You’re in the middle of your journey. Whatever that may be; a career, school, parenthood, travel, business, a new goal, a new relationship. You’re in the midst of dozens of journeys it seems, yet you’re unsure about something. You’ve hit a dead end, you’re in a pit of uncertainty, hell you don’t even think that this is the thing. The big thing. The thing you want.

A lot of the time you feel like you’re just floating, trying to make sense of it all. It seems that you haven’t even begun your journey.

“I don’t know what I want to do.”

“I don’t know what I want for a career.”

“I don’t know if I want this person.”

“I don’t know what I want.” Period.

When you have an endless sea of decisions, a few things happen. You feel anxious, directionless, and feel an overwhelming sense of agitation and restlessness. Why? Because you know there is so much to do, so many possibilities yet you do nothing or very little. But why?

Let’s be clear on this logic.

You try to optimise a decision so deeply,

You try to think about every possible outcome,

You spend weeks, months, years thinking about the right choice,

Only to not make a decision and postpone your journey that little bit longer,

Because heavens forbid it turns out to be the wrong decision.

You’ve heard it time and time again that it’s ok to fail yet you don’t seem to put it in action. It’s because you don’t know what you want right?

Wrong, it’s because you want a lot of things, and you don’t like choosing.

Time spent doing one thing is taking away from potential time doing another thing that you might like better, right? You just want the best for you. I get it. We only have one life, we want to optimise this life, but let me rip off that band-aid. This is flawed logic and will only make you miserable after 5, 10, 20 years of waiting or deciding.

If you’re not busy doing, you’ll never figure it out.

Don’t treat your life like a formula you have to spend 10 years writing, only to maybe have the next finite amount of time slightly better off.

This is misguided. Life is meant to be an experience. Not something to be optimised by thinking 24/7 while on autopilot for the next 10 years. You’ll figure out what you want by trying different things, by simple problem solving, by the process of elimination — not a formula.

The best thing about this is that you’ll look back on those decision you actually made, and realise that they were what made the adventure possible, they made you feel fulfilled, overjoyed, maybe uncomfortable or even sad at times… but that’s what a journey is meant to be.

But I realise it’s hard to start. It’s hard to change the routine and it’s hard to break free. No amount of motivation will help unless there’s something practical to do. So here is a place to start.