You think you’re taking action, but let’s get something straight: you’re just putting on a performance. All the planning, all the announcing, and all the reading, it’s just noise. I stumbled on this essay that spelled out what I had been half-consciously wrestling with—how we’re all experts at looking like we’re making progress without actually doing a damn thing.
The essay can be found in the page of Strangest Loop. And it goes like this:
Preparing to do the thing isn’t doing the thing.
Strangest Loop
Scheduling time to do the thing isn’t doing the thing.
Making a to-do list for the thing isn’t doing the thing.
Telling people you’re going to do the thing isn’t doing the thing.
Messaging friends who may or may not be doing the thing isn’t doing the thing.
Writing a banger tweet about how you’re going to do the thing isn’t doing the thing.
Hating on yourself for not doing the thing isn’t doing the thing.
Hating on other people who have done the thing isn’t doing the thing.
Hating on the obstacles in the way of doing the thing isn’t doing the thing.
Fantasizing about all of the adoration you’ll receive once you do the thing isn’t doing the thing.
Reading about how to do the thing isn’t doing the thing.
Reading about how other people did the thing isn’t doing the thing.
Reading this essay isn’t doing the thing.
The only thing that is doing the thing is doing the thing.
Now let me tell you about my experience, and listen up because it echoes what a lot of you are doing. I was building this app, right? Weeks turned into months, and all I had were nicely checked off to-do lists, a bunch of people informed about my grand plans, and zero lines of code. Then, one day, I stumbled upon this essay—”Do the Thing”—and it felt like a gut punch. It’s like someone grabbed me by the collar and shook me awake from my self-imposed delusion.
The world doesn’t give a damn about your intentions. It only cares about what you produce. You can throw your planner into the wind, delete your self-help podcasts, and quit the self-flagellation. None of it’s getting you any closer to doing the actual thing. I had to learn this the hard way when I realized I was more obsessed with the perfect app design than I was with actually coding the damn thing.
And what about you? Building a business, networking, hitting the gym, or finding ‘the one’? Doesn’t matter. Stop romancing the idea of accomplishment and start getting your hands dirty. In my case, I finally broke the cycle by actually sitting down and writing code, imperfect as it was. And guess what? The sky didn’t fall down, but something else did happen: progress.
Look, most successful people you hear about aren’t at the top because they had the perfect plan or the most followers; they’re there because they had the audacity to do the thing. Success isn’t awarded to those who planned every detail or avoided failure at all costs; it goes to those who were possessed by a goal so gripping, it’s like a dog with a bone—they just can’t let go. If you want to be successful, do the thing. If you want to make progress, do the thing. If you want to stop being the person who talks about doing great things and become the person who actually does them, then just do the thing. You’ll either succeed, or you’ll learn. Either way, you’ll move. So quit the charade and get to it. Because reading this post isn’t doing the thing—the only thing that’s doing the thing is actually doing it.