why i dropped my client

Hi there,

Being busy feels good. It looks impressive too. When someone says they’re doing ten different things, we assume they’re productive, ambitious, and moving fast in life.

But there’s a quiet problem with that kind of busyness. You often realize it only later — when progress on the thing that truly matters hasn’t moved at all.

Let me explain.

Imagine two people.

One person goes to the gym once a week. The other six days? They’re journaling, playing cricket, learning chess, meeting friends, maybe trying a new hobby every few weeks.

Another person goes to the gym every single day.

After a few months, who do you think will see a visible change?

Most likely, the person who showed up daily.

Not because the other person was lazy. They were active. They were learning. They were doing “good” things. But their effort was scattered. Fitness simply wasn’t their main priority — even if they said it was.

That’s the difference. It’s not about doing more. It’s about doing what matters, consistently.

In my last newsletter, I mentioned that we’re launching a product in February.

Sounds exciting, right?

Here’s the honest part: we still haven’t started building the landing page.

And if you build products, you know this — the landing page is not a small task. It’s the place where people decide whether your product is worth their money. It’s the first impression, the pitch, the story, the proof, all in one place.

Now here’s where it gets tricky.

I didn’t waste last week. In fact, I did several useful things.

I finished reading two books.

The first one was Obviously Awesome. It gave me a fresh way of thinking about positioning — how to explain what you do so clearly that people immediately understand if it’s for them or not. It made me realize how easy it is to confuse an audience when you try to sound smart instead of being clear.

The second book was Making Websites Win. That book is packed with practical advice on how to make a website convert visitors into customers. Honestly, if someone fully applied everything in that book, their website would become a sales machine. It’s that powerful.

The problem? I don’t have the time or bandwidth right now to implement everything I learned. I will apply parts of it, but learning felt faster than doing.

I also enrolled in swimming classes.

Trying something new was on my list this year. I’ve always had a small fear of going underwater, and I decided it was time to face it. I don’t know how great I’ll become at swimming, but I’m proud I started.

There’s something powerful about being a beginner again. When you learn something new, you become more patient, more humble, and more aware of how learning actually works. If you haven’t been a beginner at something recently, try it. It changes the way you see yourself.

I also restarted work on my book.

The product we’re building is influenced by buying psychology — how people make decisions, what makes them trust, what makes them hesitate. I thought it would be amazing if my book could launch around the same time as the product. So I began writing again.

Writing has a strange effect. Thoughts that feel messy in your head suddenly become organized on paper. When I write, I understand my own ideas better. It’s like cleaning a cluttered room inside my brain.

And then, I attended a session on SEO.

We’ve been doing well with content marketing, so we never focused deeply on search engine optimization. But I wanted to understand the tools and strategies better. So I started learning and experimenting with it too.

Now read all that again.

Books. Swimming. Writing a book. Learning SEO.

All useful. All interesting. All productive in their own way.

But none of them was the most important task for the business right now.

The landing page is the bridge between our product and our customers.

Without it, people can’t understand the value clearly. They can’t decide. They can’t buy.

Everything else I did last week was like polishing the furniture while the front door of the house was still missing.

This is what people call shiny object syndrome. You don’t waste time scrolling or being lazy. You work hard — just not on the thing that moves the needle the most.

And because the other tasks feel meaningful, you don’t immediately feel wrong. Only later, when deadlines come closer, you realize you avoided the uncomfortable, high-impact work.

This also made me take another decision. I’ve been thinking about dropping one of my clients. Not because they’re bad, but because my priorities have changed. If I keep saying yes to everything, I’ll keep delaying what truly matters right now.

We often plan our weeks like we have unlimited focus.

We don’t.

In a single day, you can only do a few meaningful things well. In a week, only a handful of tasks really move your life or business forward. In a month, even fewer things create real results.

But we behave as if we can do it all.

We underestimate how long deep work takes. We overestimate how much energy we’ll have after meetings, calls, messages, and daily life.

Last week reminded me of something simple: just because something is productive doesn’t mean it’s the priority.

I had a lovely weekend. I rested. I spent time well. But somewhere in the back of my mind, there was a small feeling of guilt.

Not because I was lazy.

Because I knew the most important task of the week was still waiting for me.

That feeling is actually useful. It points to what truly matters to you.

So this week, my main focus is clear: build and send out the landing page for the product. Not perfect. Not fancy. Just clear, honest, and live.

Everything else comes after that.

If you could complete just one important thing this week that would make everything else easier or more effective — what would it be?

Not ten things. Not a long list.

Just one.

Set your priority. Protect time for it. Let the smaller, shiny tasks wait.

That’s what I’m trying to do this week.

Talk soon,

-Agnel John