If you want to reach your dreams, if you want to achieve your goals, if you want to feel fulfilled spiritually and emotionally, then you need to learn the difference between bad timing and random excuses. 

Sometimes, you’re right to wait to make a move on someone you’re crushing on, to pivot career paths, to move across the country, to see the world, to break up with your partner, to quit your job, to start up a new business.

Sometimes, the timing really is bad. Sometimes, making such a big change would put you in a difficult position, but waiting a little while longer would truly be beneficial. Sometimes, you’re doing the best thing by remaining patient, by not getting carried away by temptation.

However, there are other times when your excuse of bad timing is simply procrastination. It’s your fear grabbing ahold of you.

You might not consciously realize it. You might think that your excuses are valid. But really, you’re grasping at straws to avoid making such a huge change, because you aren’t sure whether you’re ready for a switch in your routine, you aren’t sure whether you’re going to succeed or flop, you aren’t sure whether you are really ready to take this next step yet.

Sometimes, you have to take a step back and ask yourself: If now isn’t the right time, then when is the right time? Are you always going to have another excuse lined up? How many excuses have you used in the past? If this isn’t the first time that you’ve put off the same exact thing, then there’s probably a deeper reason for that. You’re probably searching for excuses, even if you don’t realize it.

However, you can’t spend your life procrastinating. You can’t keep talking about tomorrow and doing nothing today.

It’s scary to make a change, even a change that you’ve been excited about making for a while. It doesn’t matter how much happier you think you’re going to be in the end because there’s always a risk that things won’t work out. There’s always a possibility that your plans are going to backfire on you.

In order to change your world, you need to put faith in yourself. You need to have confidence that you’re doing the right thing. It’s natural to have doubts, and it’s a good idea to think through the pros and cons, but if you dwell on what could go wrong for too long you’re going to psych yourself out. You’re going to make it even harder for yourself to do the right thing — and the right thing is usually to follow your dreams. To take a chance on yourself. To follow the path that will make you the happiest.

It’s so much easier to talk about all the things you want to accomplish than to actually take that first step toward accomplishing them, but if you want to reach your goals, then you’re going to need to take action. You’re going to need to drop your excuses.