On feeling behind

Hello Gorgeous.

For this morning, I want to talk a bit about night creams and big dreams.

When I turned 30, something subtle changed; I started googling people's ages. At first, I thought it was a general curiosity, but then I talked to friends and we were all doing the same thing. We all started googling around the same time, our 30th birthday. It wasn't just curiosity, we were using the ages of people we admire as a measuring stick, to see if we were behind.

Behind has become a theme with the ambitious, brilliant women I spend my time with. Everyone, no matter how successful or wonderful they are, feels behind. We have these incredibly high expectations of ourselves and our careers, and if we’re not already an “influencer”, a billionaire, or Oprah yet— we’ve failed.

We keep riding ourselves and still feeling like we aren’t where we need to be. We whisper to ourselves "When I get this thing, I’ll feel better", only to get that thing and still feel behind. It’s a shitty SoulCycle class that will go on for eternity, and Ashley will always have a better ass.

We collect achievements like Pokemon; we have to catch THEM ALL. Then we measure our collections against those of the people we know, and the people we admire. Our collections can always be bigger, so we feel behind, and scramble to what’s next.

We are telling ourselves ‘what I have done isn’t enough’, when we are really feeling ‘who I am isn’t enough’.

We have to cut it out. The comparison, the feeling behind, the constant striving. You can’t benchmark your story against someone else’s, because only you can live your story. Take inspiration from the successful, but don’t compare your story to theirs. You don’t know theirs, and it’s probably a lot more complex and painful than you could ever imagine. Comparison is the enemy of joy, sure, but it's the enemy of community too. It hinders connection and prevents growth.

You can always have more, but what we all have to decide that who we are right now is enough. Right now. Not after you lose 5 pounds, grow your followings to 100k, host the next event, launch the next company. Right. The. Fuck. Now. Sitting in your PJs, in bed, squinting at your phone. In this moment, you are enough

Say it out loud, I am enough.

You aren’t behind, my dear, you are right where you are supposed to be. And when you get back on that shitty stationary bike, just remember that you don’t have to prove your worth through achievement. It was there all along.