Stop researching, start doing
Introduction
Let’s have a heart-to-heart about research. It's time to debunk a widespread myth and unleash your inner go-getter.
You see, there's this notion that you need to spend years buried in research before taking the leap into starting your own business. But guess what? That's not always the case, and sometimes, it's even better to throw caution to the wind and just go for it.
So, let's dive into this blog post and uncover the truth about why research isn't everything. We'll tackle the notorious excuse we often hear from solo business owners, "I can't do _____ because I don't know how."
Let’s dig into it.
Research is overhyped
There is one big misconception about research that I'd like to clear up: you don't need to do years worth of research before starting your own business. In fact, sometimes you're better off not doing any at all. Let me explain.
One of the most common excuses I hear from solo business owners is:
"I can't do _____ because I don't know how. "
Put anything here. Any skill. Any tactic.
Marketing
SEO
Sales
Design
Website building
Taxes
... literally anything.
Admitting you don't know something takes radical self-awareness. But admitting defeat because you don't know how to do it is bullshit.
You don’t know, until you do
Trust me, my friend, admitting you don't know something takes incredible self-awareness, but giving up just because you lack the know-how is just ridiculous. Because here's the thing: you don't know until you do. Nobody magically knows how to do anything until they take action and learn along the way.
Nobody knows how to do anything until they learn.
And guess what? The best way to learn is by doing.
Not by reading, studying or theorizing.
But by actually doing.
Now it’s around here that you might stop and say "I'm a visual learner. I learn best by watching YouTube videos!".
But I urge you to stop kidding yourself. While it's true that you can learn in many different ways:
Watching on YouTube
Listening to Podcasts
Reading Books
Investing in Courses
Paying for Coaching
... you learn significantly faster by doing.
Why we avoid doing
Humans are hard-wired to avoid pain. Doing something and failing is painful, so we generally try to avoid it.
It's much safer to learn online. It feels productive sinking 10 hours into a course, or 20 hours into reading every book on the subject. We immerse ourselves in countless hours of content, videos and other people's experiences instead of having these experiences ourselves.
I'm not saying you shouldn't learn from books, lessons or courses. I have a library of books at home and I've invested in multiple courses to further my education.
But if you're learning instead of doing, then you're removing any possibility of failure. If there's no chance of failure, there's also no chance of success.
You let kids make mistakes so they can learn from them. You can tell a child not to touch something hot and they'll do it anyways. Once they do, their brain will register that pain so they can avoid burning themselves in the future.
By avoiding "doing" you're avoiding extremely valuable lessons.
You get hurt. You course correct. You keep going. You try another way. You see something that works. You start to see success. You keep testing. You work off of that success. You find shortcuts. You get even better. You keep going.
Eventually you master it.
But you can't master something without doing it bunch of times.
I know that seems obvious, but you wouldn't believe how many people will try to become experts at something without ever actually doing the fucking thing.
Do I sound like a broken record yet?
Do the fucking work
Just pick a direction and run.
Even if you don't enjoy it.
Even if you suck at it.
You won't always suck.
Eventually you'll benefit from compound interest.
But before you can get there, you NEED to put the hours in.
There's no way around it.
