Taking Stock

It's really discouraging when you realize that your worst enemy is yourself. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one. So take some bit of comfort out there, because yes, there's someone who knows they're awesome, but are sabotaging themselves and holding themselves back from greater things, just like you. 

You aren't consistent with work, you don't keep up with your workout routine, you don't write in your journal every day, you can't finish that free programming course-

We all know it's good to be self aware, but let's be honest, being aware of all the ways you have contributed to your own failure falls into the category as going back to the dentist for a root canal: Good for you, will stave off worse pain down the road, but it's insanely uncomfortable. No one wants to sit back and count all the ways they really screwed up in a day. But this isn't about that; this is about taking stock of what I can improve on.

Social Media and Loneliness

Working from home can be challenging, but there's one thing you're not prepared for: you're working alone. No coworkers to complain about, no coworkers to share the trials of your day with or have an office party with. Work is an easy way to kill two birds with one stone: you get money with which to afford food and other necessities, and you get that necessary and vital socialization we need to function as human beings, all in one go! Even if you love the freedom being self-employed provides, finding the extra time to hangout with friends can be just another chore to add to your already packed schedule. So maybe you go out for lunch or go on a walk, but depending on your workload, even that hour out of your day can be impossible.

But that break from work is vital! Since you're home with no coworkers in sight-maybe you've already had lunch at this point-you log into Facebook and reply to a few messages, maybe switch to Twitter and send out a tweet or two. Or you do what I do and get on Reddit and post comment after comment until your eyes bleed and your poor little fingers snap in frustration. You refresh the page five times in ten minutes in the hopes of getting that one sweet reply. You don't even have to leave the house, it's all on the computer you were already planning on using anyways. You know that you need to go out and interact with real people, but like I said, that becomes just another chore. 

It's like a cupcake for lunch instead of a healthy sandwich. The cupcake might fill you up, but you're going to end up eating more and more of them to get the calories and some of the nutrition of that sandwich. Same with using online socialism to make for the real thing: you go for more and more until you haven't gotten a single thing done. And because it is all at the computer that you're going to be using anyways and isn't it so much easier to do that than it is to just work. Who wants to work when it's so much fun not to? But none of that would be possible if not for this next fact:

There's Always Someone Better

There's always someone better than you. There's about a 2% chance that you will be "the best" at anything. 

OK, hard part's over. Admitting that is never fun, especially when you have to work so hard to be good at anything. You work hard for college, you spend days and weeks studying for your courses, you practice for hundreds of hours and yet something is still off. But you soldier through that and get to the point where you say, "Hey, I am totally competent at [insert skill] to apply for that job!" 

And then the first and second and third rejection letter/email arrives. Dozens more follow and those are the good ones! Most places of potential employment don't even bother to send you anything at all. You just can't seem to break into where you want to be. Some people are motivated by this sort of rejection, but for the rest of us, it's just another reason why we feel that our hard works means nothing anyways, so why exert the energy to continue? It doesn't help that social media-your go-to choice for social interaction-is full of people who seem to be doing better than you. They have careers worth having, real friends, and weddings, and better food! You know you shouldn't compare yourself to them, but that is almost impossible to avoid when you're looking at their pictures everyday. Plus, it's only human to want to see if you're in a comparable spot as the people closest to you. 

Some people find these posts inspiring because they give them something to strive for. But for the rest of us, all it does is to tell us that we suck. Our minds can't get over the fact that we just simply aren't as good as the people around us. It leaves you feeling wrong and, quite frankly, useless. I know that sounds really whiny, this whole article probably sounds really whiny. I probably sound like I need to see a therapist. But it's important to take stock. Sometimes that means whining. Sometimes it means admitting that...

You're Lazy

Yep, it's a harsh truth: sometimes you're lazy. I'm lazy, everyone is lazy. In fact, when you look back at the history of the world, you'll find that a lot of human advancement was made for the sake of being able to be lazy. Farming was developed so that humans didn't have to hunt and gather every single day, while planes were invented so that humans didn't have to travel for weeks or months to get to the other side of the country. People work very hard so that they can be lazy later.

It's easy to be too lazy, though. You go to your social media page of choice, get bummed out from looking at all of your friends who seem to have more going on in their lives than you, and you find that it's easier to wallow in self-pity and not get to work. It all feeds into the "loser" narrative in your head and after awhile, you've dug yourself so deep into a rut that you've ended up making more work for yourself than you needed in the first place. 

I want to end this post by telling you all that I have some sort of solution to all of these problems we share, but I don't. That's not really what taking stock is about. Before you can find a solution, you have to even know what the problem is, and that means confronting these harsh truths and feeling uncomfortable. But you know what the great thing about that is? That means that you're taking the first step to being that better person. It's going to be OK, you have to believe that. It's not just some phrase people use to sell you some false idea of assurance. It's survival. You have to believe that everything is going to be OK or else you're never going to have a reason to work towards something better than what you have now. All of that fear and loneliness and mountain of failure you have in front of you is scary, right? It seems impossible to get over, doesn't it? But it isn't and you can't think that it is. 

And how do you stop with that line of thinking? You've probably been doing it so long that it's just your default train of thought now. There's no magic saying or exercise you can do. You just have to stop. Sure, it will come up again and you'll just have to stop it again. And you'll probably end up doing that a lot for the rest of your life. But I promise, it will get easier, that negative train of thought will get easier to suppress and one day, maybe you will even totally forget about it for a little bit. And I promise, you will be better able to handle it then and everything will be OK.