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Lesson #31: Are excuses holding you back?

You may not have enough space, but you can still get the job done.

You may not have enough space, but you can still get the job done.

You will never have enough resources. You will never have enough time. Opportunities will never arrive with convenient, advanced notice. You will never have enough information. You will never have enough training or experience.

It's not a charity thing. It's a "trying to accomplish things no one has ever accomplished before" thing.

If I could go back in time, I'd tell myself this:

"It's easy to approach your work with excuses in the charity world. Some of the work we do is so draining, so emotional, that it can even be a kind of armour. Resist."

It's easy to say “I could have done better if I had more time, more resources, more information, more training.”

Resist. 

Because real failure comes when you approach work armed with excuses. It makes you feel better about yourself for a short time. But it holds you back.

Excuses keep you living in a nice, comfortable box where you slowly but surely make it okay to achieve less. Except, the problems you're trying to solve will impact the lives of millions of people. It's not okay to aim low.

When you protect yourself with excuses, you also strip yourself of agency. Success comes from you and your talents, but all shortcomings are the fault of constraints imposed upon you by the world. Give that thinking enough time, and you'll stop believing that you actually have the ability to change the world.

There are a million legitimately good excuses to give up, to achieve less, or to distance yourself from the impact of your work.

None of them matters

We need to talk

Lesson #30: The most important work has no deadline. It's already due.