Why not now?
Stop waiting for new years, new months, or new days—ask this question and get started now!
Have you ever had a day where it felt like the universe was trying to tell you something?
On Tuesday, I woke up to an email from one of the young men I used to advise. The subject line was, “why not now?” and in the email he talks about how we spend so much time hoping for things to improve in the future that we miss out on enjoying what we have in the present. I nodded my head, silently agreed, closed out the email, and jumped into my day.
Then I opened up YouTube and there was a clip from The Office—not one of the many funny ones I’ve watched or rewatched in the past. Instead it was this one from the end of the series where Andy says one of my favorite lines from the entire show.
“I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days, before you’ve actually left them.”
Andy Bernard
My head is nodding with more energy at this point because I’m really feeling things.
The day ends with a call from a close friend/mentor and during our call, he asks me, “what would change if you knew this was your last year in Singapore?”
I’m not even sure how to capture what physical effect the question had on me.
I think my body processed the answer before my head processed things. Everything just relaxed. And my answer was, “I think I’d let myself enjoy things more.”
And like that feeling when the last piece is placed in the puzzle, I saw and felt something more clearly.
It shouldn’t take closing a chapter up to fully appreciate the stories unfolding each day.
These are the good old days.
I know I’ll love them when I’m nostalgic about them someday.
But the real question is, “why not now?”
Why should you ask this question?
Earlier this week, a friend from back home told me about a boy on his son’s soccer team who was just accidentally killed in a traffic accident.
This isn’t the first time something like this has happened and it won’t be the last. You likely know someone who died unexpectedly. Those are the hardest. We forget this one truth captured by Marcus Aurelius:
“You could leave life right now. Let that determine what you do and say and think.” Marcus Aurelius
When we ask the question, “why not now?” we confront all of the excuses we have for putting things off and instead do what is needed to make today the best (and possibly last) day we can.
Stop waiting for January, the first of the month, Mondays, and mornings
“How long are you going to wait before you demand the best for yourself?”
Epictetus
We have a variety of starting points we like to use to “begin.”
The start of the year.
The start of a school year.
The start of a month, week, or day.
We want to wait for the right time. We tell ourselves we’ll do it later—there’s plenty of time. We place future bets with money we don’t have.
“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.”
Richard Feynman
We fool ourselves regularly.
Stop waiting. Ask yourself, “why not now?” You can improve yourself now, at this very moment. You can push pause and let yourself enjoy this moment as it happens.
For me, the hardest part is balancing performance and pleasure. My mind can get so lost in performance that I don’t always let myself fully enjoy what’s happening. That’s something I’m working on. If you’ve got a great tip for doing that more often, let me know so I make sure I don’t let the good old days slip by.