It’s time to stop saying it’s time

Last year, I wrote a post about why I’d been saying “it’s time” for five years.

And then, naturally, I let another year pass.

Honestly, the commitment to the bit is almost impressive.

For years, I’ve been saying it’s time to tell the stories.

It’s time to explain what I’m building.

It’s time to put myself out there.

It’s time to show the work.

It’s time to make all the random pieces make sense.

And now it’s time to stop saying it’s time.

It’s time to make time.

Because if I keep waiting for the perfect moment, the perfect system, the perfect words, the perfect website, the perfect photos, the perfect launch plan, the perfect alignment of Mercury and my calendar…

I’m going to be writing this exact post again next year.

And I think we can all agree that would be ridiculous.

The short answer is: everywhere and nowhere.

I’ve been building.

Rebuilding.

Rethinking.

Overthinking.

Working on a lot of beautiful (and, in some cases, slightly unbelievable) opportunities.

I’ve been helping build brands, businesses, websites, campaigns, growth systems, technology, partnerships and ideas that probably sounded a little unreasonable when they started.

Some of them still do.

I’ve also been navigating life, motherhood, marriage, ambition, exhaustion, uncertainty and the particular kind of chaos that comes from being deeply curious and genuinely interested in approximately 42 things at once.

And because life apparently needed more plot, there has also been betrayal, backstabbing and a whole lot of bullsht.

The Lord only knows, it has been a sht load of sht.

Some of it made me stronger.

Some of it made me smarter.

Some of it just made me tired.

But all of it taught me something.

Mostly what not to do.

I care deeply about quality.

I notice the words, the spacing, the strategy, the story, the way something feels and whether all the pieces actually connect.

That standard has helped me create work I’m proud of.

It has also, at times, become a very polished excuse to hide.

If the design wasn’t right, I couldn’t publish it.

If the strategy wasn’t completely clear, I couldn’t talk about it.

If the project wasn’t finished, I couldn’t show it.

If I couldn’t commit to posting every day forever, why start at all?

Perfectionism is sneaky like that.

It can look a lot like having high standards when sometimes it’s really fear wearing a nice outfit.

Fear of being misunderstood.

Fear of not being taken seriously.

Fear of sharing something before I’ve figured out exactly where it belongs.

Fear that something good still won’t be good enough.

Meanwhile, nothing gets published.

And it turns out the impact of content that stays in your head, your camera roll, your drafts and your 87 open Notion pages is approximately zero.

A groundbreaking discovery, I know.

One of the biggest lessons we’ve learned through our work at DropUp is just how much high-quality content matters.

Not content for the sake of feeding an algorithm.

Not recycled, AI-generated nothingness that uses a lot of words to say absolutely nothing.

Not posting seven times a day until everyone (including you) is exhausted by your own existence.

I mean content that helps people understand what you do.

Content that makes the right person stop.

Content that earns trust before a conversation ever happens.

Content that gives a good business a chance to look as good as it actually is.

At DropUp, we help good businesses become easier to see, trust, choose and grow.

That requires more than a nice logo or a clever campaign.

It requires the story, strategy, creative, website, demand, systems and follow-through to work together.

And content is one of the ways people begin to see that connected picture.

The slightly inconvenient truth is that I believe this deeply, and have still been absolutely terrible at consistently doing it for myself.

So, we’re changing that.

Or, more accurately, I’m changing that.

I still have a high standard for what we put into the world. I’m not interested in making more garbage just to say we posted something.

But I am loosening the rope.

I’m giving myself permission to publish the strongest truthful version we have today, and continue making it better as we go.

Make it matter.

Put it in motion.

Make it better.

That is the approach we take and what we’re calling our core philosophy:

Quality at Speed.

It doesn’t mean lowering the standard.

It means refusing to let perfection become hiding.

Now, before anyone interprets this as my formal announcement that I will be posting every single day at precisely 8:04 a.m…

Absolutely not.

One thing about me is that I am consistently inconsistent.

I can’t promise daily posts.

I can’t promise a perfectly organized content calendar delivered with military precision for the rest of time.

I can’t even promise I won’t occasionally disappear into a project, emerge three weeks later and act like no time has passed.

What I can promise is more effort.

More honesty.

More willingness to be seen before everything is finished.

More stories from the work.

More lessons from the things that worked, and probably even more from the things that absolutely did not.

More of the strange, funny, painful and unbelievable moments that brought me here.

More of what we’re building through DropUp, what we believe about growth and why so many genuinely good businesses are still harder to see, trust and choose than they should be.

More life, business and bold moves.

Not because I have everything figured out.

Because I very clearly do not.

But I have lived, learned, lost, built, rebuilt and accumulated a lot worth sharing.

There is some big news coming.

News that will make a lot of what I’ve been building (and perhaps some of what has seemed completely random) make a little more sense.

I’m not ready to share all of it yet.

Yes, I realize the irony of writing an entire post about no longer hiding and then saying, “But not that part.”

Growth, people. We’re aiming for growth.

What I can say is that the next chapter connects more of the story:

Who I am.

What DropUp has become.

What we’re building.

Why drop x drop exists.

And why I believe the biggest things in life and business rarely happen through one perfect move.

They happen through the decisions, relationships, risks, failures, lessons and improvements that accumulate over time.

Drop by drop.

I’m putting myself out there despite the insecurity, the fear, the chaos and all the bullsht because maybe something I’ve learned will help someone else.

Maybe a story saves someone from making one of my more expensive mistakes.

Maybe an idea helps a founder finally explain the business they’ve spent years building.

Maybe seeing the unfinished process gives someone permission to move before everything is perfect.

Maybe one of the things we’ve learned helps another human or business make a sht load of money.

That would be nice, too.

I’m not here to pretend I have a clean blueprint for life, business or becoming the person you keep saying you’re ready to become.

I have stories.

I have scars.

I have strong opinions.

I have an unreasonable number of ideas.

And I have a real build to show you.

So this is me, again, saying it’s time.

But this time, I’m done waiting to find it.

I’m making it.

Let’s see what happens.

Shawnee

P.S. If you’ve also been saying “it’s time” for an embarrassingly long time, consider this your sign. Not to make it perfect. Just to put something true in motion.