Decades ago, I told my mother I had decided to go live and work in Asia. She knew there was no arguing with me on that idea, but she couldn’t help asking some worst-case scenario questions. What if you don’t find a job? What if you get sick? What if you can’t find a place to stay?

I didn’t have any of the answers. Instead, I told her: I have my wits, my resilience and my determination. Whatever happens, I’ll find a way.

Since then, I have seen many people delay decisions or fail to act, because of such worst-case scenario questions. Rather than moving forward with uncertainty, they chose to wait for the moment when the hesitation disappeared, and everything felt safe.

But certainty rarely arrives before action.

In most major changes — changing roles, starting a project, leaving a situation that has stopped working — uncertainty is present in the beginning, if not the whole way through.

Only as you go through the process of change, do you discover that some things are easier than expected. Other parts are harder. Some turn out to be impossible altogether.

And that is fine. What happens in each step helps you decide, confirm, or finetune the next one. Acting and learning from experience builds a kind of confidence that you don’t get from sitting still and thinking ahead. Each step makes the next one slightly less intimidating.

Waiting until everything is predictable can hold you back for a very long time. In many situations the courage to begin simply comes from trust. It’s a matter of reframing. Rather than asking “How am I going to do this?” ask yourself, “How am I going to get started?”