Episode 419: Monday Mindset: Stop Waiting to Be Ready

In today's Monday Mindset episode, I talked through the mindset shift that changes the game for teachers and for anyone chasing a bigger life: Ready isn’t a feeling, it’s a Decision. I share what I told a friend who asked how I went from an idea to building EB Academics, and why the real “secret” isn’t a magic checklist. It’s the willingness to take the first step and keep taking micro steps, even when the outcome is unclear. We also get practical about the mid-June to August spiral: you promise next year will be different, you rest, you plan, you delay, and then you return overwhelmed because nothing got implemented.

Along the way, we reframe classroom mistakes as feedback, not failure, and we look uncertainty in the face instead of sprinting back to comfort. If you’ve been telling yourself, “I’ll do that when I’m ready,” this is your nudge and your permission slip. Listen, then share it with a teacher friend, subscribe for more Monday Mindset episodes, and leave a review with the one thing you’re done waiting on.

Join me in our Free Summer Workshop: ebteacher.com/workshop

Transcript

Welcome And The Real Block

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Well, hello teachers, and welcome back to another Monday mindset episode. This is gonna be a short one. I really hope it lands. I love this one and I think it's really, really important for all of us, not just in teaching, but in our lives in general. So I'm gonna talk about something that I think is holding just a lot of us back in life from doing the things that we want to do. And it's not what you think it is. And when it comes to teaching, it's not even things as simple as your schedule or your admin or the curriculum or lack of resources or the 43 minutes that you've been given, right? I saw 47 minutes from three teachers yesterday on a workshop that I was doing. I was like, that is an oddly specific number. But the thing that holds almost all of us back in all areas of our lives are two things. Number one is fear, which I'm not gonna talk about on this episode because I could talk about that for hours and how much fear impacts so many of our decisions.

Waiting For Perfect Conditions

SPEAKER_00 0:54

But today I want to talk about waiting. And it's like waiting for the right circumstances. So I was talking to one of my friends recently who's like super into fitness and mindset and the woo and spirituality and all of that stuff. And she knows all about EB academics and what we do here. And she's been thinking about kind of starting her own thing on the side. And she asked me, like, what's the secret? Like, how did you actually do it? Like, how did you go from this idea in your head to actually creating it and now having this business, this company that impacts teachers and students? And I thought about it for a minute and I'm like, okay, well, what's what is the difference? Like, what is the thing that got EB to where it is? And I thought about it because I wanted to give her a really intentional answer that wasn't like, well, you do A, B, C, and D, right? Because there are very specific like logistical things. But I think a lot of the time is that the people who get the things that they want or who have the lives that they desire are simply the ones that go after it. They just start. Like that's it. They don't wait until they have like the perfect plan, and they don't wait until they feel like they're ready because newsflash, they're never gonna be ready,

The Summer Reset Trap For Teachers

SPEAKER_00 2:12

right? That's just life. They don't wait until like everything is perfect. They just start. And I think about that with like myself and all of the areas of my life that have changed significantly over the last well, EB was started 12 years ago, but all of the things that I've done from leaving the classroom to going back to the classroom to starting the business to getting divorced to all of the things that I've gone through. It's like the people who want the things that they want and actually get them are the ones who just start. They just move forward. They take one step after the other, after the other, after the other, not knowing where things are gonna lead. It's like this whole concept of take the leap and the net will appear, but the net doesn't appear until you take the leap concept, right? And I know it sounds almost too simple, but sometimes, all the time, simple and easy are two very different things. I have this conversation with my friends a lot. Like it's simple, it's not easy, right? It's a simple concept, but it's not an easy thing to actually put into practice and like integrate into your being in your life. Like conceptually, intellectually, like you get it. You're like, yeah, duh, Caitlin. But then to actually go do it and to be it is a totally different ball game. And here's why I want to tie this into teaching and for you as a teacher, because here's what I see happen to teachers, especially this time of year, right? Mid-June. Finish the school year, or maybe you're not finished yet, and God bless you, I'm sorry. Um, but if you finish a school year and it was hard, right? I've seen a lot of our teachers like this is one of the hardest years I've ever had. And you're like, okay, I can't do that again. I have this vision for how next year is gonna be different. So you tell yourself, I'm gonna get more organized, I'm gonna start working from home every single night. I'm gonna try this new approach to teaching writing. Hint, it should be the EBW approach, right? You're like, I'm actually gonna feel good on Sunday afternoons. I'm not gonna drive Monday morning, I'm gonna do everything that Caitlin tells me to do on the podcast. And then summer comes. And you're like, okay, I'm gonna rest first. I'm going to start thinking about school when I'm more rested. And then you get to a point where you're more rested, and then you tell yourself, well, I'm gonna start when I have like a clear plan. Okay, well, then you have a clearer plan, maybe, but now it's August and you're overwhelmed and you walk back feeling the same way as you did in June because you didn't actually put the plan into practice, or you didn't actually stick with it, or you didn't keep taking those micro steps forward, right? Life changes through a lot of these like tiny little micro steps, or sometimes one big, massive, scary ass decision that you just like are like, I'm done. I'm done doing this, I'm gonna do something different. And I think that that's so important to keep in mind because we wanna get ourselves out of this cycle that happens so many times to us. All right, I've lived it myself.

Ready Is A Decision

SPEAKER_00 5:00

And the hard truth is this is that if you wait until you are ready, you're gonna wait forever. You're never gonna be ready. Ready isn't a feeling, ready is a decision. And I see this all the time in the business world from so many of my mentors. And, you know, I talked to my dad about this, who ran US sports camps for a long year, decades. And it's like, you're never gonna be ready. But you just have to take the leap. You just have to do the different thing and see what happens. And it's so hard for us as humans because so many of us value certainty. And when we take a leap or when we do something different, guess what? It creates uncertainty. And so many of our brains do not like that. It's like alarm bells go off, and we're like, fight or flight, we have to absolutely not do not do this, go back to what's comfortable, right? Run away immediately, threat. And it's like, it's not really. And I think the more that we can become uncomfortable with ambiguity and uncertainty and not feeling like we need to control every little thing in our lives, the more likely we are to start to move toward a life that we actually

Uncertainty And The Comfort Zone

SPEAKER_00 6:08

want. And as I say this to you, I'm like, I literally am saying this to myself because I'm experiencing this in my life in a variety of different areas. And it's like we only are going to make that progress towards the things that we actually want when we start to do something. And we might do some things wrong, right? Some things are not gonna work out the way that we had hoped. You might try a new approach in your classroom and it might fall flat on Tuesday and your students hate it. That's not failure, it's just feedback, it's information. And like that's the process working the way that it's supposed to. So every single thing that doesn't go the way that you planned teaches you something that moves you closer to being the teacher and the person that you actually want to be. But none of that growth is available to you if you just keep staying in your comfort zone. If you're just like, nope, not perfect conditions, not gonna do it yet, just gonna wait a little bit longer, right? Or like, nope, we can talk about fear another episode, but nope, fear. Nope, that scares me and not gonna do it. Not gonna take that leap. I'd rather stay here in my comfort zone. And look, that's fine. Like you can totally make that choice. But all I'm gonna say is that then you can't be upset about things not changing. Because things are only gonna change when we look fear in the face or we look the

Feedback Beats Failure In The Classroom

SPEAKER_00 7:24

unreadiness in the face and are like, I'm just gonna do it anyways. But I have this phrase that I live my life by where there is your fear, there is your task. Where there is your fear, there is your task. So stop waiting. And so I want to ask you a question. I want to leave you with this today. I want you to sit with it honestly. What is the one thing in your teaching life or in your life in general that you have been telling yourself, I'm gonna do that when I'm ready? What are you waiting for permission on? What are you waiting for permission to start? And I want you to use this episode as that permission, as that kick in the pants, that like stop waiting. Jump off the cliff, and then that is going to freaking appear for you. You just have to trust that no matter what happens, you're going to be okay.

The Leap Mindset And A Personal Story

SPEAKER_00 8:17

And look, to take it like very personal to my personal life and my divorce, is I had to sit with the fact of this, was just like the questioning that I went through in that decision. Is it was like, okay, if I take this leap and I lose everything, like that was my greatest fear of losing just everything and like having to go live with my parents, which would drive me crazy because my mom, I love her, but we could not live together. I had to get to a place where it was like, okay, and even if that happens, I'll be okay. Like, I'm gonna be okay, and so are you. So I just want you to sit with that for yourself that no matter what happens, no matter what quote unquote leap you are looking into take in your life that you need to stop waiting for, that you can choose to stop waiting for, you take that leap, the nut's gonna appear, and even if it doesn't, you're gonna be okay because you can handle it. You've got yourself. And that's where everything changes. It's not in the thinking about it, it's in the actual doing of it. So I really hope that this episode serves you. I know it helped me because I gotta do this shit too. Um, and sorry for swearing, we'll put an explicit on this episode. Um, love you guys. Happy Monday, and I hope you have a great rest of the week. I'll see you a bunch more

One Question And A Workshop Invite

SPEAKER_00 9:40

on the podcast. I hope that you're joining me for my free workshop. If you haven't signed up, ebteacher.com forward slash workshop. We're gonna talk about mindset stuff too, as much as we're gonna talk about curriculum. So I hope to see you guys there and have a great rest of your day. Thanks, everyone.