You don't need more to make more

Hi friends,

Who else feels like they are in a season of waiting?

By God’s grace, I have a few cards on the table that could completely shift the trajectory of my work, my business, and my team. And if I am being fully transparent, my default mode in a season like this is to hold my breath. I build goal maps, I obsess over timelines, and I wait for the big thing to drop so the real momentum can finally start.

On top of that, it has been full summer mode here in London. The kids are home, and Nana Aba and I have been working double time to fill their days with meaningful memories. We love it but we all know what navigating full-throttle parenting while steering a demanding career is like.

Sometimes, I feel like I have been enduring the present until the future arrives. Can you relate?

I’ll share a quick observation.

Three doors down from us, there’s a family that is thoroughly enjoying their summer. Every other afternoon, they pull mismatched tables and folding chairs onto the pavement outside their house. There is nothing lavish about it. It runs on pure, unpretentious potluck energy. People bring whatever they have and somehow it is always seems enough. They sit together and talk for hours.

I presume there is no milestone needed for them to throw a “party”. They just take the little bit of time, space, and community they have right now, and they turn it into something rich.

A good friend said something to me recently too: It is deeply limiting to put your faith in a vision. Put your faith in the work, tools and skills you have in your hands right now, and move. I paraphrase.

Aba has also been nudging us all to stop waiting for the big moment to start enjoying the season. I personally know all too well that I don’t need a massive breakthrough to create immense value. But the funk persists, so I write this for you and for myself.

In business and leadership, we fall into the exact same trap.

We convince ourselves that we can’t execute a brilliant strategy because the budget isn’t large enough. We defer launch dates because the team isn’t big enough. We delay deep innovation because we’re waiting on a client to sign a game-changing contract. We treat small seasons as something to survive rather than something to leverage.

We tell ourselves, “Once we get the funding, then we’ll build culture.” Or, “Once I get that promotion, then I’ll lead with excellence.”

That is a lie. And we know it.

Zechariah 4:10, KJV: Who hath despised the day of small things?

Your job today is not to force the big outcome before its time. Genuinely try to extract maximum joy, creativity, and value from what is already sitting on your desk right now.

If you cannot create something remarkable with a lean budget, three team members, and a basic spreadsheet, a multi-million-dollar line item will not save you either. Scale only multiplies what you have already built.

So take a breath today. Drop the expectation that this season has to look grand to be valuable. The big trajectory shift will come when it comes. Right now you have a day to live, a team to inspire, a family to love, and work already in progress.

Go into your week, look at your little, and make something remarkable out of it.

We’re all in this together.

Stay awesome,

Sydney