I am just not good enough to carry this dream out.

Thought by thought, I destroy what I had been deeply wanting. I smother the fire that’s been burning inside of me. I dismantle what is possible for me.

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And then it hit me. These realizations seem to always “hit” me. I have been complicit in idealization and self sabotage. I listened to the voices and let them drown out my desire.

It all became clear, and I knew what I needed to do. I am done waiting waiting for the blog to be perfect. I am done waiting for me to be perfect. I am going with my gut feeling that I am ready to go live with this blog. I am trusting my desire that this is what I want and it is right for me. In whatever happens will be a lesson.

It was not easy writing this, but it was easier. I focused on what I had been wanting in the first place: to share my journey with the world and to live out my life purpose. I want to free myself and release others from the different ways we get in the way of achieving our dreams and what is possible for each and every one of us. I may not get it “right” the first time or the hundredth, but I am willing to try.

And honestly, I could not have designed this more perfectly: a lesson about possibilities helping me launch my blog about opening up to possibilities.

The lesson: I watched myself get caught in idealism and expectations, nearly killing my dream. I got in my own way.

Idealism seems like the right thing to do – we are taught to live according to our ideals and to do the best we can. But it’s tricky. Idealism is narrow-minded and rigid, like a train running on a single set of tracks. There is little room for failure and learning from mistakes – it’s all good or it’s a derailment, and nothing in between. And that immobilized me for months. Cynicism was running not too far behind – when things did not go according to expectation, I made sweeping conclusions that the world is just a rotten place and that I am just not good enough for this.

“Scratch the surface of most cynics and you find a frustrated idealist — someone who made the mistake of converting his ideals into expectations.”
~ Peter Senge

I know why I wanted this blog to be about possibilities. Possibilities open up when we let go of the attachment to the outcome, when we trust our desires and intuition that what we are doing is important. A knowing that my desire is not wrong, my dreams are valid – and that it will take a lot of learning and resilience to keep going. It’s about trusting that process and that things will work out in the end. It’s about focusing your energy on doing your part right – the part that’s coming from your heart and is driven by your intentions, and letting go of outcomes. Let the Universe take care of that.

Possibilism is about awareness and living life with intention – conscious and true to our desires and hearts. It’s about designing life around these principles. At face value, it may seem that it’s about lowering standards. And it’s just the opposite – you are raising your standards when everything you do is done at the highest level of your integrity, at whatever lever you are. Being the best that you can be without worrying about what others thing or will accept. Being gentle on yourself as you are learning – and we’re all learning every day.

In publishing this blog, I realized that what is possible starts with my commitment to my desire – it’s the fuel and the energy that keeps me going on the journey.

“Let hope inspire you, but let not idealism blind you.”
~ Don Henley

This blog is about possibilities – about opening up to failure and learning and not being blinded by a specific outcome. It’s about growing into the person I want to be, and that starts with following my desires. And so the blog goes live. Let the journey begin.