Taking the handbrake off on your career

Hello and welcome to another edition of Inside The Newsroom, home to more journalism opportunities than any other newsletter in the world.

As I pack up to move back to London, something unexpected has arrived with the boxes: the urge to go for it again. Not to work longer hours for the sake of it, or to prove that I can outrun everyone on my timeline. It's a quieter kind of courage: saying yes to opportunities the “mature” head has gotten very good at declining.

I used to think keeping the handbrake halfway up was about pace. Slow and steady wins the race, while still leaving something in reserve. But what I've noticed is that the handbrake wasn’t entirely about speed, it was about risk. It could be applying for the fellowship that you felt undeserving of. The dream job that felt out of reach. Or even something less related to your career like moving to a new city or country. There's always a million and one reasons not to do something that pushes you out of your comfort zone, but I've realized it's mostly just fear and/or complacency posing as sensible.

The pattern might be all too familiar: you scroll past a new opportunity, you feel the flicker of excitement but then the mature voice arrives with reasons to keep scrolling: wrong timing, too competitive, not the “smart” use of your week. Problem is, if we keep only listening to that voice, we quickly build a career of almosts. Every time I catch myself declining something before I’ve even tried it on, the same question surfaces: am I being wise, or am I protecting a version of myself that never has to be embarrassed?

So what can all of this teach us? Taking the handbrake off isn’t flooring it, it's about releasing the veto. The mature head is useful for contracts, rates, and not burning out, but it is a terrible editor of your ambition. Moving cities made that obvious for me. Living temporarily in a temporary mode makes every leap look reckless, but leaps of faith that pay off make the mature head look foolish.

So this week, when that next cool opportunity inevitably comes up, don't just negotiate it away in your head, write down on paper why you should go for it, and leave the handbrake behind.

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