One of the biggest challenges I face in just about everything I do is can be summed up in two words—analysis paralysis. It’s when you have one of those “big ideas” for the next big thing. Something you get really excited about sharing with the world and that you want to get just right. So you start by kicking the idea around, over and over in your head, trying to figure out every aspect and element that you’ll need to address. You check and double-check your work, you noodle and tinker, you write, rewrite, re-rewrite until everything is perfect. Then you find something else that needs to be adjusted, another part that needs more tweaking, or a possible risk that you didn’t think of before… so you go back to the drawing board. In the end, your project never sees the light of day because you’ve spent so much time thinking about the idea that it never seemed good enough to move on to the next step—taking action.

Putting in the right amount of preparation for something is important. Whether you’re writing a paper, giving a talk, writing a blog, or starting a business—being prepared and doing your homework is an important step. But sometimes we make that step seem so big that we never actually move forward on anything else. We overanalyze everything to the point of killing our motivation and burying the project before it has a chance to comes to life.

The best way to not get stuck in the analysis paralysis trap is to commit to taking at least one small step each day. Don’t wait until it the timing is perfect or you have everything memorized and ready to go. If you do that you’ll never be ready to move forward.

You have to get out of the habit of wanting everything to be perfect. News flash—it’s never going to be perfect.

They say you should jump and learn to build the plane on the way down. While this is not the best advice for actual plane building, for almost everything else it’s a sound strategy. The most successful people did get that way because they knew exactly what they were doing right at the beginning or because everything was correct from the start. The most successful people are the ones who start building what they want and then adjust as necessary. Learn to be flexible and react.

Fail forward, as they say. At least you’ll be moving in the right direction when you do.