When I looked at my calendar for this week and saw this was a blog post I was supposed to write, I panicked. My first thought was how could I possibly narrow that down to one blog post? But I feel like that’s why I need to talk about it. It’s something we all feel from time to time, yet it’s something we all beat ourselves up about. We are not good enough.
But who are we not good enough for? Our boss? Our significant other? Our kids? Ourselves? If you’re Type A, an overthinker, an overachiever, or a perfectionist, chances are the answer to that question is all of the above. I know I feel the pressure constantly. I was raised in a household where working hard was the only option. I wasn’t pressured to go to college or to know what I wanted to do at 18 years old. I just had to have a dream, and I had to work hard. Working hard just comes naturally to me. Working my ass off and living with chaos is really the only way I know how to live. For me, that’s not even a real pressure of mine.
The only pressure that really feels suffocating is the pressure I put on myself. Lately I’ve been trying to run two businesses, finalize some wedding details, go to the gym, all while still running my household (cleaning, cooking, laundry, etc.). And I fall short every fucking day. But nobody else cares, that’s the strange part. Here I am feeling like a failure because I haven’t folded the laundry yet or I forgot to put up my daily agenda but the only person who seems to notice is me.
Last week I placed a Shipt order (signing up has honestly been a saving grace because I’ve eliminated that from my to do list) and Shaun was helping me put groceries away and he’s like, “We already have 3 onions. We have cabbage. We have two boxes of this and both are unopened.” You guys, I don’t even know what’s in my refrigerator or pantry because I’ve been too busy to even take notice. But Shaun doesn’t care that we have 14 heads of cabbage. It literally doesn’t affect him whatsoever but here I am feeling so guilty that I didn’t know. Why? Why do we do this to ourselves?
Last week I was so sick I could barely move my neck because my throat was so swollen. Yet I was extremely hard on myself, making sure I was posting on Instagram at least once a day and trying to get in my 3 blog posts for the week. And I was being so hard on myself for “not feeling like it”. It’s my job. It’s my obligation to get this stuff done. If I’m physically able to type on my keyboard I should be able to get a post published. There is no excuse.
But in my opinion we need to give ourselves a break, cut ourselves some slack. (Yes, me too.) Let’s stop that inner monologue where we tell ourselves we’re failures and we need to do better. Because even though that voice in our head is technically silent, I find it to be the loudest. Let’s start reminding ourselves of our successes, our hard work, and recounting all of the things we did get done that day. So what, we missed a few things on the to do list. Life is short, and there’s always tomorrow.
