can we stop trying so hard?

a few thoughts on why to ditch this badge

I’ve been going to therapy again and doing a few ketamine-assisted sessions¹ because who doesn’t therapy in this world?

And because the last four years were hard. Lost my mom to Alhemzier’s. Lost my oldest sister. Launched a book during the beginning of a global shutdown, lost most of my income, and worked my butt off to keep my business afloat, burning out multiple times.

So therapy, yes, good idea.

In my sessions, one of the themes that has come up every single time is…

stop trying so hard

A refrain of letting go.

Don’t strip the screw.

Drop the rope.*²

On every ketamine trip I see so clearly how intimately bound up my sense of safety and worth are with me working full tilt.

Not to be the best but rather to disprove my biggest fear: that I’m dumb and incompetent and everything will fall apart any second now.

Anything successful that happens to me (happens! As if I’m living in a Homeric epic subject to the gods’ whims!) only happens because I worked my little fingers into stubby nubs. Huff and hustle and overdeliver my little heart inside out and serve it up with a fancy garnish.

And look, for someone who grew up with a lot of undiagnosed brain stuff and a dad who was terrified of poverty and who has been self-employed and supporting her family for 32 years — fair enough that I have a few self-trust issues.

But even now? Even after I wrote book after book that supported me, even after I built a successful business based on those books and later, as a writing coach, even after I did all the inner work and lots of therapy, why do I still keep the pot of try-harder on a steady boil?

You know why. We humans, so adorable. So much better to be on hyper-alert for the wolf at the door. Because you know, if everything goes to hell, it will certainly be because I stopped trying hard. Because I got lazy. Complacent. Pretended I knew what I was doing and belonged at the smart kid’s table.

The wisdom I accessed in my ketamine sessions — followed by talk therapy — is how completely exhausting this way of approaching life is. And how I really am ready to be done with it.

Talk about paying to see the obvious.

Take off that badge sweetheart.

I’m grateful for my pattern of gritting through, hustling, working hard, although I do wish it hadn’t so often been laced with massive anxiety and self-doubt. It’s how I repaired my creative confidence after USC film school gutted me. It’s how I taught myself workarounds for my brain — long before anybody talked about that kind of stuff. It’s how I taught myself to be a writer even when writing was so difficult for me.

Trying hard has brought me so much. But it’s time to let it go.

What long-held pattern of yours might it time to let go of?

It’s not too late to let that pattern soften. Maybe gratitude can help you wiggle your way to a fresh perspective. What gifts have you given yourself by doubly and tripling down on some way of being? Sure, maybe isn’t serving you so well now but it sure did once upon a time.

Share if you wish. I’d love to hear.

Love,

Jen

1. I have done this therapy under a doctor’s care and with a trained therapist in her office.

2. As in stop tugging on and holding onto what is out of your control.