Postpone Your Impact, and It May Never Happen

You know how frustrating it is to have your flight delayed?

You remember flights, right? We’ll get back to them one day.

The reason flight delays are so frustrating is that you have somewhere you really want to go, and you’re not getting there. You’ve been put in a holding pattern until you take off for your destination.

We can put ourselves in a holding pattern too.

For a long time, I put off starting a podcast. I’m not ready, I said. I don’t know how to do it, I said. I’m scared to do it, I said. I’ve got too much going on, I said.

Those obstacles were real, in my mind. Turns out, they were excuses I used to avoid the discomfort of not knowing, the fear of not doing it well right off the bat, and, honestly, being intimidated by the impact I could have.

That last one was not a way I was used to thinking about myself. I was used to downplaying the impact that I could have. Turns out, that was another way I was “protecting” myself, this time from my ability to change the world in my own way. That required changing me, how I saw myself, and who I could grow into. It was change I was protecting myself from.

Finally, after some particularly masterful coaching, I was able to stop saying I had too much going on, and all the other things, and start the podcast. I started to embrace my worldchanging work of impact in other ways too.

Now, after more tha
200 episodes of the Work Alchemy podcast and guests like Marianne Williamson, Seth Godin, and Prince Ea, I wonder what I could have accomplished if I’d started sooner, the inspiratio
I could have provided, the impact I could have sparked in my audience. I wonder who I could have been, and what that would have led to.

How often do you catch yourself putting off your impact?

The thing is, 3 or 6 months from now, when you say you’re going to work on it, you’ll have lost those 6 months. You can never get them back. That’s the deceptive thing about time – you think you have all the time in the world.

But who would you have influenced? What good would you have done? What satisfaction and fulfillment would you have gained?

Something I’ve heard my clients say: I have things going on in my life and I just can’t focus on that right now. The thing is, you will always have things going on in your life. That’s how life is.

Ultimately, what is bigger and more important than having the impact you want to have with your life and your business?
What is more pressing for the people whose lives you’ll change?
What is more valuable than you growing as a person and a leader so you can have your impact?

The thing is, when you postpone your impact, it may never happen. Life will always get in the way, if you allow it. The months you can’t get back may stretch into years, and you’ll be no closer to having the impact you want to have.

Truth: having impact takes work. It takes digging deep and being real and vulnerable to what your inner workings are. It takes being willing to change and grow into the leader you can be, to have the impact you want to have. That can be why you’re putting it off.

This path is not for everyone, and that’s fine. If you’re really not ready, that’s ok.

But if you are ready, then let’s get to work. You and everyone impacted by you will be that much better off, and sooner.