Give Yourself Grace, You Weren’t Meant To Do It All

I’ve been binge watching Caroline on YouTube (check her out if you haven’t already, she’s fantastic), and her confessions about balancing work, life, and the struggles of today’s societal expectations are so, so beautiful.

I think there are compounding reasons why monologues like hers and movements like Antiwork have taken off recently.

It’s weird. I work with colleagues from different parts of the world who tell me how lucky I am to have grown up in America. I recently went to a wedding where family members from other countries praised their children during their speeches about how wonderful it is they get the opportunity to live in America.

That word, “opportunity” — it means a lot of things to many different people. I’ve found myself struggling with it a lot lately, and I apologize for the following rant coming from a place of privilege, but I think we’re all doing life wrong.

I don’t think humans were meant to live to work. Work, work, work. I don’t think it’s healthy.

I don’t think we should have to feel the guilt we feel for not having enough time in the day to complete all of our house chores because we choose to prioritize a long walk after work to decompress.

I don’t think we should weigh questions like, “should I work overtime today, or should I get outside to enjoy the beautiful day and this sunshine?”

I don’t think we should feel bad about not succeeding by whatever society’s definition of the word is.

It’s all backwards, and it’s all bullshit. If I allow myself to go down the rabbit hole of thoughts on it for too long, I find myself agreeing all too much with George Carlin. But the problem with that for me is that it’s not good for my mental health. I think he’s 100% correct! But I can’t dwell on it, because I appreciate my moments of joy in the little moments in life far too much.

Even in a beautiful moment while walking my dog, feeling the sun on my face, and noticing the leaves on the ground creating what looks like nature’s version of a gorgeous, tie dyed art piece beneath my feet, I feel the pull in my gut of, “shouldn’t you be working on project X, Y, or Z?”

This isn’t fair.

Humans weren’t meant to be put on this earth be assembly workers.

Even for those of us who “have it lucky” and get to work from home and spend time with our animals, I sometimes wish we just didn’t have to work at all.

Even for those of us who are content creators, sometimes I just don’t want to do it. Sometimes I don’t want to do anything, and that should be more normalized as acceptable.

This isn’t me trying to say that we should have everything handed to us, I just think we deserve a break. We deserve to empathize with one another in these moments of frustration together, we don’t have to suppress them.

So the next time you find yourself worrying that you’re not doing enough, or that you feel guilty for not feeling 100% at work, stop. Appreciate yourself, and give yourself grace. You are not meant to do it all.

No one is.

Those who say they do it all while keeping a smile on their face the whole time are lying, and they know it. They feel that pang of FOMO with nature. And if they don’t now, they will when they’re on their deathbed.

Give yourself grace for wanting to go outside to smell the rain on the pavement.

Give yourself grace for wanting to lie down away from any blue light or screens.

Give yourself grace for feeling your body move during yoga during your lunch break.

You aren’t meant to do it all, and you are doing just fine. Allow yourself to embrace the “little moments” that spark joy throughout your day. Those are the moments that truly matter.