What matters most?

Sometimes the choice you have to make is between taking care of yourself and meeting other peoples expectations.

Nobody wants to be considered a let down which is why often people end up putting themselves aside and focusing more on other people. But you shouldn’t treat yourself as though you don’t matter, you matter just as much as everyone else.

It shouldn’t take you sacrificing yourself in order for other people to be happy.

And maybe you haven’t even realised that you’re doing it. Perhaps it just takes you looking at things as an outsider to realise, you’re so focused on meeting other peoples needs that you’ve stopped making time to tend to your own.

It’s not that important

Sometimes things that aren’t that important get dressed up to be the most important thing in the world.

You react by getting overwhelmed and stressed. This effects you’re sleep, general mood and how you interact with others.

As much as you want to feel good within you’re body, you can’t help but sacrifice that for the sake of the thing that is important.

But then you might find that the deadline you’d been proiortising was much more flexible than you thought.

And so, even though you rushed about trying to get things finished, it turns out it was pointless. You were much better off making yourself priority.

What are you willing to sacrifice?

Sometimes you reach a point in life where you need to make a sacrifice.

What are you willing to give up in order to reach your goal?

And are you willing to give up the right things?

Maybe you need more time to work on your book and so you decide to give up your 30 minutes of exercise a day. Yes, you’ve made a sacrifice but perhaps the right thing to give up would be 1.5 out of 2 hours you spend on social media each day.

The exercise positively contributes to your wellbeing but it’s unlikely you can say the same for social media.

And so when it comes to making a sacrifice in order to gain something, think about the things you currently do that benefit you the least.

Those are the things you should be willing to sacrifice.

Don’t check the stats

It’s easy to fall into thinking that having access to and analysing the numbers will improve your work.

But sometimes it just makes you miserable.

When you sacrifice what you want to do with what will make the numbers go up you’re less likely to be satisfied with the work you produce.

If you focus on producing work that will make the numbers go up but instead they go down, you’ll be even less satisfied.

Sometimes the numbers are helpful when they give you information about what is or isn’t working.

But other times, they’re not worth checking at all.

Giving the people what they want

A few days ago, I wrote a post that did well numbers wise and I knew it would.

It was the kind of thing that people like to read whilst also being useful.

I don’t advocate for writing for people as you’ll never find your own voice or style that way. But in my previous post I managed to find the overlap between what I like to write and what you like to read.

That bit is the sweet spot because that way you’re not sacrificing your creativity or your chance to explore.

The path of most resistance

Most of us have things that we want to achieve in this life and some of us are willing to work extremely hard for what we want.

We’ll sacrifice a lot of things and even go through periods or excessive stress or discomfort in order to reach the light at the end of the tunnel.

In some ways it’s like we take the path of most resistance. We know we could live an easier life but we choose otherwise because we’re not just dreamers we’re do-ers.

But at the end of the day, what’s it worth?

Is putting yourself through a great challenge worth it in the hope that you’ll overcome it.

Of course if you make sacrifices and are able to upgrade your life tenfold then you’ll believe it was worth it.

But don’t get caught in believing that you need to struggle to justify your success.

A bad version of a good thing

Arizona Birkenstocks are a classic sandal, there is no doubt about it. They’re ergonomic footwear designed to mould to the shape of your foot over time.

There around £60 which is not particularly expensive for a good quality pair of sandals. However, when there are similar versions for a quarter of the price it can be tempting to go for the cheaper version.

But the thing about the cheaper version is that it has a few things missing. There’s PVC/PU instead of leather, they’re not as comfortable and they show signs of wear much sooner.

They’re a bad version of a good thing.

That’s the sacrifice you make when you’re constantly looking for the cheaper option.