An email I couldn't open for months...

It wasn't about an email 😅

A few years ago, things got complicated in my business.
There was an email thread I needed to deal with — and I just… couldn't.
For months I let it sit there. Every time I saw it, something in me wanted to avoid it.

I told myself it was about the money.
It was stressful, the timing was bad, I'd deal with it later.
That was the story I told myself on the surface.

But when I finally looked underneath, it wasn't the money at all.

Along the way, that business had made me feel significant.
And dealing with that email meant facing a fear I didn't even know I was carrying — that without all of it, I'd be nothing.
That I'd lose the thing that made me matter.

So I avoided it.
For months.

Here's the part that still gets me.
My avoiding it caused the exact thing I was afraid of.
Because I went quiet, the whole thing fell apart on its own.
The outcome I was so scared of?
I walked myself right into it by doing nothing.

That's the trap I never understood until I lived it:

Avoidance didn't protect me from what I was fearing.
It delivered it to me.

The task was never the problem.
Me avoiding the feeling underneath it was...

Next week I'll get into what was under my procrastination and how to find the root.

Have a great Saturday,

- Tom

PS. If you struggle with procrastination, I would love to hear about it.