The Time is Now

What are you waiting for? Yes, I’m putting the question to you, but it is also directed at myself. It’s a question that came up repeatedly as my partner’s mother experienced her end-of-life journey, and then transitioned from this world into the next. The recent passing of my Aunt Olga—whose brightness of life inspired me to live my life fully—again puts that question front and centre. Because too many of us, myself included, keep waiting for the circumstances to be perfect before we act on our dreams. But here’s the thing we still don’t get: the time is now.

Push Past the Fear

For a long time, I let fear hold me back from pursuing a lot of things that interested me. At the beginning of my writing journey, I didn’t submit my work for publication because I feared rejection. When I finally started submitting my work, the rejection letters quickly piled up but eventually the acceptance letters rolled in, too. Even though I’d been running for years, I repeatedly told myself I had no interest in running a full marathon. The truth, however, was that I feared I couldn’t physically do it; but with training and determination, I ran my first full marathon in 2019.

Fear, if we let it, will keep us stuck—holding us back from our dreams and the life we imagine for ourselves. That is why we must push past the fear, why the time is now to act. It’s too easy to stay where we are by not doing the things we know we must do to succeed. But as Eric Thomas writes in You Owe You, “On the road to success, you cannot afford to make excuses.”¹

The Time is Now

The time is now. To act. To work on our dreams. And dare to become who we believe we can become. It’s not that we have to make dramatic changes in our lives, but that every day we take one small step, one small action that moves us and our dreams forward. If we don’t do anything, if we let fear—or other people’s opinions and expectations—hold us hostage, then nothing changes.

Stop waiting. Stop putting off until tomorrow what must be done today. This is your life. Because tomorrow isn’t guaranteed to any of us, make today count.

Today, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And, best of all, you do not need anyone’s permission to be—unapologetically—who you are.

1. Thomas, E. (2022). You Owe You: Ignite Your Power, Your Purpose, and Your Why, New York, Rodale, p. 16. [↩]