I had a call with a client the other day, and a few minutes in, the last issue (of Underneath the Numbers) came up.

At the risk of sounding like an episode of “Friends,” that was the one where I didn't send the previous issue. Two rules I believe in were pointing in opposite directions, and the way through was working out which one was load-bearing and which one was only a schedule.

It came up because she was sitting in her own version of it.

She was waiting on an answer. Someone else was going to come back to her with a number, and that number carried real weight. If the answer was no, the decision was made for her. If it was yes, she had to decide whether to take it. Either way, she was going to find out soon.

So, we spent most of the call on the part that hadn't happened yet.

I told her upfront that some of what I was about to say was probably recency bias from my own life, because it's hard to keep what you're sitting with from leaking into what you tell other people. She took it anyway.

The first thing I said was that the waiting itself was a risk. Not the answer like we’d tend to tell ourselves. When you're in between things, there's a pull to do something, anything, because sitting still feels like falling behind.

We tend to assume that if we aren’t doing something, we’re doing nothing. The way my coach tuned me in to this is with the idea of being actively still. I realize it sounds like something that means nothing, but it’s a way to explain that you can progress without forcing an answer to come. Instead of trying to make something happen, you're paying attention to what isn't happening. And it’s important to remember the absence of something can be just as informative as the presence of something.

The second thing is that it isn't enough to know what your answer would be, as you also need to know why it's your answer, when it stops being your answer, and what causes that shift.

Once she hears the number, she can't unhear it. If it's more than she expected, that alone might pull her toward yes, and whatever she'd be giving up never gets named out loud. If it's less than she expected, that might pull her toward no, even if less money came with less of everything else she's been trying to get away from.

That isn't a flaw in her. That's what happens to all of us when a real number lands in front of us. The answer arrives, and it quietly rewrites what we wanted. It’s a variation on inheriting someone else’s goal.

And it's never a clean line. There isn't one number where it flips. It slides around based on things that have nothing to do with the offer, including what kind of week you're having when the email shows up.

The third thing I told her was the one that seemed to land the most though.

Whatever she decides, she's only deciding it for now. Not forever. We evaluate choices like they're permanent, like this is the thing we'll be doing in fifteen years, but the odds of that are almost zero. Saying yes to something is not saying yes to it for a decade. It can be the right call for the next ten months and stop being the right call after that, and both of those can be true at the same time.

That's usually where the weight comes off. Not from solving it. From realizing it doesn't have to be solved permanently.

I don't know what she's going to decide, and she doesn't either yet. But regardless, she'll be deciding instead of reacting to it, and that's a big difference.

If you've got an answer coming, from a client, a bank, a buyer, anyone, do the work now. Name what a yes means. Name what a no means. Name the thing in between that you haven't let yourself consider, and what you'd be trading for it.

Do it before the number shows up, because after it does, you won't be evaluating it. You'll be reacting to it.

~ Nolan

PS - If this one made you think of someone, send it their way