Have you ever thought, “Dear God, by now I should have had this all figured out?” At some point, everyone faces this fear, and I have to tell you – it’s OK to not have it all together, no matter how old you are or what you thought you should have accomplished by now.
Episode Highlights
00:24 Why am I flailing through life? What do I want, and why do I even want it? Shouldn’t I have become an adult by now?
00:40 We all feel this sense of burning shame for not having figured it all out, as though others have and we need to hide our ignorance and inability to function from them.
01:00 We want to know the secret to life because we feel like if we knew it and had it together, we would have an easier time in life and be safer.
02:00 We grow up with a mythic belief in the awesomeness of adulthood, but then we find that adulting is not actually as cool as we anticipated.
02:38 In the same way that your choices expand as you grow up, your responsibilities also expand, whether we want them to or not.
02:50 When we’re teenagers and kids we don’t factor in that we’ll have to give up stuff to get the things we want.
03:30 We are disappointed by our realities, especially when doing our part to get the benefits we wanted so badly turns out to take so much time we don’t get to enjoy those benefits at all.
04:30 I’ve been surprised by how much relief there has been for me when I finally let go of the fantasy that life gets any better than it is right now.
04:40 People resist giving up the fantasy of life becoming easier and better to experience than it is right now because we fear losing hope or losing something good if we only believe in it enough.
05:35 Giving up the expectation that life has some secret level to be achieved lets you have happiness right now instead of after you’ve unlocked the secret level.
06:00 Nobody else has unlocked the secret level to life. It doesn’t exist. It’s a myth. It’s OK to stop searching for it and just enjoy yourself today, I promise.
06:20 Nobody wants to wake up at 2am with their thoughts racing about how they need to try to outsmart life tomorrow.
07:00 This is life as it is right now. What would I like to experience more of within the limits of my current reality?
08:10 Take the pressure off of the unrealistic goal you set when you were twenty and instead focus on how you can maximize your enjoyment of this week. It will feel GREAT.
09:00 Feeling guilty shuts down all your access to inspiration and energy flow. It’s OK to release expectations that are making you feel guilty and bad and allow yourself to be inspired for something new that feels good.
09:15 I don’t want to keep trying if I already feel like I’ve missed the boat. Keeping trying just feels miserable if I believe I’m already too far behind to succeed.
09:30 I’ve found such relief in having a certain amount of pessimism. It lets me accept that trying might not work out and oddly makes me feel better about trying for longer than when I’m optimistic.
10:38 I can’t live a superhero movie every day of my life. Sometimes I just need things to be bearable and predictable and not that exciting.
12:20 I want to teach my kid that her contentment and happiness does not hinge on her figuring anything o
Your donations mean the world to me and allow me to continue to create content each week. I ❤️you and thank you from the bottom of my heart.
Thanks for listening!
