attention avpd/ocd/adhd/social anxiety havers, perfectionists, overthinkers, people pleasers, and anyone prone to freezing up in moments when you really need to take action:
for the love of all that’s holy, forget about that stupid advice and just do it wrong.
i’ve been unemployed for months because i moved and have yet to find a job in my new area, and you know why it’s been so hard (on top of the everything else making the job market a living hell right now)?
because i heard a bunch of advice telling me to chance my resume up to tailor it to every job i apply to, and i got overwhelmed by that because let’s be honest, that’s SO much work. but i heard that advice from so many places that i convinced myself it was The Only Way to apply for jobs, and that of course just led to me not applying for any jobs at all. tonight is the first time in two weeks that i finally sent out some applications because i finally sat down and said “fuck it, i’m not getting any jobs by sitting here wishing i could do it right, so i might as well do it wrong.”
so whatever it is that you’ve been trying to do and feeling overwhelmed by, please throw away all the extra overwhelming advice you’ve been given about the Perfect Way To Do It and just do it in whatever way you can manage. half-asses is still done. done badly is still done. you still gain more from doing a shitty job at something than you do from doing nothing at all.
i promise, the world isn’t going to end when you do something less-than-perfect. no one is going to hate you for it. in all likelihood, nobody will even notice or care that you didn’t follow whatever mostly arbitrary guideline you’ve been torturing yourself over. that advice is for people who have already been doing the thing and are struggling to see results, not for people who are struggling to do the thing in the first place.
whatever standard someone else set for the thing you need to do, it’s probably bullshit anyway, so just do it in the way you can. if the alternative is not doing it at all, you’re not going to be any worse off if you just make the best effort you can muster and call it a day.
when you’re not doing anything at all, any action is an improvement. you’re allowed to do it wrong. it’ll be okay. just get it done and let yourself rest.
