Why Most People Quit Before Anything Good Happens

Because starting is rarely smooth, and quitting is usually premature

Photo by Wurzelwerk Agentur on Unsplash

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“By being willing to be a bad artist, you have a chance to be an artist, and perhaps, over time, a very good one.”

Julia Cameron

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Back in 2010, I ran one of my first webinars from a sun-drenched apartment in Cyprus.

The content was solid (if I do say so myself). The slides worked, the delivery flowed, I had a couple of hundred people show up, and the whole thing had gone better than expected...

Until the end. When I realised I had absolutely no idea how to turn the bloody thing off.

I started furiously clicking buttons, laughing awkwardly and apologising to the remaining attendees. One of them kindly offered to help, and between us, we figured it out. Or so I thought.

I shut down the screen, turned to my partner and said, “Well… that was a f***ing disaster.”

My screen lit up like a Christmas tree.

“We’re still here, Jo!”

“We can hear you!”

“Don’t worry, it was brilliant!”

Mortified doesn’t even cover it.

I still laugh/cringe about that moment today, but did it stop me doing webinars? Not a chance. Because we only get good at what we practice.

Funnily enough, I’m about to run another webinar next week. My first in years, and I’m feeling exactly the same nerves. Will the tech work? Will I fluff my words, forget something, click the wrong button?

• Will it be messy? Probably.

• Will I still do it? Absolutely.

Because the uncomfortable truth about doing anything new or different is:

If you’re not willing to be seen as a beginner, you’ll never give yourself the chance to become brilliant.

The Myth of the Polished Start

We’re so used to seeing the finished product. The sleek website, the slick video, the beautifully branded business, that we forget what came before.

• The messy drafts.

• The awkward pauses.

• The Canva logos that looked like they were made in PowerPoint circa 2003.

We scroll past someone’s polished post and assume they’ve always had it together. But no one starts shiny.

As Twitter co-founder Biz Stone once said:

“Timing, perseverance, and ten years of trying will eventually make you look like an overnight success.”

Behind every seamless offer is a stack of things that didn’t resonate:

• Freebies no one downloaded

• Sales pages that attracted tumbleweed

• Courses that launched to an audience of one (hi Mum)

And sadly, this is the point where most people give up. In this quiet, cringey, confusing, messy stage, where your ambition outpaces your skills.

And no wonder. It’s uncomfortable, particularly when you’re used to being competent.

You’ve had a career, led teams, raised a family, figured life out... and now you’re back to fumbling with MailerLite and asking Google what a funnel is.

It’s humbling. It’s frustrating. And if you’re not ready for it, it can feel like failure.

But it’s not.

It’s just proof that you still have fire in your belly, and that you're willing to take risks to grow and follow your dreams.

The Courage to Be Seen Starting

When you decide to start something new, (especially when you're supposedly older and wiser), it's not the tech that's scary, or the time commitment, or even the learning curve.

It’s the vulnerability of being seen as a beginner.

Starting over after a whole adult life of being capable and competent, can feel like standing on stage in your underwear.

You're exposed. Unsure. And your brain’s screaming, “What the hell am I doing?”

At 25, you can chalk it up to inexperience. At 52, it feels like you should have it all figured out. And your mates might be quietly raising their eyebrows at your ‘digital dream’.

So instead of giving ourselves permission to learn out loud, we sidle in quietly.

• We research.

• We tweak.

• We overthink.

• We try to publish without drawing too much attention, hoping to skip the awkward phase altogether, aiming for polished before we’ve really begun.

But there's no getting round it: you can’t skip the beginning. Not if you want to become awesome at what you do.

That shaky, uncertain first step is part of the deal. It's where your clarity comes from, where growth begins, and where you start building confidence. Not by reading more books or watching more courses, but by doing the thing badly until you do it better.

If anyone tells you they nailed it first time, they’re either lying or they’ve forgotten what it felt like.

So yes,

• Your first blog post might be rambling.

• Your first product might miss the mark.

• Your first offer might flop.

But if you’ve got the courage to be seen starting, that’s already something most people will never do.

Why I’m Still in the Arena

I was talking to my daughter the other day about how flakey I feel right now.

In the past year alone, I’ve:

• Rebranded my newsletter from The Working Traveller to The 50+ Nomad

• Started a free side hustle group (then promptly abandoned it)

• Talked publicly about launching my ecommerce brand Grey Nomad Co, which still isn't off the ground (new date Jan 26’)

• Promoted my blog, pivoted to Substack, and questioned my entire social media strategy... more than once

I looked at her and said, “I just feel all over the place. I should have this figured out by now.”

And she, in that wonderfully direct teenage way, said:

“I’m not being mean Mum, but... do you even have a big enough following to feel flakey? Isn’t now the time to mess around and get it wrong, so when you do have a bigger audience, you’ve already figured it out?”

Wise words indeed. (She is my daughter, after all. 😉)

But it stings a bit for me because I've done this before.

I’ve built the audience. Run the big launches. Grown the seven-figure business. I know how to do this.

So the ego (bloody thing) kicks in and says, “Starting messy is fine for beginners, but you should be past that now.”

But I’m not.

Because this is a new path.

It’s a louder, faster, more crowded online world than it was in 2012. There’s information at our fingertips, competition on every platform, and shiny new trends launching by the minute.

It’s scary, and overwhelming, and the fearless energy I had in my 30s has been replaced with a bit more caution, and a little less bounce.

But this is the part that matters more than anything else.

It would be so easy to pull back, and say, “I don’t look polished enough. I don’t feel clear enough. This is embarrassing, forget it.”

Or… I can do what I’ve always done. Which is just to keep walking the path and every time I hit a dead end, change direction and find a new path.

Until the path gets longer, lighter, and the view looks good.

Why Most People Quit Too Soon

This messy stage is where almost everyone gives up.

Not because they’re lazy or they lack ambition. But perhaps because they were expecting something different.

Maybe they were hoping results would come faster, that people would notice (but not judge), and that they'd feel more confident, not less, once they finally started.

• Instead, they publish their first newsletter… and no one replies.

• They post their first offer… and not a single sale comes through.

• They spend hours on a course, a video, a blog post — and the silence is deafening.

And so they think, “Maybe I’m not cut out for this.”

But the truth is, they were just one step into the process.

We live in a world that promises quick wins. Launch in 30 days. Make 10K from your first offer. Build an audience overnight. So when things take time. When they’re slow, clunky, or invisible, we assume we’re doing it wrong.

We’re not.

We're just at the part right after starting, but before traction. The part where we’re still invisible in the crowd, because we haven’t been consistent enough to have broken through yet.

And what you do next determines your outcome.

What to Focus On Instead of Perfection

If perfection is your goal, you’ll never start.

And if you somehow do start, you’ll never finish, because nothing will ever feel “ready.”

You’re not meant to be perfect in the early stages of anything. (In fact perfection is subjective and I’d argue, you’re not meant to be perfect ever!)

You are, however, allowed to be flakey, change your mind, learn what works (and what doesn’t) and build momentum by actually doing it.

So if you’re in the messy stage, or hesitating at the edge of it, here’s some things to focus on instead:

1. Progress over polish

Can you make your next thing 10% better than the last? That’s the game. Not perfection, just improvement.

2. Curiosity over clarity

You don’t have to know exactly where this is going. You just have to stay curious enough to keep exploring.

3. Consistency over confidence

Confidence comes after action, not before it. The more you show up, the more capable you’ll feel. But only if you keep going long enough to see it through.

4. Relationships over reach

Forget going viral. Focus on connecting. Speak to one real human. Build trust. Create something useful. Everything else flows from that.

5. Practice over perfection

Every blog post, email, video, landing page, is all practice. No one’s grading you. The only way to get good is to keep showing up when it’s not good yet.

As Robert Louis Stevenson said;

“Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant”

My Messy Stage Never Really Ended (And That’s OK)

I used to think there’d be a point where it all clicked.

Where I’d finally feel like I knew what I was doing, everything would be smooth, easy, and effortless, and my nerves would go away, the launches would be seamless, and I’d never stuff anything up again.

Still waiting.

The truth is, every new chapter brings its own version of the messy stage.

• Starting a podcast? Back to fumbling with audio software.

• Launching a new brand? Cue the self-doubt all over again.

• Hosting a webinar after years away? Suddenly forgetting how Zoom works.

You might get faster at recovering, or be more forgiving with yourself and less thrown off when things go sideways.

But the awkwardness never disappears completely. Not if you’re still growing, doing new things, and being brave enough to keep stretching.

The difference for me now is, I expect the mess.

• I know I’ll say the wrong thing.

• I know I’ll forget a step or change direction halfway through.

• I know I’ll launch things that don’t quite land, and write posts that feel a bit… meh.

But that no longer stops me.

Because I know that staying in the game and continuing to show up through all the uncomfortable moments, is what builds something meaningful.

What Will You Begin (Badly) This Week?

If you’re standing at the edge of something right now. A business idea, a newsletter, a course, a side hustle, a new chapter, and you’re hesitating because it doesn’t feel ready yet, the good news is:

• It’s not meant to feel ready.

• It’s meant to feel awkward, clunky, exposing.

• You’re meant to question yourself a bit.

• You’re meant to look back in six months and wince at the version you’re about to put out into the world.

That’s what beginning looks like.

So the question isn’t, “How do I make it perfect?”

It’s, “Am I willing to begin before I feel ready?”

Because the messy stage never really goes away. You become more practiced and more resilient, but each step forward brings new challenges, and so it goes on.

“Don't wish it was easier wish you were better. Don't wish for less problems wish for more skills. Don't wish for less challenge wish for more wisdom”

Jim Rohn

So take action today, even if you’re unsure, even if you feel it’s not good enough.

• Publish the post.

• Outline the offer.

• Send the email.

• Record the first video.

• Say it out loud.

The goal isn’t to be brilliant. The goal is to be in motion.

That might mean showing up to your first webinar and not knowing how to turn it off. It might mean fumbling with tech, second-guessing your content, or launching something that falls completely flat.

But that’s how you get better.

You just have to be willing to be bad at it before you get good.

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