How to Stop Thinking & Start Doing
The 4 steps you need to break the research loop & start your online business
I got a great message this week in response to one of my notes;
My note:
The Response;
Firstly, thank you to Susan for being so open and honest and responding in such a self aware way.
That’s half the battle conquered already.
Secondly, if you’re nodding along in empathy with Susan, please know you’re not alone. That feeling of overwhelm, information overload and not knowing where to start is the most common reason so many incredibly talented people never get a freedom funding business off the ground.
And yet, it’s not the real reason. At the risk of sounding like AI (which this is not, this is me writing with my own hand), overwhelm is, in reality, fear dressed up as an emotion we can relate to.
And the only way through it, is to stop thinking and start doing.
The Research Loop (aka The Comfiest Trap in the World)
The great thing about research, is that it feels like progress.
You’re learning, taking notes, comparing platforms, reading reviews and watching 3-hour YouTube breakdowns of affiliate marketing funnels.
What a productive learning day!
And at the end of it, you know maybe slightly more than you did yesterday, (depending on how much info you can retain - which in my menopausal brain ain’t much these days) but you’ve built precisely nothing.
I know this, not just from the questions and conversations I’ve had over the years, but also because I myself have lived in that loop for months, sometimes for years.
Before I launched my first business, after my first big failure, after burn out, even before I launched my ecommerce brand This Big World in January.
I told myself I was “sharpening the saw”, as per the famous Lincoln quote.
"Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the ax,"
But what I was actually doing was avoiding the terrifying moment where I’d have to put something out into the world and risk it (and me) being seen as rubbish, or silly, or out of touch, or whatever judgement fear we have deep inside.
The research loop, also called ‘The Resistance’ in Steven Pressfield’s book ‘The War of Art’, is crazy dangerous because it masquerades as productivity.
You feel busy. You feel like you’re making informed decisions. But what you’re actually doing is giving yourself permission to not start, over and over again, while feeling virtuous about it.
But starting imperfectly and risking being bad at it on your first go (and maybe second and third) is the whole game.
"By being willing to be a bad artist, you have a chance to be an artist, and perhaps, over time, a very good one." - Julie Cameron - The Artist's Way
Which leads nicely to…
You Don’t Need to Be an Expert
Let’s address Susan’s comment about wishing to be “an expert in one thing.”
The good news is: nobody starts as an expert. You become one by doing the thing repeatedly, in public, and getting slightly less terrible at it over time.
When I started my first online business in 2010. I didn’t know what an opt-in page was. I didn’t know websites began with https:// (and got publicly humiliated in the Warrior Forum when I asked about it). I spent 4 hours one day trying to embed a paypal button in a page, and an entire afternoon crying with frustration when I couldn’t upload a video (pre YouTube embeds!).
One of my favourite stories is when I was unable to turn off a webinar at the end of a presentation, had to be guided through it by one of the attendees and then swore loudly at my incompetence as I thought I was off air but was still live! 😂
I had zero tech skills, an old laptop, and a 4-year-old using me as a climbing frame.
I wasn’t qualified or ready. I just started, took action every day, and figured it out as I went along.
16 years later, I’ve built multiple businesses, sold a 7-figure Amazon business, and am writing this from the real Amazon (ironic) in Brazil while running two brands from my laptop.
I’m not smarter, more talented, or more techy than Susan or anyone else.
I just err on the side of action and refuse to stop, even when it gets hard. (Probably especially when it gets hard).
If I Were Starting From Scratch Today
As for a blueprint, mentoring or pointing towards help, here’s exactly what I’d do if I were starting from zero in 2026, with no audience, no tech skills, and no idea what I was doing.
Just 4 key steps.
1. Pick your topic.
Not the most profitable topic. Not the one some bloke on YouTube promised would make you six figures in 90 days. Pick something you enjoy talking about. Something you’re interested in, have experience with, or just won’t shut up about at dinner parties.
Pets. Travel. Health. Menopause. Leadership. Parenting. Retiring well. Art. Music. Baking. Gardening. Grief. Fitness over 50. Vintage cars. Literally anything.
If you have opinions on it and could happily bang on about it for six months, it’s a valid topic.
2. Pick your audience.
Your niche is not your topic, it’s your audience.
Who do you want to talk to, help, serve, inspire, entertain?
Who are you writing for, creating for, adding value to?
“Everyone” is not an audience. Everyone means no one.
Get specific. Who exactly are you talking to?
Women over 50 who want to get fit but hate the gym?
Blokes who’ve just retired and are going quietly mad?
First-time dog owners who are in way over their heads?
The more specific you are about your ‘who’, the easier everything else becomes.
3. Pick one platform and show up every day for six months.
Not five platforms. One.
Post consistently, build an audience, and encourage people to sign up for your email list. That’s the whole game at this stage.
(Substack is brilliant for this because your newsletter, your content, and your subscriber list all live in the same place. No funnels, no separate email software, no tech headaches.)
6 months of showing up will teach you more than six years of watching webinars ever could.
4. Listen to your audience and sell them what they want.
Once you’ve got people paying attention, they will tell you what they need.
In the comments. In the DMs. In the questions they keep asking. That’s when you create or find a product to sell them. Not before. Not based on what you think they want. Based on what they’ve actually told you.
That’s it. That’s the whole blueprint.
Everything else (the fancy websites, the complicated funnels, the seventeen different software subscriptions) is stuff you figure out later, if and when you need it.
The tools in 2026 are absurdly easy. AI can help you write copy, design graphics, and figure out almost anything you’re stuck on.
You don’t need expensive courses. You need these 4 steps and the willingness to expose yourself online (not literally obviously! 😂)
The Real Problem
As I said at the start, it’s not the courses or webinars that are the problem.
The information overload isn’t the problem or the ADHD brain (though I have sympathy, truly).
The problem is that starting something real is scary.
It means you might fail. It means someone might judge you. It means that comfortable identity of “person who’s going to start a business one day” gets replaced by “person who started a business and it might not work.”
That second identity is much more uncomfortable, but it’s also the only one that leads anywhere.
When I launched my travel challenge cards in January, I had a literal meltdown. (Just ask my husband).
When my vision turned into reality and I now had to start promoting and asking people to ‘buy my stuff’, I panicked!
‘Who’s going to buy? No one will like them? They’re silly, they don’t solve a real problem, it was a stupid idea!’
And that was after a solid year of procrastination & ‘research’.
But I took action, started selling and last week hit my first big milestone of over 200 packs ($5k in sales) sold.
Susan pretty much answered her own question when she said that she feels like if she could just get started, she’d figure it out.
She’s right.
She (and you) absolutely would. The figuring-out happens in the doing, not in the researching.
‘Clarity comes from action’ - Marie Forleo
So, Susan (and Friends)
Close the browser tabs. Cancel the next webinar. Forget about finding the perfect business model.
Pick one thing. The one that makes you feel a tiny spark of “ooh, I could do that.”
Give yourself 90 days to try it. Not 90 days to research it. Ninety days to actually do it, no matter how imperfectly and likely with no idea what you’re doing half the time.
It’s how anybody who’s ever done anything worth talking online about started.
Not with a perfect blueprint. With a deep breath and a wonky first attempt.
The hardest part is starting and trying long enough to make some progress. Everything after that is just problem-solving, and you’ve been doing that your whole life.
So pick your thing & make it happen. I’ll be here cheering you on.
And actually, Susan, I want to put my money where my mouth is.
I have a course called ‘Start the Right Side Hustle (How to Go From Stuck to Started)’ on Gumroad that walks you through exactly this process, step by step. It’s normally $47, but I’m going to give it to you for free. Keep your eye on your Substack inbox for access details.
For everyone else reading this who feels like Susan & is stuck in their own research loop, you can find the mini course here. (Or join as an annual subscriber to get my complete library for free!)
It’s not another strategy or new idea to add to your overwhelm. It’s action based exercises you can do in a weekend to move you from thinking to doing.
It’s the blueprint Susan asked for, to get you off the starting line. 🔥
I hope it helps! I’m off piranha fishing 😳 Wish me luck! 😂