Have you ever quit something? How did it feel?
Was there guilt or shame associated with quitting a job, a relationship, a friendship, or a hobby?
Maybe that activity or that situation or that job had served its purpose. And now you’re free.
Maybe quitters are really winners.
Ask someone who got divorced if they’d still like to be married to their ex. Most will say no! Why? Because the beauty of life is that you can always quit! You can always make new choices! And you don’t have to live for the rest of your life with someone you’re not suited to. Or stay in a job that you hate. Or a hairstyle that is crappy for you! Everything changes, and that rules actually.
What failure really is
Failure is staying where you’re not happy.
It’s not quitting something that makes you unhappy.
Is a relationship or a job you quit really a failure if it taught you something? If you grew?
Who decides that something long term is in fact a success?
You could be stuck in a terrible relationship or a job you hate but on the outside, it’s long term, so it looks good.
Who decides that a 20 year relationship is a good one? Just because it’s long? The sunk cost fallacy, quantity over quality in WS, really bites us in the ass here.
Repeat after me.
History is not compatibility
Proximity is not compatibility
Attraction is not compatibility either!
You can love something that is bad for you
Addicts know this, but hey, guess what. You can love a whole system that exploits you.
Just like going no contact with family members who somehow think it’s OK to deny you body autonomy and vote against trans rights or abortion, or people who see Palestinians as necessary casualties, you get to walk away. But you first have to figure out, what are my values?
My values can be why I don’t talk to these people anymore.
Quitting is awesome.
Here’s what I’ve quit doing.
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Quit being a baby photographer after 3 days!
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Quit buying so many clothes
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Quit doom scrolling
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Quit reading the NYT, cannot recommend this highly enough
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Quit NYC
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Quit arguing with my family about my grandmother having dementia
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Quit trying to fix people
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Quit trying to codependently solve everyone’s problems
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Quit trying to jump into each social issue and solve it
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Quit making passive aggressive comments when people were help-rejecting complaining, and instead just moved away from them
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Quit relationships that didn’t work for me
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Quit friendships where our values didn’t match anymore
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Quit eating foods that made me sick
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Quit living on the east coast because it wasn’t right for me
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Quit living in Asia
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Quit teaching English
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Quit doing volunteer work (NOT WORTH IT)
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Quit doing shit for free
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Quit letting other people decide what success was for me
What have you quit?
You can get my new book and workbooks, Healing from the Nonprofit Sector, here from Amazon, or here from me
