HOW TO QUIT QUITTING

Guess what - you can achieve anything, as long as you never give up. (Cue audience cheers and roaring approval).

Well, that sounds absolutely fucking exhausting, to be honest.

It may be true (within reason), but for those of you with a tiny whipcracking version of yourself inside your brain, it's pretty punishing advice.

It's the kind of advice that leads to burnout.

And because it feels so relentless - and therefore unachievable - you're much more likely to give up when things get tricky.

Because if it's tricky now, just imagine how much trickier it's going to get later on.

And because you've given up this time, you're more likely to give up next time, too. It becomes a habit.

Your brain learns it as a pattern - and the brain loves a pattern. It loves to stick to what it already knows, even if that's not what you really want.

So frustrating!

So how do you get anything done? How do you achieve a goal without burning yourself out by never giving up?

How do you quit quitting?

The answer lies in adopting a flexible mindset - sometimes called a growth mindset.

It means ditching black-and-white, all-or-nothing thinking. 

Simply put, it means that you will inevitably stuff up, or fall off the wagon, or miss a workout, or 'fail' in some way. And when you do, you see that as a normal and natural part of the process, rather than as a failure.

And you begin again as soon as you can.

If you plan to practice your new skill every day for a week, and you've buggered up by Wednesday - you don't throw in the towel. And you certainly don't give yourself a hard time about it.

And if you don't do it the next day either, that doesn't mean it's the end - there's always tomorrow.

Now, if there's a little voice in your head right now saying:

• You'll never get anything done that way

• This is so lazy

• Don't put off till tomorrow what can be done today

• You should have better discipline

or some version of the above - then this tells you something.

It tells you that there is a relentless, unforgiving little whipcracker inside you. It makes you more likely to either give up or burn out.

Healing is not linear - progress is not linear. 

Whatever you're doing, there will be up days and down days. You'll have seasons of growth, and seasons of rest and reset.

You'll have times when you can see that you're obviously moving forward - and times when it feels like you're sinking.

As a counsellor friend of mine says: "There may be waves, but there's still a tide."

There's no need to give up - so long as you don't demand relentless progress. Or rather - so long as you see it all as progress - the peaks and the troughs.

Let yourself off the hook - after all, when has beating yourself up ever achieved anything? That's something you CAN give up - today.

Big love,

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