My name is Wendy and I am a procrastinator. Okay. There. I said it.

Now I can analyze why I do this…but I won’t. Because that’s where I have been for years and years. Trying to figure out why I just don’t get to doing so many things that I really WANT to do. Good things. Valuable things. Smart things. I say it’s God’s big joke. I have a business called Fit2Finish and I don’t finish anything. People laugh when I say this, but it’s really not funny.

What is funny is our tendency to “go into” as a business or career or volunteer service solving the problem we have (our problem) for other people. That is, we become financial planners because we grew up in a family that failed for lack of financial planning. We become experts in child rearing so others won’t fail as we did at disciplining our children. We become fitness professionals so others won’t grow up fat like we did.

Isn’t it interesting how our shortcomings impel us? But I wonder if they allow us to feel better about ourselves without addressing our own issues. Without starting at the beginning and admitting we have a problem.

So, today I have been illuminated by the behavior of several friends. One who says she wants to help me with a project, tells me its a great idea, says “let’s meet” but then doesn’t get back to me. Or when I email, she says “after company leaves” or “after the weekend away that’s planned.” ‘After’ just keeps getting further and further away.

Another friend wants to help me with a project. She doesn’t tell me it’s a great idea but she cc’s me on emails inquiring about applying it, acting on it, finding space for it. When I reply she gets right back to me with a response. She offers to put me up at her place if I want to travel to follow up on a contact I’ve made with someone who lives in her town. She is clearing a path for my project.

Honestly, both of these friends are driven by fear. The second one knows it and has let it empower her. The first one doesn’t and has let it take charge of her. In fact, she is filling her schedule with things that make her feel active which “explain” why she can’t get to the other. Fear is sly. It hides itself well.

I have been friend #1 to myself for so long. I will get to the good that needs doing after these…after that…when things settle down…when there is more time… the truth is, when you wait until ‘after that’ to get started, the time does not  present itself. Time is not like that. If there’s no time now, there won’t be time then.

So I thank both of these friends. In the ‘right now’ I must seek just to move things forward. Set a course and commit to walking it, at whatever pace life allows today. I don’t know what tomorrow may bring. But whoever comes after me will be better off if I have done my part today.