Opportunities come to us most often when we aren’t looking for them. Opportunities for more busy work, to meet new people, make new connections, collaborate on a project, or to build something we’ve always dreamed existed. Opportunity is really an invitation to invest your time into something. But too many opportunities can start to become something you never wanted them to be. Like drinking from a firehose, it can quickly become too much of a good thing. Now these new endeavors have moved from opportunities to distractions.

We as humans are often terrible at saying no. We’re intrinsically afraid of rejection so we’ll over-commit ourselves with opportunities that will eventually distract us from the opportunity we hope will come one day. What if we’re making ourselves too busy to actually do what matters? What if, instead of doing what is most important, we’re wasting our time doing what is simply urgent.

It’s easy to waste time on something that is easy to accomplish. It’s predictable, it’s quick, it’s achievable and the goal is in sight from the get-go. On the contrary, doing something new, something risky, something exploratory often has a hopeful but unknown outcome, it can be daunting to begin when you don’t know how it ends. But if we only did things that were safe, we’d miss out on a lot of potential growth. After all, life is best lived outside of our comfort zones. Anything worth doing is often a risk. That big leap, asking out that girl for a first date, a new city, a hard conversation, a pouring out of your soul, taking on that project you’d not done before.

It’s terrifying. It’s vulnerable. There will be failure involved at some point along the way. But one thing’s for sure. Life is best lived as a journey, not a series of destinations. Where are you heading? What are you doing today that’s going to change your tomorrow?

Choose your opportunities.