Move Before You're Ready

I was at an online coaching conference recently. One of the panellists, Miko, was asked how you support leaders who are risk-averse and driving change.

His answer was short. "Those people will need to suffer. Suffer enough. And then they will awaken. That is the only way."

The chat lit up. And I've been sitting with it since.

Is he right?

In my experience working with leaders, the ones who won't move until every condition is perfect, until they have all the information, until they feel completely ready, often don't move until something forces them to. A restructure. A health scare. A relationship that finally breaks.

The world does the cracking open that the person wasn't willing to do themselves.

There's truth in what Miko said. But I've also been sitting with something else.

A different answer to the same question

My husband's TEDx talk was just published a few weeks ago (proud wife plug!) I heard his speech at least 100 times, and it still leaves a mark.

Seán spent years in humanitarian logistics, deploying to crises around the world. In the talk he describes a moment in Switzerland: a safe job, a promotion on the table, a pull he couldn't name. He kept telling himself to wait. To be sensible. To feel ready before he moved.

What his coach helped him see was that he wasn't stuck because he didn't know what to do. He was stuck because he was afraid of who he'd disappoint if he chose a different path.

Once he saw it, he couldn't unsee it. Standing still stopped being an option for him.

What followed was a resignation, a move to the Democratic Republic of Congo, and eventually a handshake with a stranger in the Philippines that built a humanitarian response operation in less than 24 hours. Not because he had a plan. Because he had moved.

Two different things

I think Miko and Seán are describing two different paths to the same place.

Miko describes what happens when you don't choose. Sean describes what happens when you do. I notice the discomfort in both cases, and the question is whether you wait for the world to force it, or whether you move before it gets to that.

Here's what I find interesting. The people I work with often aren't risk-averse in the way that word usually means. External risk, taking on a difficult role, stepping into uncertainty at work, operating in challenging environments, that they can do. They've done it.

But personal risk is different. A decision about their own career. A change they know they need to make. Reaching out for support. That's where we wait. We wait for the right moment. We wait until everything is sorted in our heads. We wait until we feel ready enough.

And that waiting becomes the thing that keeps us stuck.

Seán's closing invitation in the talk is simple: name the decision you've been delaying, find one person who can help you see it more clearly, and take one step.

Not when you're ready. Before.

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If you've been waiting for the right moment to reach out, this might be it. If you'd like to think something through, hit reply or book a discovery call here.

With you,
Linda

Founder of Touching Distance