Why Is It so Hard to Take the First Step?

Let's unlock your creator career ASAP.

I decided to become a blogger and solopreneur midway through my PhD. I was excited, but also scared.

I knew no content creators, no entrepreneurs. This change was as hard as moving to China for me. I was venturing into a totally unknown territory.

So I spent dozens of hours studying. I needed to be prepared.

But in the end, I just wasted my time. The only thing that counted was that I made the first step and started publishing.

It started a chain of events, a jumbled mess of successes, challenges, and failures. All of them taught me a new lesson or gave me new motivation that informed the next step.

But this is an insurmountable obstacle for too many new creators. They can’t convince themselves to make that first step.

This bugs me. They are missing so much! So, I keep wondering: why is it so hard to “just do it”?

Here are my answers. I hope they get you unstuck.

Yes, you don’t have time. No, it doesn’t matter.

The "right moment" never truly comes.

You are right. You ARE too busy. You've got work, family commitments, and a packed schedule. But often, very often, the problem isn't the lack of time itself. It's how we choose to spend it.

We often fill our days with activities that feel productive but aren't essential, both at work and at home. We do things simply because we've always done them or because everyone else does. How many of your daily tasks are genuinely necessary?

Sometimes, we overload ourselves by being overly perfectionist. Tasks that could be simple and quick end up taking hours because we want to impress, avoid mistakes, or simply because we're not well organized.

It’s often possible to carve out space for what's truly important, even during challenging times. To do this, you might need to:

• assess what's genuinely critical in your daily routine

• temporarily sacrifice activities you enjoy,

• question tasks that feel mandatory but, upon reflection, aren't as vital as they seem.

• be honest about your priorities.

Once you start creating content, you'll find momentum builds quickly. You'll become faster, more efficient, and more motivated.

Stop waiting for the "perfect" moment—it doesn't exist. Instead, recognize what you're genuinely committed to and make space for it.

Eradicate this word from your vocabulary

Perfectionism makes simple things complex.

We often stretch tasks to take longer than they need to. Even simple tasks become complicated because we overthink them. We worry too much about details that don't truly matter and end up losing time and energy. In some cases, I spent hours looking for the perfect tool for a client, just to learn he needed an extremely simple solution.

Perfectionism complicates even the simplest tasks:

• Spending hours rewriting a short email, worried about every word.

• Repeatedly editing and never publishing a social media post because it isn't "perfect" yet.

• Constantly rearranging or reorganizing your workspace instead of actually working.

• Delaying decisions because you're afraid of making a minor mistake.

• Over-researching a simple topic out of fear of missing something important.

And when you don’t have started, yet, perfectionism hides a tiny first step, like publishing your first article, behind the mountain of “changing career and life”.

How do you overcome this? Be objective. You just need a small action to get the ball rolling. It could lead to a major shift or to nothing. But its quality is irrelevant. You just need to get moving.

You can’t just wing it

All the established creators I talked to and studies have some system. It may come natural to them, it may not correspond to productivity best practices. But they need to protect their creative time and do their best work.

Lack of organization shows up in subtle ways:

• Filling time with things that feel useful but aren’t necessary.

• Doing tasks just because everyone else does them, or because you’ve always done them.

• Letting your to-do list grow without checking if the tasks actually make sense.

• Staying busy just because it feels right.

• Stretching simple tasks because you didn't set limits or deadlines.

So yes, you don't have enough time. But it's because you are actually wasting it.

To fix this, you don’t need dramatic changes. Just an additional half an hour every day can be enough to start your content creation journey.

Take a look at your calendar and todo lists. Consider every commitment, ask yourself:

• Why am I doing this?

• What happens if I remove it, pause it for a while, delegate it?

• What happens if I devote 20% less time to this?

By shaving a minute here and there, you'll easily recover enough time to start creating.

You never ARE a failure

Starting something new is always scary. Especially when it’s something that matters.

Putting yourself out there means investing time, energy, and a piece of your identity. It may end up in a total waste of time. But most importantly, you don't want to face the emotional toll of failure.

I may be "braver" than the average when it comes to creating content. But everything about relationships paralyzes me. I can't count how many opportunities of making new friendships I wasted just because I feared failure.

Then there’s the fear of judgment. Not just from random people online—but from the ones close to you. The ones who already doubt you. The ones who might say "I told you so" if things don’t go perfectly. That hits harder than any online comment ever could.

And let’s not forget how badly we want guarantees. You want to know it’ll pay off before even starting. You want a proven plan, a guaranteed win. That’s why people get stuck researching and buying courses instead of taking action.

I started publishing in English after 10+ years of growing two businesses with content in Italian. I knew I didn’t need a course. I asked for refunds so many times in the mast. But, starting afresh in a new language, I hit reset. So I bought a couple of courses by successful writers, hoping they would change my trajectory. It didn't happen: they were just teaching what worked for them years prior. (Here’s why courses are a waste of time)

So, there' are plenty of legit reasons to fear failure. But not trying at all is the worst failure of all. You don’t just miss out on success (fame, money, whatever you call it). You miss the growth, the skills, the people you could have met, and the legendary stories you could have experienced.

Think of yourself in 10+ year. Think of yourself on your deathbed. How would you feel knowing you didn’t even try?

You are an impostor. But this doesn’t count as well.

"I can't start publishing. I'm not expert enough. ", told me an attendee to a recent webinar of mine. Do you know what I replied?

I replied that she was right. She never published consistently. She wanted to cover a topic she just started exploring. She wasn't an expert by definition.

But I also told her this wasn't a good reason to sit on the sidelines.

Every single creator started from utter, embarrassing, scary ignorance. Go back to their first videos, articles, podcasts. They will be cringe-worthy. And if they aren't, it's because they had previous experience you don't know about, or they got lucky.

Every skill you need, from writing to editing to building an audience, can be learned. And you don’t need to master everything right away. In fact, at the beginning, you need very little.

What you do need is the willingness to try. To learn by doing. To suck at it for a while.

So, I have the perfect trick for you. If you're not an expert, don't act like one in your content. The internet is full of memes about 20-somethings dishing out life advice...

Use your content to share the lessons you learn, the experiments you try, the experiences you live through. Your elevator pitch should be "follow my journey", not "I figured it out. Listen to me."

And of course, before all that, make sure you’re actually growing—studying and practicing every day something that creates value for others.

The first step is sooo within your reach

There’s no reason not to take it.

Put on the blinders. Ignore every objection and fear. Start that publication and publish that first post.

You’ll start a chain reaction. It’ll provide you with the tools to figure out the rest.

Let’s go!

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