Opening Thoughts
“We find the defendant guilty your honor.”
“This court sentences you to a lifetime of guilt, overwhelm, anxiety, and subtle depression.”
The Sunday Scaries are here and you daily dose of guilt is being administered.
You wake up Monday feeling guilty.
You feel guilty when you eat that cheat meal that’s slowly become your breakfast.
You feel guilty as you drive to work outwardly frustrated by the traffic but internally relieved at the momentary delay.
You feel guilty as you find yourself losing your drive and motivation at the office. No longer eager for more responsibilities to prove to your manager you’re capable of being promoted.
During your lunch break, as you scroll through Youtube to calibrate your meal, familiar thoughts slowly embrace you from behind like a jubilant child giddy with joy, hope, and excitement. What if I took that chance after high school (or college) and built that business I always dreamed of. Or what if I kept running like in my crosscountry days to stay in shape? Or what if I was wiling to risk starting over at a new job in order to make more money and have better opportunities?
Brrrrriiinnngg. Brrrrriiinnngg. Brrrrriiinnngg.
Your alarm goes off. Your thoughts are brought back to reality (oops there goes gravity 🧨). The joyous thoughts and sense of hope make their exit for the day. You’ve had your daily respite from reality. The familiar and almost comforting sense of guilt has returned.
You feel guilty as you finish your work day.
You feel guilty as you are once again stuck in traffic.
You feel guilty as your drive by the gym you haven’t gone to since the beginning of the year.
You feel guilty as you arrive home and park in your driveway.
You feel guilty as you walk past the mini home-office you set up in your bedroom. Fading thoughts of that business you wanted to start at the beginning of the year.
You feel guilty as you eat the takeout you ordered on your way back home.
You watch TV and feel nothing.
You scroll through your phone on social media and experience every emotion the algorithm dictates.
Eventually you fall asleep at some point after midnight, hoping to delay tomorrow for as long as your can.
Brrrrriiinnngg. Brrrrriiinnngg. Brrrrriiinnngg.
Your alarm goes off. Your thoughts are groggy (mind is foggy, mom’s spaghetti 🧨). As you start gathering your thoughts and making sense of the world, an old friend is the first to greet you, like a lover waiting for his partner at the arrival gate of the airport. It’s only been a few hours but it’s feel like a lifetime. Your old friend is back in town. Big G. You get ready to start your day with the familiar, comforting, and paralysing sixth sense.
You start you day feeling guilty.
Standard Deviations
It wasn’t until recently, that I was able to identify the source and my solution for this overhanging sense of guilt that had overtaken my existence.
Guilt stems from your moral compass. Your sense of right and wrong are the north star for this sensation.
Guilt also stems from your expectations. When you set a goal for yourself. You typically create a corresponding map, timeline, or a trajectory for how this journey should ****transpire. The more we stay on track, the happier or more satisfied we tend to be with our progress. The more we deviate from this projected course, or the greater the delta (differential) between reality and expectation, the more guilt we feel. The longer we stay off course, the more persistent and bedeviling this sensation is.
Eventually, it become a part of our lives. The guilt becomes a part of you.
Life Is Laughing
When I first ventured on this path of entrepreneurship and building something for myself. I was fueled by excitement and optimism. Like you, I also created a corresponding map, timeline, and a trajectory for how this journey should ****transpire. For a multitude of reasons, things didn’t work out the way I anticipated (shocking right 🙀). In other words, life did what it always does, laugh in your face.
This is now year two for me. A lot has changed regarding my growth, my pivot, and my expectations for the future. One thing that hasn’t changed is the ultimate destination. With a full year of experience and painful (and expensive) lessons under my belt. I’ve come to learn that the roadmap I initially created didn’t account for any waterbugs. I foolishly expected things to work out with minimal deviation. I didn’t account for life laughing at me.
Now in year two, going on year three soon (time flies), I’ve re-calibrated my expectations.
I know this journey is hard and will push you to question whether you want to, or can, keep going.
I know this journey feels like an eternity in the moment but time flies when you’re not looking at the ground (bars 🧨).
I know there are no shortcuts. Despite many on social media claiming to make 10k per month in six months or less, those results are unrealistic (no waterbugs) and would lead to you charting an unrealistic path. This is what leads to guilt down the road.
Closing The Gap
I no longer operate with a sense of guilt in any areas of my life. Not because I’m a psychopath (or am I 😎) but because my expectations are more aligned with my reality – my desired reality. No, I’m not nihilistic, but I do understand that everything can’t happen at once. Progress takes prioritization and time.
When you play an RPG and your character levels up. A fixed amount of points are awarded. You will allocate those points based on your philosophy on how the game should be played. You prioritize the areas that you believe will have the greatest long-term impact on your development and maximize your chances of achieving your goals.
The narrower or smaller the gap between where we currently are on our trajectory and where we expected to be at this time, the less guilt is cultivated. The better we are at projecting what our journey will actually look like the freer our mindstate will be.
I’m not saying that you need to lower your expectations…actually yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying. You should be more realistic, but not with the magnitude of what your are trying to achieve (aim big and don’t hold back). You should lower your expectations on fast it will take you to achieve those goals. The bigger the goal the more time it will take.
15 More Minutes
To be clear, the solution to dealing with overwhelming guilt isn’t just expanding your time horizon. There are multiple steps that can be taken to get you back on the right course and state of being.
When I was dealing with this ailment, I hit an inflection point in which I decided to take a small step everyday. I called it the 15-Minute Workday. This eventually become a foundation that I’ve been able to build upon and branch out from.
After about 6 months of taking small steps, I’ve been able to build momentum towards my goals and create a more balanced lifestyle. I’m more open to experimenting with different facets of my life to see what works for me.
By starting out with 15-minutes per day during the week, I was able to establish consistency, get multiple wins under my belt, and build my confidence back up. Eventually, I decided to continue to push myself and try to do more. Currently, this approach has manifested into me waking up at 5:00 AM during the week (6:30AM on the weekends), and writing for an hour. Then going to the gym on days I’m working from home and don’t have to make the commute into the office. This means the first two hours of my days start off with back-to-back wins. This feeds into my confidence and motivates me to keep going. After work, I’ll come home and make some dinner – I’ve stopped eating out all the time and cook my own meals. Maybe play on my Nintendo Switch or watch some YouTube until its time for me to go to sleep. On the weekends, I’ll visit friends or family, play some basketball, or go on a bike ride.
This may not sound exciting or dramatic – working from 5:00 AM to 12:00AM every single day for 3 years until you “make it”. My goal is to make the journey as sustainable as possible. In the next coming months I’ll expand my schedule to include an extra hour of work for new projects.
I don’t want to burn myself out again.
I’m able to get my work done based on my schedule and enjoy my off time without worrying about getting off track.
This is the life that I’m building and that has brought me peace.
Closing Thoughts
It might seem like I didn’t actually give any direct advice on how to deal with guilt. In case, I wasn’t clear I’ll re-iterate.
First, it’s important to have realistic expectations and expand your time horizons. If you want to make several millions of dollars in the next five years, that’ve very realistic. If you want to make $100k in the next 60 days – it will be challenging, in fact it’s even harder. Give yourself enough time so you don’t set yourself up for failure.
Second, take small steps on a predetermined schedule. I’ve mentioned that I basically work during the week and enjoy my weekends. People will disagree and say the weekend is when I should be going all out. However, I’ve tried that before and ended up burning myself out and becoming miserable in the process. There will be a time when it makes sense to move the ball during that window but my focus is on consistency over intensity.
One of the core principles of the 15-Minute Workday is that you allow yourself to build into your future version. I’m living the life now that I want to live in 3 years. I’m not going to delay all the simple joys of life (friends, family, being active) just because I have a goal.
Eliminating these simple joys are not a sign of my dedication to myself and my future. They’re an invitation to the inevitable guilt that will follow and consume you if the slightest thing goes wrong. As soon as a gap appears between your expectations and reality, and if you’re already in a state of deprivation, you may find yourself burning out, becoming miserable, or quitting altogether.
Imagine taking small steps everyday and allowing yourself time to rest and enjoy the moment – enjoy life. Rather than succumbing to an insidious sense of guilt for not being “productive”, you can allow yourself to indulge in what I call Guilt-Free Boredom.
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