Why You Need To Embrace The Urgency In Your Work

Always believe that this is your moment

Urgency is believing that the right time to strike is now. It’s understanding that this moment is yours, right now.

It’s having a sense that you need to grasp every second and take advantage of it as though it was your last… I never used to feel that my work was urgent. I never used to feel like it was vital that the work was done, that the opportunities were seized.

I know I wasted a lot of time thinking that it could all happen tomorrow, and that I was somehow special enough that I didn’t need to hurry.

I’d do anything to have that time back.

The thing is, every piece of creative work you do is urgent. Every move you make in your business is urgent. It’s urgent because the time you have to do it is always limited, but you’ll never know or understand how much.

When you work with a real sense of urgency, you’re not thinking about just ticking along, just living your life, just doing some work. You’re operating on an almost instinctive level. You’re switched on, your pulse is pounding. The adrenaline is pumping.

Working urgently isn’t about speed – it’s about feeling and believing that you’re dismantling a time bomb, that there’s so much riding on what you’re doing right in this instant.

Working urgently is about taking the risks that must be taken when time is running out and you’re working on the immediate, taking those risks and feeling your heart drop and leap.

Working urgently is about discovering that excitement in what you do. Where you’re no longer just sitting down at your desk to draw, or write, or sell or build — you’re sitting down to save the world.

Try and tell me you won’t be running at your best.

[This post by Jon Westenberg first appeared on Medium and has been reproduced with permission.]

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