Stop living your life like a Marathon, Jog instead!
Have you ever heard of the overused phrase “Life is a marathon, not a sprint” and felt inspired by the quote? If this is the first time, I bet you already figured out that this is about finding the determination of pursuing your dreams, decomposed into goals which bring their ups and downs no matter how perfected the plan on achieving them was. People often seek for motivation to start something new or even worse, trying to nurture it in order to stay committed to what they’ve already started. That’s why they’re confusing life (or big chapters of it) with a sprint and get disappointed and demotivated when they find out that’s not like so.
So I totally agree with it, but does that mean we have to literally live life like a marathon? What if you get a boost of energy and creativity when you decide to jog it without worrying about the finish line?
The flaw of the constant speed, even partially, might not be immediately observed… and it might trick you on sinking in routine instead of making habits. Let’s say you’re not an athlete, and aiming for a 10km run in the city at night in under 1h and you reach your “comfort zone” at a pace of ~6min/km. There’s a good chance of finding yourself after half the route deepened into your thoughts and plans, whether they’re from the past or near future. And the sudden appearance of a pothole, car or cyclist <you name it> might take you by surprise, an accident-prone situation. I feel the same can happen with opportunities if you let your habits become just a routine, when a normal day of yours starts to look too “normal”, thing which is still good compared to doing nothing or wasting time scrolling the news feed. But what if you spice up your daily activities with more focus, excitement, doing the best you can, seeking for impact feedback and asking constantly if what you’re doing is getting you closer to your primary objectives, the ones that produce true fulfillment and happiness? Struggling with your business and grinding on your growth, accelerating your learning curve, they require a healthy amount of easy ankle movement afterwards. And taking it easy enough time ahead prepares you for the next challenge and feeds you with the most effective enthusiasm and motivation; you just need to add yourself the most important element: determination. Isn’t this looking like HIIT or jogging? Aren’t you self aware and sharp of what happens around you all the time this time?
Is life a race? Yes, one with many finish lines and milestones. Are there competitors? Yes, just one: yourself. The second your start comparing with the others, you’re running in the wrong direction; no matter the speed, you’re moving away from your happiness. Just cross your finish line, don’t bother with being the first. And make sure you fill your chapters with “high intensive interval” experiences, lived with enough amounts of rest in a never ending marathon. You might not remember your “Done” list, but for sure you’ll remember how good you felt when you had the energy to not give up each time you fell. Because during the same distance, you managed to squeeze in more results and feel almost the same fatigue, sometimes even less.
To succeed with your life marathon, you also need to do some other things than applying the right approach described above. Best example is admitting, accepting and embracing failure each time it happens, as fast as you can. You tell me if there’s a better way of thoroughly learning from something. Any rejection should excite you instead of disappointing you and doubting about yourself. As with remote work, there’s a ton of noise, so that “Unfortunately …” mail is actually doing you a favor, redirecting to what’s best for you and cutting the settle risk. Don’t take it just because it’s available.
Constantly change and adapt
I think this is the recipe for winning your jogging sessions. Weak people will sometime point you out and say “- You’ve changed”, envious on your flexibility and surviving & thriving ability. To move forward you have to leave something or even someone behind, as Interstellar paraphrases. And that’s the only thing laggards can grab onto. The side effects of finding and caring of self, the false-negative perception and projection of selfishness and arrogance you just “created”. Just make sure you leave that negativity behind too. First, they will control you through your emotions and once you don’t let yourself controlled anymore, they’ll try controlling what others think about yourself. Too bad critics who don’t build are hard to believe :).
This is all about discovering your inner self, ending in the same place from where you started but with different eyes or even better, creating yourself… reinventing yourself. Your genes define you, at least that’s what frustrated are wishing for, but this shines as a lie once you let your education, experiences and carefully chosen environment shape you. People are obsessed with learning, some of them soak themselves with career paths and time-centered roles they brag about, whether the hardest and most fulfilling thing is actually the unlearning. Getting back to zero, starting from scratch, exploring the other ways and doing it right this time; how you dreamed off from the beginning, without even knowing.
Remember, “What people will say?” killed a lot of dreams.
A vocation odyssey
And that’s why statistically speaking I won’t stay in the same role or company for more than 1.5 years. Went through 10 companies since 2013; sometimes leaved, sometimes been laid off, doesn’t matter, I’ve always seen it as a blessing since I had all the reasons to not look back, not a single doubt. And as a proof, what came next was better, every time.
This is how I started to know when to trust my gut feeling over data with increased accuracy and learned the hard way that good things really take time. And they don’t need to be rushed. Just working on what you want most compared to what you want now. Some people call it discipline.
Burnout
When I searched for a meaningful “burnout” opening image, I’ve seen just bored people with their faces tossed on couches and desks. I honestly don’t resonate with victims whose no. 1 “ability” is complaining. For sure I was there too some long time ago, but no matter how much I struggle now, I can’t put myself in the same old shoes… without grasping my life with full control. Best case scenario I’m disgusted at giving up so easily. So then was the moment when I searched just for “burn” and found what I was looking for: somebody brave enough to take this shit out of his/her life, with his/her hands dirty, after crawling in the mud before rising up. Stepping over own ego.
The pandemic revealed us that people confuse burnout with stress, depression or even languishing, where they’re mostly linked but not the same. Working over-time (although I don’t recommend it at all; try to jog instead of making a marathon out of it) on something you love, seeing its impact, learning and even earning in the process is still way better than applying the 9–5 mindset, where 5 hours you usually scroll social feeds, chat and take unnecessary coffee+cigarette breaks with co-workers. And guess what, after those 3 hours of partially productive (and not necessarily effective) work, you still feel useless and unfulfilled. Then you quickly get away with your hands clean by reacting with being burned, since that term became popular on the internet, especially with remote work. Can I give you a hint about something better than complaining? Like being proactive and taking action. Doing something different if you’re expecting a different outcome.
If you read until here you already know how to overcome this and there’s no better advice than constantly asking yourself the “why” before “how” and “what”, while checking the compass to make sure whatever you do, it brings you closer to your life goals. But before that, are these goals valuable and based on principles? Or are they borrowed from those shallow Instagram social norms?
