7 things I’ll be giving even less of a sh*t about in 2021.
I have no idea how I limited this to 7, but here goes…
- Having a planner. Wow, if buying one of those things wasn’t the biggest waste of paper and cash in 2020! And more fool you if you spent most of the previous December’s mortgage payment on purchasing yours, thinking it held any power whatsoever over how likely you were to achieve your ‘dreams’, anyway. All the glossy pages and snazzy space for motivational mantras in the world can’t save you from a recession f***ing up your calendar year before it even gets going…
- How much money other people earn. I honestly don’t know why people are okay with telling others all about their monthly ‘Ks’ in social media posts, despite the fact that a) nobody would ever walk into a room and announce that stuff in real life, and b) the only person who really cares about that cash is whoever’s in your will and whoever’s in the tax office.
- Looking for more. For so many reasons over the years – with 2020 being no exception – I’ve learned to be grateful for what I have and what I achieve. I work hard and smart, and naturally gain more of the things I want and need as I progress, but I believe if you’re constantly looking for more, you’ll never truly be satisfied. There’s a point where you can only do so much with it all, anyway. And you can’t take any of it with you; whatever ‘it’ is.
- Leaving my comfort zone. Funnily enough, I worked damn hard to get myself so comfy in the first place, so I’ll be staying here for as long as I choose, thanks. Whilst I agree that good things can happen outside of said zone of comfort, I don’t think it’s the be all and end all of progress, and I certainly don’t think my comfort zone is anyone else’s business. Here’s an idea, have a good rummage around your existing zone (snigger) and see what’s left to explore!
- ‘Smashing‘, ‘10x-ing‘ or ‘leveling up‘ on anything I’m doing. I went into business for myself in pursuit of an easier life, so forgive me for being happy and merely doing what I need to do to enjoy it. I don’t need to put a label on my progression, I don’t need to be in any kind of competition with anyone, and I certainly don’t want to be judged by targets that I can feel inadequate about if I don’t (for any reason) hit them. I think that’s pretty much why I left employment in the first place.
- Other people’s definitions of success. You do you, but if you’re going to push your way of doing things on me and be almost insistent that I follow your ‘path of success’ to do with my business what you allegedly do for yours, I’m going to question how successful you really are. Why are you so hell-bent on gaining my custom? Surely you already have people throwing themselves at your successful self, no? I may not have the money you claim you have, but I’ve not had to sell my soul on social media, either, so… that makes me pretty successful, I’d say.
- Whoever shouts the loudest on social media. My god, I am so done with those people – and we all know them. We live our lives online even more than ever now thanks to all this virus crap, and the pivoting really brought out the pretension and the predictability, it really did. Please, dear lord, show me more of the people who have something different to say in 2021, rather than spamming me with the same old loud-mouth vacuous rubbish from the same old ‘influencers’, who are both somehow ‘crazily busy’ with their madcap successful lifestyle, yet also have a helluva lot of free time to be phenomenally predictable on social media…
I could have gone on past 7, I really could have, but why draw out the crap from 2020 even longer than it already has been?
Quick note – if anyone’s wondering why I left “what other people think” off my list of things I won’t be caring about in 2021, then it’s because that statement simply isn’t true. I’ve always cared what people think, and will continue to do so. Okay, admittedly, what people think never makes me change who I am and rarely makes me change what I say, but it does form a big part of how I choose and use my words, because whilst some people bloody love to draw out haters because they bring attention – and that’s the one currency they crave even more than money – I merely quite welcome those antagonists if it means I indirectly get the right eyes looking my way. In simple terms, I’m not here to deliberately p*ss people off; it’s merely a bi-product of what I do. So yeah, I care what people think of me, because I’m human. And because I’d quite like people to hire me for stuff.
And the best thing about the seven things that did make it onto my list of shit to care less about in 2021? None of them are new to me. I’ve been doing them all the time anyway (or trying my hardest, at least). I don’t really believe in setting new New Year’s resolutions, because if my lack of willpower won’t f*** them up, then a deadly strain of virus and a sh*tbag government just might do it for me anyway. There’s little point.
So, my message for 2021 in all of this? Keep doing what you’re doing, lovely people. Despite anything you’ve been through, you’ve got this far, and no matter what anyone on social media manages to convince you that you need to do, have or be in your business or life, remember that we don’t actually know if they have those things themselves. And if they do, they can’t be that bloody happy with it all if they need to seek validation and adoration for it on social media every ten seconds, now can they?
Now go, avoid social media – including this post. I may write for a living, but that doesn’t mean I’ve achieved any of my success through having written anything of any real value…
Happy New Year and stuff.
Jo x