I walked out of the airport and was in Istanbul. A teeming city of 12.8 million people that straddles two continents, both Europe and Asia. The air sparkled from a recent rain and green leaves fluttered on the trees as cars whooshed by. Quickly, I hopped in a cab. Traffic signals and lanes mean nothing in Turkey. It was a death-defying ride to the hotel.

Turkey was an awakening. I didn’t know much about the country and the people. I loved everything about it. The people were gracious, gentle and kind. The architecture and history was amazing. The food was, well, in a word, “yum.” The Grand Bazaar was an amazing day of sights, sounds and shopping. What’s not to love?

Didn’t research much beforehand. I was too busy with business. I knew what the weather would be like. I knew a few hotspots I wanted to visit. I knew it’s a more moderate country from its conservative neighbors. That was about it.

I mentioned in my last post sometimes as women we have a tendency to hesitate and over-analyze. We hold off from taking action and getting out of our comfort zone because we’re unsure if it’s the right thing to do. We take forever making decisions. Visiting Turkey was the perfect thing for me to do. The thing you’ve been hesitating about, your excellent adventure, is probably the right thing for you, too.

But doubts linger. So we hold back from something we really want to do. You may have no interest in visiting Turkey. Your excellent adventure may be something totally different

A few years ago I discovered something called, “The Paradox of Learning.” It speaks to how we can get overly caught up in analyzing, researching and not doing.

Let’s say you decide you want to do something to change your life – start a network marketing business, travel to Istanbul or play tennis in a tournament. You know almost nothing. Let’s say everything you know about it is the size of a grape. Everything you don’t know about playing tennis is touching the outside of that grape.

So, you decide to learn more about playing tennis – or whatever. You watch a couple tennis matches on TV. Now everything you know about tennis is the size of a lime. Which means everything you don’t know is touching the outside of that lime.

You decide to learn more. You buy a couple books about tennis. Everything you know about tennis is now about the size of an orange – but everything you don’t know? It’s grown, too.

You research online about tennis. You spend endless hours hunched over your keyboard. Everything you know about tennis is about the size of a cantaloupe. But what’s happened to what you don’t know? It keeps growing.

So when do you know that you know enough?

Answer: when you know that you don’t know everything – but you’re willing to get out of your comfort zone, take a risk and get started. That’s when you know enough.