Wee Bit Wiser

by Jordan Harbinger

Something wise(-ish)

Out of all the reasons people come up with to not pursue their goals, I think my favorite is “I’m too late.”

I’m too late to go back to school.

I’m too late to change careers.

I’m too late to start exercising.

I’m too late to build relationships.

I’m too late to work on my marriage.

And look — I get this line of thinking to some degree.

Time is finite. We’re all getting older. History can be crushing.

Also, in some cases, it really is too late.

For example, I love taking things apart and might’ve been happy working at BMW or Nvidia or whatever, but I’m not about to get my Ph.D. in electrical engineering. (Also, I’m a little busy solving all of your conundra, so there’s that.)

But for almost everything else in life, you’re never too late.

Because first of all, how do you define “too” late? At what point does late become too late? How do you even know you’re “late” in the first place?

More importantly, even if you are late — whatever that means — does that mean your goal isn’t still worth pursuing?

What’s wrong with being the oldest person in your grad-school program?

What’s so bad about getting in shape at middle age?

Would you rather settle for an unhappy rest of your marriage than work on things now?

Sure, if you want to play in the NBA, you better start playing basketball when you’re a kid and you’re only going to have a career until you’re, like, 38, tops. If you want to become a surgeon, it doesn’t make sense to begin med school at 50. And your deathbed probably isn’t the best time to start therapy. (Although even then, I’d argue that there’s still value in talking.)

But for almost everything else, there’s no such thing as “too late.” There’s just “I don’t feel like I can do it” masquerading as a practical decision.

“I’m too late” is usually just an excuse to not act.

To not have to put in the work.

To not have to confront a challenge.

To not have to bear responsibility, vulnerability, shame.

In the process, we not only abandon our dreams, we also miss all the upsides to pursuing these goals later in life.

With more life experience. More wisdom. More appreciation. More humility. More urgency.

Talk to anyone who’s pursued a big goal later in life. They’ll all tell you that it was hard sometimes, but that it was an even more meaningful experience. And that it gave them a sense of agency and vitality that actually ended up making them feel younger.

A few weeks ago, a friend of mine was talking to me about finally going for his doctorate in psychology, a dream he’d been putting off for almost two decades.

“I’ll be 64 when I finish,” he sighed.

“You’ll be 64 anyway,” I told him.

The silence on the other end of the line was one of the greatest sounds I’ve ever heard.

So if you feel like you’re too late to pursue a goal, ask yourself:

By what metric am I deciding I’m “too late?” What does “too late” actually mean?

Have other people pursued this goal at my age/stage/life phase? How did they succeed?

Does it actually make no practical sense to start now, or is my journey just going to be different?

Would I rather wake up in five years not having done this? Or will I look back and be proud that I did?

Sit with these questions. Write down your answers. Reach out to other people who have walked this path and ask them your questions. By the end, you’ll know whether you’re truly too late.

And if you’re interested in hearing how this idea played out in a listener’s life…

Check out episode #1110, where we took a question from a 35-year-old guy working in corporate IT who thought it might be too late to pursue a more meaningful career.

In our response, we unpacked the idea that he was running out of time to make a pivot in his career, and how that idea might keep him stuck in a miserable situation.

We also talked about how to chase dreams later in life without being unnecessarily reckless — which is also important.

Have you found this principle to be true in your world? Struggling to make use of it?

Hit reply and tell me about it. I’m all ears!

On the show this past week

1201: Benjamin Bikman | Insulin Resistance Is Killing Half of America

1202: Grandma’s Feast Ruined By Guest You Trust Least | Feedback Friday

1203: Veganism | Skeptical Sunday

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