how to stop ruining everything

confidence, giving up, and the power (?) of delusion.

Dear whomever,

I have a lifetime’s worth of odd behaviors. Of course. For one, I tend to start things - projects, Instagram pages, videos - and then, halfway through, just scrap them and sit in misery. Often I blame it on external factors - I need a better idea, I need a perfect feed, I need a professional camera - but, well, it’s deeper than that. I do it with friendships, too. I do it with cleaning. I do it with homework, or projects, or emails. I do it all-around-and-with-everything.

I hold a lot of shame about this.

See, I realized this week, after a quick check of my stats here on Substack, that I posted way more than the promised once a week, in June. A few emotions welled up in me: 1. embarrassment (why did I spam everyone), 2. frustration (why didn’t I keep the complete ones in my drafts and use them later, when I had writers-block?), and 3. the urge to stop (this is going nowhere, I need to kill it before it disappoints me more).

See, I was pretty happy in Japan. In fact I was ecstatic and feeling creative and utterly excited about life. I was excited about what I was writing, and feeling confident, and though I considered saving some complete drafts for a rainy day, I wanted to post while I was excited and not thinking about it. I wanted to share the excitement with my few loyal readers. Despite the fact that I really thought it through, I still sort-of-kind-of regret it.

I knew - and wrote - that the inspired feeling would fade as real life returned. It did. Quite hard, in fact, because after my extremely long trip (6 hours in Haneda airport, 13 hours to Istanbul, 5 hours in Istanbul’s Airport, 2 hours to Amman, landing on a Saturday), I went to the clinic the night I got home, and was utterly sick, bed-ridden, with work waiting for me on Monday.

Life, I’d decided, was making sure I stayed humble. Though, in reality, my body was just doing what it had to. I was exhausted. We walked all day, every day, and even throughout the trip, my joints were on fire. I had to take painkillers every night to be able to sleep. So, of course, I’d have to make up for the overextension. I thought sleeping on the 13 hour flight was enough, and I could smoothly retranslation into my normal routine. I couldn’t.

But still, I handled everything wrong. Had I relaxed into myself and accepted I would be suffering a bit due to jetlag and the exhaustion of the trip, I would have felt better sooner. If I had, also, asked my manager to work from home, I would have allowed my body some rest. But I pushed through - embarrassed that I was on vacation for a week-ish and returning with complaints, and utterly convinced I had to prove to myself that I wasn’t someone who always “gives up".

Maybe I am.

Well, listen, the truth is, I am.

This is a decade-long cycle - my giving up. Mostly it comes up in my writing. I’d love to say I write and don’t care what it achieves, but that would be a lie. It’s always about reciprocity, you know. Writing is an intense act of caring about something, and rarely do you receive that care back. I’ve often said the hardest part about being a writer is not being acknowledged. And people, writers, they go about it for years, in silence. I sometimes can’t handle the quiet. How am I supposed to know if I’m any good if no one is reading? How am I supposed to get any push of creativity if it’s only me on the page, only me judging? The idea of finishing a novel without no outside remark terrifies me - that’s why I no longer write novels, and focus on poetry.

---

In a Youtube video I recently watched, How To Stop Quitting Everything You Start, she references a study by Mueller and Dweck, titled, “Praise for intelligence can undermine children's motivation and performance.”, where children were split into three groups, and then given a series of questions to answer. Then, each group was given different acknowledgements for the work they completed.

Group 1: Praised for their intelligence

Group 2: Praised for their effort and motivation

Group 3: Control group: given acknowledgment and general comments.

Interestingly, Group 2 showed greater task persistence. So, when they couldn’t figure something out, they’d spend more time trying to. Group 1, on the other hand, blamed themselves for their failures, and seemed to give up more easily if they didn't get it on the first try.

We all know about the “gifted child” jokes which litter the internet - and we know they’re true: the burnout, the disappointment, the frustration when things don't click like they once did when you were seven. The term task persistence really got me thinking about how I could develop that muscle. That’s what I need.

You’re probably a perfectionist because you’re a people-pleaser, and you’re a people-pleaser because you pleased everyone so easily as a child and thought you would continue to for the rest of your life, but then eventually you tripped and someone was unhappy with you, and you’ve been chasing the high of being liked for your whole life.

Does that make sense? Or sound familiar?

As I was writing this draft, I came across this meme:

This meme is kind of what goes on in my brain sometimes. Or used to, really, because I’ve developed quite a thicker skin in the past year. In the past few months, especially, I have been teaching myself self-sufficiency - whilst making sure not to isolate. It’s a fine line. But overall, self-sufficiency has become important to me. That, and discipline, and hobbies.

When I feel I’m hyper-focused on someone’s reactions to me, I remind myself that that’s probably my trauma, and the fact that I have way too much time on my hand. I remind myself often, when I’m overthinking, that if someone is upset with me it’s their job to tell me. Then I breathe. I move on. I do something worthwhile, like read or play a video game or clean.

I’ve realized that my perfectionism and obsession with outside affirmation made me never pursue hobbies, which, in my opinion, could be the center of the issue. I’ll try to explain.

Once, I interviewed - at fourteen - for an expensive private school, and they asked about my hobbies. This took me by surprise; it was a question I didn’t prepare for, and I had none. I couldn’t answer. I stuttered. I said writing, and reading, which was true but mostly unimpressive and came off as an attempt to seem smart, I think. So, I was rejected from receiving financial aid and always thought of that interview as the reason I didn’t get it.

I had my first panic attack at 13 which thrust me into almost a lifetime of navigating an anxiety disorder. Ever since that day, I’ve been trying to get better. I’ve been trying to solve the problem that was me. I didn’t do much but… read up on psychology, try to diagnose myself, and try to keep my panic attacks (which occurred almost daily) under control. It was so bad that I was given a special pass to leave classes whenever I could, and that was mostly to sit in bathroom stalls and hyperventilate.

As I grow older and now that I live alone, I realize that the reason I’ve spent so much of my life focused on others’ opinions of me is because it’s the only thing I could focus on, really, since all I did was analyze myself and, thus, people’s views of me. Sometime during puberty I looked at myself in the mirror, I guess, and I fucking panicked, and just never stopped staring. I’d stare so long the reflection stopped making sense.

If I had hobbies, or played sports, I’d be busier, and thus take better care of myself, because more of my attention would have been going to learning new skills instead of trying to solve being mentally ill. But, also, if I had hobbies, or played sports, and was busier, I’d be interacting with more people, putting myself out there around more people, and that would open me up to more eyes that could possibly form thoughts about me.

It’s a conundrum, yes. (How many times have I used the word conundrum on this Substack? Does it annoy you? I mean, life itself will always be a conundrum. And conundrum is a fun word to use - right?)

So how do you stop?

You do like I did, which is get older and belly dance and adopt a mixture of Buddhist and WuWei teachings.

No, I’m joking, but really, what you need to do is stop analyzing. Well, first you analyze, really quickly, to find the the issue - but you probably know the issue just like I did. You know where it comes from, you hear a voice in your head that caused it, and if you really drew a line between where you are and what made you the way you are, you’d think of some situation vividly.

That’s the moment that ruined you.

Like, I know why I didn’t allow myself to work from home or ask for a sick leave the week I got back from Japan, when I was mega suffering. It’s because in high school, I was always berated for taking days off. I would get sick often, honestly, and my mom would keep me home for a week when it was bad and my tonsils were a big issue, and when I’d come back, obviously healthy, even my teachers would be like, “You look fine! You just wanted a vacation!”

So now, I could be dying, and I’d say to myself, Stop being a brat. You’re fine. You’re lying to get a day off.

The trick is counter it as much as you can. Yes, that’s the secret. Countering. On Tik Tok, they call it delusion.

I saw my panic attacks as issues that needed to be solved, so I did everything I thought I should. I fought for therapy, I took cold showers, I journaled, I did every single bit of work I felt I had to and probably, if you’re anything like me, you did too.

My anxiety is just a deep fear of being anxious

I’ve learned that the longest I went without having a panic attack was when I wasn’t preparing myself for the panic attack.

Like, you know when you have a crush, and you tell them, and they confirm they like you too, and then there’s a small window where everything about the world is perfect and dreamy and sweet. It’s because nothing has become contaminated by old beliefs or worries. It’s because, for now, you both are on the same page, and everything is working and going to work, and there’s a whole life to live and dates to go on and kisses to have. Like, in that window, no mental illness fucking exists. Everything is utterly perfect.

But then, maybe, they look at you wrong, or you have an argument, or their text comes too late, and you’re like that meme I showed above, being like “OMG EVERYTHING SUCKS AND THEY HATE ME NOW”, and what you really need to do is counter it.

You get nothing, absolutely nothing, from hearing your crush say they love you back, and being like, Well, you’ll probably break my heart so whatever. You get much more, actually, from trusting another human being, and thrusting yourself into the situation. If you think, This’ll end badly, you say: Thanks, Anxiety, but for now, I’m going to ignore those ideas until I get confirmation for them.

This is what all three therapists I’ve seen in my life say. This is all the handful of self-help books I’ve read say. And the immediate response is OMG I’ve heard this, it’s stupid, and it sounds so because it’s simple, but… well. It works. Most of the time, it works.

I actually wrote a full novel, when I was sixteen, about a girl with schizophrenia who saw her anxiety as a real person - he would torment her and basically say all her fears aloud, and a lot of the book was mostly dialogue between them. Her, trying to trust in herself, and him, her Anxiety Disorder Personified, being like, Girl, you suck.

I was onto something then, really. And though I do not write novels anymore I have a soft spot for that story. I think maybe it was me trying to talk to me. I didn’t fight my thoughts, much, back then, but I do now, as much as I can, like:

Thanks, shaking hands, but just because I made a mistake driving doesn’t mean everyone on the road is now making fun of me. Also, heart, you can relax, because even if he told me he hated me right now, like literally if he told me I should drop dead, I’d live through it, because I’ve lived through harder things. Hey - brain! Shut up. Yes, I’m doing a presentation, and I’m shaking, but I’ve done presentations before and I’ve been fine. I’ve been accepted to jobs before - and rejected, too, and I dealt with them fine. I’ve survived all the bad days, so let’s not make all this drama about surviving this one.

I kind of talk to my brain now like I would an annoying toddler, really.

I would recommend it. A lot of people are always recommending it - stop rolling your eyes at what works.

I’ll start working on an Instagram soon, with the hopes that I can come back to this post and remind myself that I should try to resist the urge to delete everything I worked on because I’m suddenly embarrassed I exist.

Hey, Amal, I’ll try to remember to say, It’s okay to exist. You’re supposed to.

I hope to remember that it isn’t my intelligence that is oh so important, but my persistence, my endurance.

Hey, reader,

same goes to you.

Have some faith

It takes courage to believe that tomorrow will be good. Even more courage to believe that even if tomorrow is no good, you’ll live to see a tomorrow that is good. No matter what. I’m not being hopeful, or dreamy, or romantic. This is just honesty, and maybe statistics. Life will always be mostly difficult, the beautiful moments are often far and wide, but they’re there, and they’re what we live for, they’re what we fight for.

But the perfect life you’re trying to live is impossible. It will never happen. You can go to therapy for years and then have a friend die, or your lover break up with you. You can be married for a lifetime, then get a divorce. Things happen. Life is unpredictable, and impossible to prepare for, and I know you think eventually you’ll reach a point where you wake up one day fixed and perfect - but you’ll be better off accepting that that’s just not true.

My trip to Japan was an example. I mean, I was almost at rock bottom. I was heartbroken, and fucking tired, and mostly lonely, then, I got there, and I was like Holy Shit Living Is Worth It! And now I’m back, like, ugh, I hate this whole being alive thing. But Japan happened out of nowhere, for me, it was planned and done in a months time. So, even if it’s just statistically, I’ll have something so exciting and inspiring happen to me, eventually.

So, if you’re having a bad day, I won’t lie and say it’ll be the last one you ever have. But I will say the truth, which is, there will come a day that you’re glad you stayed strong through it. There will come a day when you’re glad, maybe, that you kept writing on Substack, or you kept working on your relationship, or you didn’t quit your hard job. It’s like saving money. It sucks but eventually you get to buy something amazing.

Trust me. I promise. Just stop ruining things for yourself! Be hopeful in the world, and confident in your strength.

That’s all for today.

With love,
Amal