Patience gets tossed around like it’s some peaceful virtue. But most of the time, it feels more like a battle.
A battle against your own doubt. A fight to keep showing up, even when you’re not completely sure you’re on the right path. A fight to trust that what you’re building, the decisions you’ve made, and the road you’re walking will lead to somewhere worth going.
Is it worth the risk? How will this impact my family?
I’ve been in that fight lately. And to be honest, I haven’t always been on the winning side.
Starting something from scratch, especially something you’ve poured your heart and soul into, will test your confidence in ways you don’t expect. It asks you to move without guarantees. To lead without applause. To believe without proof.
This internal fight isn’t new for me. It’s been there for as long as I can remember. And while I’ve done a lot of work to grow personally and professionally, confidence is still something I have to choose – over and over again. I talk a lot about how critical confidence is to success… but it’s also something I have to regularly remind myself to practice.
Confidence doesn’t show up overnight. It’s something I’ve had to earn, slowly, learning how to navigate life while growing it along the way.
And sometimes, out of nowhere, a song drops into your life at just the right moment to smack you across the face when you need it most. That happened to me in December 2024. I heard a new song, and it stopped me in my tracks.
Not because it promised everything would be fine, but because it reminded me to hold on a little longer.
I heard this song live this past December and it hasn’t left me since.
It’s called “Give It Time” by Goose, a band I’ve come to love for their musical abilities, but also how they’re able to put complex emotions into words. I first heard it at Goosemas, their annual winter show, and it landed with the kind of force you don’t forget.
It wasn’t just one lyric, the whole damn song hit me. It felt like they’d looked inside my complicated head and crafted each line carefully, just for me. And the chorus… that became the internal voice I needed to hear.
The lyrics early in the song have played over in my mind like a mantra:
Give it time
Go ahead and give it hell
Give it all you’ve got
Or give it up for something else
Those lines aren’t just poetic — they’re a gut check. A challenge. An invitation to keep pushing while staying honest with yourself.
This song has become an anthem for me because it tells the truth about what it means to show up when you’re still full of doubt. In a world full of noise – often layered with pressure, posturing, and false promises – it’s easy to get trapped in a spiral of negative thinking. Culture pushes us toward instant success, quick validation, and outward approval.
Lyrics like this help me stay grounded, pulling me inward when the world is pulling me out. Music is one of many tools I lean on to reenter and give myself the space to think.
The timing of hearing the song was uncanny. It hadn’t been released yet and wouldn’t drop until late January 2025. If you know me, you know that I believe everything happens for a reason.
I heard it live on December 13th, 2024, just a few weeks after some big life changes. My head was already in reflection overload, constantly scanning for signs and reassurance that things were going to be okay. I had decisions to make. And I needed validation that I was making the right ones.
I’d been talking about going into business with my now-business partner for nearly a decade. My wife and I had countless conversations about what that would mean for our life, our family, our future. And even after all that… my head was still spinning with doubt and second guesses.
No amount of preparation can fully brace you for what it feels like to actually jump.
Twenty years of climbing the corporate ladder… and I decided to let go.
To pull the ripcord, a phrase my dad used when we talked about the leap. He told me he and his best friend, Edwards, used to sit around dreaming about starting something of their own. But they never pulled the cord. They liked their parachutes. They were comfortable.
I pulled it.
I was okay with being uncomfortable. Growth comes from discomfort. It’s something I’ve had to pound into my own head and something I try to pass on to others.
And now that we’ve jumped, I can’t imagine doing anything else.
I don’t typically believe in regrets. As I mentioned, I believe everything happens for a reason, and all the decisions I’ve made have led me to where I am today. That said, if I could go back and do it sooner (pulling the ripcord) … I would. If you’re reading this and have a desire to try something different, take a calculated risk, it could be the best thing that’s ever happened to you.
But even now – even knowing I made the right move – the doubt hasn’t disappeared. That’s the thing they don’t tell you about going all-in: the fear doesn’t fade away. It just shifts. It gets quieter at times, but there’s always some element of it lingering.
And maybe… that’s a good thing.
That night in Charleston, surrounded by an unreal light show, by strangers and sound, I heard:
“Give it time / Go ahead and give it hell / Give it all you’ve got / Or give it up for something else…”
And I felt the knot in my chest loosen just a little. The music didn’t give me answers, exactly. But it gave me permission to keep going.
And that was enough.
In that moment of hearing those lyrics live, a flip didn’t necessarily switch. It didn’t completely eradicate my fear. But it did help me identify it and name it.
The truth of the matter is most of my self-doubt isn’t rooted in logic. My self-doubt is rooted in old stories and my personal history. Stories I’ve carried with me for years about not being enough, not being ready, not being whatever the moment calls for. If something goes wrong, I automatically feel like it’s my fault even if I’ve done nothing wrong. It’s bananas how your history can unknowingly haunt you as you grow older but if you flip it on its head, it can also help you grow, if you allow it to.
At the end of the day, I’ve done the work. I’ve grown. But those stories still echo strong in my head.
Confidence, for me, has never been a default setting. It’s something I’ve had to build, not by force, but by showing up repeatedly. By proving to myself, quietly, that I can do hard things even when I’m uncertain.
And this song and the meaning I see behind it? It reminds me that doubt doesn’t mean I’m doing things wrong. It just means I’m doing something that matters.
These lines gave me a gut punch in a good way:
It’s a revelation
It’s a hallelujah
It’s the nature of the spirit running through yah
So take it easy
Just begin again
Take a step back from the race that you’ve been running in
It’s the next song coming on the radio
Just when you need it
So turn it up and let it go
Come on now, that’s exactly what I did.
As Jelly Roll once said, “Music will meet you where you’re at”. Damn that’s true.
I stepped back from the corporate race I had been running in for 20 years. I heard this song – live, raw, and real – and something inside me did shift. I turned it up. And I let it go.
These lyrics didn’t just reflect what I was going through, they offered a kind of permission. Permission to slow down. To trust my gut like I’ve always told myself.
To begin again.
Starting a business has challenged every version of leadership I thought I understood. And with only a few of us in the mix, leadership looks different depending on who I’m with and what hat I’m wearing.
In the corporate world, leadership often meant having the right answers. Projecting confidence. Moving fast. Being “on.” All the time.
But this chapter? It doesn’t just feel different – it is different.
Treehouse isn’t just a company. It’s a reflection of the values I’ve spent years trying to live out and sometimes failing to. It’s a bet on creating a different kind of culture: one that values consistency over chaos, people over process, and doing the right thing even when it doesn’t yield a quick return.
The staffing world, and business in general, is chalked full of comparisons, metrics, urgency, and unrelenting noise. All of it pushing for more, faster, louder. That’s why we have to lead differently.
It means being honest with my team (and myself) when I don’t have everything figured out.
It means creating space for tough conversations – the kind I used to avoid.
It means choosing patience over panic, reflection over reactivity, and alignment over urgency.
To insert a little humor and nostalgia – remember Happy Gilmore? Kevin Nealon’s character, Gary Potter, offers some wonderfully weird advice when Happy is feeling the pressure on the tee box:
“Oh yeah. Lotta pressure. You gotta rise above it. You gotta harness in the good energy, block out the bad. Harness. Energy. Block. Bad. Feel the flow Happy. Feel it. It’s circular. It’s like a carousel…”
I probably pull up that visual in my head more than I should. Sure, it’s exaggerated and it’s Sandler – but there’s truth in it. And it makes me smile.
All these small moments, quotes, lyrics, movie scenes, they’ve become more than just little levers for encouragement.
They’ve shaped how I lead.
The lyrics from “Give It Time” have evolved into a kind of leadership philosophy:
Just begin again…
Take a step back from the race that you’ve been running in…
That’s the kind of culture I want to build, one where people feel safe to reset, realign, and move forward without the weight of perfection on their backs. We’re human. And humans aren’t perfect.
I want to model what it looks like to be vulnerable with intentional slowness.
I want our internal team to feel that.
I want the providers we work with to feel that.
And I want our clients to experience what it’s like to partner with a company that actually shows up – not one that’s just focused on hitting financial benchmarks.
We’re still figuring it out. We’re still in motion. But what I’ve learned is this:
Leadership doesn’t mean never having doubt. It means moving forward — even with it in your pocket.
We didn’t start Treehouse just to do staffing differently. We want to do it better. For the physicians. For the facilities. For the people stuck in a system that too often forgets the “care” in healthcare.
This song, Give It Time, isn’t just a personal anthem anymore. It’s a reminder that the best things take time: Trust, Culture, and Credibility. You don’t build those quickly. You build them in the quiet, consistent decisions no one sees.
The locum tenens industry is fast paced and often reactive. There’s constant pressure to fill roles with quality docs, reduce falloffs, and maximize margins. And while speed matters, how you move matters more.
At Treehouse, we’re betting on a slower burn with a stronger foundation.
What exactly does that mean?
- Taking time to truly understand our providers, not just placing them.
- Treating client relationships like partnerships, not transactions.
- Prioritizing long-term trust over short-term wins.
- Building a team culture which encourages presence, patience, and purpose, not just performance.
We’re continuing to fine-tune our systems, sign contracts, and make placements, but we’re committed to doing all of it without losing sight of the people behind it.
If “Give It Time” teaches anything else, it’s this:
Fast can be efficient. But slow is often where the real magic happens.
That’s a truth culture relentlessly pushes against. Very few things today seem to bring joy by going slower – everyone wants everything done yesterday. We’re living in a generation of immediacy, and it’s setting some seriously false expectations for how we handle life as we get older.
So let me ask you this:
Where in your life are you rushing the process – when what you might really need is to slow down and give it time?
- Is there a decision you’re trying to force clarity on too soon?
- A chapter you’re trying to skip ahead to before it’s fully formed?
- A part of yourself you’re not giving enough grace to grow?
Whatever it is – career, leadership, relationships, healing – maybe the goal isn’t to push harder. Maybe it’s to pause, turn it up, and let it go.
Just begin again.
Take a step back from the race you’ve been running in.
And trust that whatever’s next… it’s on its way. Just give it time.
I hope whatever you’re doing / you’re stopping now and then / and / not doing at all.
-James Fadiman
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this post are my personal reflections. They do not reflect or disclose proprietary information about any current or former employers, partners, or clients.
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