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My parents waited four years before buying garden furniture for our first home in Dubai. Every year, they’d pick out the sturdy umbrella and durable chairs they liked, a slightly different shade of blue each time, before abandoning the catalogs to collect dust for another 12 months. “Who knows how long we’ll be here?” they’d rationalize. “We might be going home next year.”

This year marks my 19th year in Dubai, and 19 years since they should have just bought that lovely pergola and garden swing.

Despite despising the feeling of waiting for the right moment to do The Thing, my 20s were still filled with hesitation and feet-dragging. At 22, I waited until I was a size UK 8 before buying the crop top I’d always wanted to wear. At 25, I added artwork to my Etsy cart but waited for the “perfect” gallery wall collection before hitting checkout – I moved out before I ever did. I even avoided the question, “How did you meet your boyfriend?” until it became normal to admit it was on a dating app.

I’ve wanted to paint our living room wall green ever since we moved in. A deep forest shade that has always made me feel at peace. But I never did. For the past three years, the idea of moving – home, country, even continent – hung over us like a cloud on a British winter’s day.

Now, this marks our third year in the same home, and three years since I should’ve bought that paint and gotten to work.

On May 15th, in the early hours of the morning as I was boarding my flight from Dubai to London, I thought about texting my best friend to tell her I’d booked my flight to visit her and her baby in Cairo in a few weeks. I found my window seat, pulled out my phone and went to our Whatsapp chat, our last messages of “I miss you!” And “when are you coming to see us?” filling my screen. But then I thought, “It’s too early. I’ll tell her when I land.”

I never got to tell her. Instead of reading her reply when I landed, I found myself reading her obituary.

That’s when it hit me: there is no right moment. Do the thing, and do it now. Do it before it’s too late. We don’t have tomorrow guaranteed. We don’t even have the next hour guaranteed. It sounds dramatic, but it’s true.

Paint your living room wall. Dye your hair. Tell your friends you love them. Don’t wait for special occasions or birthdays. Tell them just because. Call your grandparents. Buy the damn garden furniture.

Take it from me – the right moment never comes. Today, right now, is perfectly good enough to Do The Thing.

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