I'm going to stop trying so hard
A story about finally being done.
Dear Kula Diaries,
I’m going to be completely honest with you: I’ve been trying too hard. It feels like ‘trying’ is somehow infused in my DNA: trying to be more successful… trying to be better… trying to accomplish things… trying to reach goals… trying to sell things… trying to promote things… trying to climb things… trying to do whatever the next thing is that I’m ‘supposed to do’. A few weeks ago, I decided that I was done trying. I felt tired, exhausted and burned out. Now, let me be clear — I’m not giving up on anything… I’m not quitting my job at Kula Cloth… and I most certainly am not cancelling The Dance Experiment. But, I’m going to stop trying so hard.
So, I guess this might need some explaining. As most of you know, I broke up with my cell phone and social media last year… which started a cascade of momentum in a new direction. If a repeatable past creates a predictable future… suddenly, I had no idea what to expect anymore. Initially, I went through a phase of what felt like absolute turmoil — without the ‘crutch’ of my cell phone to numb my brain, I was suddenly forced to face the emotions and thoughts that I had tried to suppress for a long time. Gradually… I climbed out of the chaos through intentionally and mindfully focusing on the things that I wanted to create.
I’m going to pause for a moment, and tell you a story about mountaineering. On my 2nd attempt at climbing Mt. Rainier, we ascended the Emmons Glacier and were greeted by a ‘wind event’ that included 80-90mph gusts. At one point, the wind was so loud that our rope team leader was screaming at us… and I could see his mouth moving erratically as he yelled… but I could hear nothing. The wind sounded like a rabid freight train that was dragging a few brakes. At around 13,000’ feet elevation, we decided to bail on our attempt at the summit — the conditions were just too dangerous. As we descended, the wind continued to howl and still remember how I could hear the gusts before they’d hit me. I’d brace myself for impact, and the wind would knock me to my knees… over and over and over again. Since we had climbed in the middle of the night, I hadn’t slept at all… and by the time we made it back to camp, I could barely walk. I crawled into my tent and laid down on the ground, even though my sleeping pad had already been packed up… it didn’t matter… I just wanted to sleep. On the way down, I stumbled my way down the Interglacier holding my ice axe and some ascending climbers said, “You know, you’d fall less if you were using your poles instead of your axe.” I remember looking back at them and saying, “I know… but I’m too tired to stop and swap them.”
Why am I telling that story? Because that is the closest description that I can find to perfectly articulate what it feels like to try really hard. It is endless… exhausting… and just when you feel like you can’t go much further… you get knocked down onto your knees, and you have to pick yourself up off the ground. And the worst part about trying? First, you never get any closer to where you actually want to go… and second there is a part of you that believes that no matter what you do … you are getting behind or losing ground or not doing enough. It is a gargantuan hamster wheel of unsustainable effort.
I am done falling down… I am done picking myself back up. A few weeks ago, I looked around at where I was and I had a sudden realization: I don’t have to do this. Nobody is making me do this. I am not on a mountain. I can let go of this endless need to try harder and get more done. I can let it go. Could it really be that simple?
I’ve frequently shared an exercise that I perform on a regular basis: a visualization of the best version of myself, coupled with an investigation of the emotional words that describe that experience. Last year, I saw very clearly that the best version of myself was not addicted to her cell phone… and, so, I changed it. I broke the compulsive addiction with my phone and it forever altered the course of my life. Suddenly, my mind was free and open to the infinite possibilities of everything around me — since my face wasn’t constantly looking down and staring at my phone… new ideas and opportunities started to arrive that hadn’t been there before. And it was during one of those moments that I experienced the next evolution in this process: the absolute certainty that I needed to stop trying so hard.
When I looked at the best version of myself, I saw a version of me that was doing what she loved: writing, being creative, teaching backpacking, riding her motorcycle, spending time with her husband and cats, having fun with people she cared about. What was she not doing? Well, she certainly wasn’t working herself to death. We trick ourselves into believing that if we work harder or try harder that we’ll make more progress and suddenly ‘get to that place’ where things will be perfect at some time in the distant future. I realized with shocking clarity that I had fallen into the exact same trap that I so often talk about avoiding.
As I investigated my own dreams and desires, I was able to pinpoint exactly what I wanted. I wanted relief. That’s what I wanted to feel: relief that I was done. Relief that I was there. Relief that I had done it and that I didn’t need to push so hard or try so hard or work so hard anymore. As I had this realization, I was walking down the hill in the dark at 4:30 am and I started laughing out loud… because it was so stupidly simple, and in that moment I realized that relief was never going to come to me if I needed ‘certain things’ to happen in order to feel the relief. Relief had to come right now. I was the one preventing myself from feeling it because I had attached it to an imaginary future moment when things were different.
As I walked down the hill that morning, I started to cry as waves of relief rushed through my body — it was the most intense relief I’ve ever felt in my life… as if the whole universe had summoned all of its energy to say, “You’re DONE!! YOU DID IT!! You MADE IT”. I thought about all of the things that I had done over the past decade to make ‘this’ a reality… and I wept for the heart that I had poured into everything… I wept for how hard I had tried… I wept for the part of me that had falsely believed that I wasn’t doing enough because I hadn’t yet ‘achieved’ some completely arbitrary level of success. I wept because the realization hit me that I already had the thing that I wanted: I already had the relief… I already had the freedom… I could give myself permission to stop trying so hard. I had already made it. I could release my shoulders and breathe. I could let go and relax and enjoy my life. I was done.
When most of us think about what we want our lives to look like, it’s easy to identify those feelings. I think that most of us would have a similar list of feelings: ease, relief, freedom, fun, joy, love, adventure, peace, belonging, abundance, creativity, and wellbeing. And yet — we unconsciously push those things away from ourselves by inviting time into the equation. Why time? Well, because in our minds it takes time to get those things… because those things are based on external results like accomplishments and money and relationships and success. Wanting our lives to be rich with experiences is not inherently bad — but intertwining our own sense of happiness with external circumstances creates a gap between where we are now… and where we would rather be — that mystical, imaginary place where things will finally be better. For me, it was usually a place in the distance: a moment in time where my house was paid off and the ultimate dream Kula office was built and The Dance Experiment had thousands of members… then, and only then, could I relax. Then, and only then… could I feel the relief that would ‘magically arrive’ with those things. Then, and only then, could I feel the infinite abundance of the universe. Except that I was wrong.
Why? Because I can find the feeling of those things right now — without them needing to be here. Afterall, it’s the feeling that I want, not the thing itself. The only reason that anybody wants something is because they want the feeling that they associate with that thing… but we forget that we don’t need the thing to have the feeling. We can find the feeling now… and then open the door for the experience to arrive. I can take a deep breath and know that in my not-trying-ness, I am not letting go of those dreams or getting further away from them — in fact, I am setting out the welcome mat for them to arrive. I am sending them a very strong signal that says: I’m ready.
I’ve been trying hard my entire life. The first time I remember trying hard, I was 6 or 7 years old. I didn’t want to play soccer, but my dad told me I had to try it. I ended up spending most of the games kneeling down on the field looking at ants crawling out of ant hills — which was far more fascinating to me than what was going on around me. The frantic parents would be on the sideline screaming at me to ‘GET UP!!!"‘ as the opposing team dribbled the ball past me to score the winning goal. I was unphased — how could anybody deny the miracle of watching ants? They were also so busy… and so productive… and so focused — unlike me and my soccer performance. Ultimately, I realized that staring at ant hills wasn’t going to earn me any validation — so I started trying, because I thought it would make other people proud of me.
As the oldest of three girls, I was the stereotypical overachiever who got good grades and excelled at nearly everything. I don’t say this out of a sense of accomplishment — but rather, out of a sense of sadness. I was simply unable to let myself fail at anything and the standard to which I held myself was ridiculous. If I did something… I had to do it the best. There was no middle ground — because middle ground wouldn’t get me the approval that I wanted. More accurately — it wouldn’t give me the love that I needed from places outside of myself.
And so, I tried. I worked hard at everything that I did, and I have never stopped. For 43 years I have been trying so hard to do everything ‘right’. I worked hard in college to get good grades so that I could get into medical school — and even though I failed, I nearly killed myself in the process. I pulled all-nighters to try and (foolishly) pass my exams… and I studied and memorized Latin texts so that I could pass my upper level Latin language class about Vergil’s Aeneid. When I decided not to go to Medical School, I proclaimed that I wanted to become a Park Ranger, and so I told my dad that my goal was to join the Senior Executive Service in the National Park Service. Being ‘OK’ at anything was never good enough. Once I got laid off as a Park Ranger, I became the first female railroad police officer in the Seattle Area in over 20 years. And once I quit that job? Well, you all know the rest of the story: I threw myself into Kula Cloth… which has been the ultimate display of trying on many levels: trying to be successful, trying to do a good job, trying to make people happy, trying to be a good boss, trying to write really well, trying to make people proud, trying to do something good in the world, trying to make a living, trying to leave a tiny little fingerprint in the cosmos that says that, even for a moment, that I was here.
Oddly, I know I’ve done a great job, but it’s never satisfied that feeling of ‘being enough’. There’s always the next thing and the next thing… and then there’s that carrot of relief that dangles off in the distance: the day that I can finally relax a little bit and enjoy the ‘freedom’ that I have tried to carve out for myself in the world. Except that I forgot the thing that I knew all along: the carrot never gets any closer. It hangs there, just out of reach until the day that you remember that freedom doesn’t happen because you finally, someday in the future, make it to the carrot. Freedom is the realization that in this very instant… you can just step off the treadmill… walk around the front of it… grab the carrot… dip it in some ranch dressing and go live your life.
And so, this past week, when I felt the relief of finally being done… after 43 years of trying… I felt an indescribable happiness that was the thing I had been wanting all along. I went to work that day, not as the version of me who needed to be better and work harder and do more… but as a version of me who felt a strange sense of peace in knowing that I don’t need to figure out all the details — those will fall into place on their own. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that the things I am most excited about already exist — because I can feel them. I don’t need to see them… I can just enjoy the feeling, and trust that the ingredients are coming together in the perfect way, without me needing to force anything.
As a kid, my dad used to to tell me that I needed to, “Put my shoulder to the wheel.” I love working… I love my job… I love running a business… but working and trying hard are two very different things. Going to work because you love being creative and because you genuinely care about what you are doing and because it inspires you is an entirely different thing than trying hard to make things happen. No amount of attempting to ‘force’ things has ever worked for me, and yet we’ve been taught that the harder we try… the more successful we will be. But it’s not true. The harder I try, the more and more I lose sight of why I started this journey to begin with. I didn’t start a business because I wanted to feel nauseated and stressed all the time. I started it because I wanted a chance to create something from my heart.
What is the feeling of relief? It’s the feeling of taking a long, deep exhale and letting my body sigh and rest. It’s the feeling that I get when I crawl back into bed on a weekend morning after my walk… and just lay there… doing nothing except for appreciating how good it feels. It’s the feeling of getting back home from a motorcycle ride and feeling exhausted and sinking into the couch and petting my cats as I sip tea. It’s the feeling of eating a breakfast sandwich in the morning when I’m really hungry and tasting the salty, buttery crunchiness of the bread. It’s the feeling of being truly present to where I am — not needing anything else to change, and completely trusting that the details of life will figure themselves out. It’s the knowing that I don’t need to do anything else — that I can simply find the next best feeling thought or idea, and know that I’m on the right path. It’s a feeling of deep satisfaction and goodness — like the feeling of looking at somebody you love and seeing the kindness in their eyes.
It took me 3 attempts to successfully climb Mt. Rainier. On the first attempt, we were foiled by wind. On the second attempt… it was again, wind, that prevented us from climbing beyond 13,000’. On my third attempt, the weather was perfect. I had envisioned reaching the summit of Mt. Rainier for over three years, and I thought that I knew exactly what it would feel like to finally put both of my feet on the 14,411ft high point on Columbia Crest. I had imagined a feeling of relief and euphoria — a literal and metaphorical apex of three years of training and dreaming in exchange for a brief moment in a spot where I could climb no higher. And yet, the feeling didn’t come on the summit. The feeling came much, much earlier: we had stopped to take a rest near the top of the Emmons Glacier, and the sun started to rise on the horizon. The mountains below, which had seemed so massive only the day before, looked like an insignificant carpet below us. I had watched the colors on the horizon change overnight while we were climbing — and I had never known that a sunrise didn’t just ‘appear' in the East… that it took hours and hours of different colored layers of light, before it finally cast its warming glow over the earth. And somehow, amidst this indescribable beauty — I could sense that I was a tiny piece of it.
I did stand on the summit of Mt. Rainier that day — but, to be honest, that’s not what I remember most about the trip. In fact, the summit was cold and windy… and I was exhausted and ready for the long descent back to camp. What I remember about climbing Mt. Rainier was the moment, watching the sunrise, when I let it all go. I would descend back to my life… and to a few more decades of trying really hard… but that singular moment has stayed with me more than any summit I’ve ever climbed. It was a simple but powerful lesson: you don’t need to be on the summit of the mountain to feel what you are looking for.
What’s going to happen? Well, that’s something I’ll have to continue to share about — but I have noticed that in the last few weeks of not trying…things are going more smoothly, I’m remarkably peaceful and happy, and I’ve been inspired to new and fun ideas. I’ve re-energized my gratitude and appreciation practice, and I’ve been noticing the little wonders of life again. I feel a renewed sense of energy and hope and a complete knowing that things are working out for me — and that I can give up the impossible task of trying to juggle and control the chaos of life. I can simply be here in this moment… and know that, for the first time, I don’t need to try anymore.
Friends, thank you all so much for being here and for reading the things that I write. If you are a compulsive over-tryer like me… I hope you will join me in this practice of letting go. I’ve said everything to justify my over-trying… and not one thing has ever helped. No amount of ‘trying hard’ that I’ve done has ever gotten me further or made me happier — it’s only kept me away from the relief, peace, ease and stillness that I want. The realization that we can have that right now is a powerful gift not only to yourself, but also to others. Please keep in mind that not trying hard does not mean doing nothing. In fact, it is quite the opposite — it’s simply the practice of living in the present and taking actions that are inspired by the answers and ideas that you have access to from that place of stillness and connectedness. I assure you that the actions you take from this place will do far more than any actions that are taken from a place of fear, doubt or scarcity. Try it… or should I say… don’t try it… and see what happens.
I’ll end by sharing one my favorite poems from Thich Nhat Hanh called, ‘Going in Circles’:
O you who are going in circles, please stop. What are you doing it for? "I cannot be without going, because I don't know where to go. That's why I go in circles." O You who are going in circles, please stop. "But if I stop going, I will stop being." O my friend who is going in circles, you are not one with this crazy business of going in circles. You may enjoy going, but not going in circles. "Where can I go?" Go where you find your beloved, where you can find yourself.
I’m sending you all a lot of love today and all days. Thank you for being here.
“If you don’t save a bit of your time for you, now, out of every week…there is no moment in the future when you’ll magically be done with everything and have loads of free time.”
— Jessica Abel, author of the audio storytelling classic Out on a Wire, quoted in Oliver Burkeman’s book Four Thousand Weeks.
Pasted from: https://soundjudgment.substack.com/p/my-story-meet-your-story
This is so powerful, Anastasia. And wow, what a great poem. You're on track to "simplify" 2024. Thanks for sharing everything, this resonates so much. Sending lots of love!