The Only Way to Be Free

0 people had breakthroughs this week. Will the next one be you?

Two things for you to think about

You can have anything you want in life. You just can’t have everything you want.

The game of life is trade-offs.

Being willing to disappoint people is the only way to be truly free.

One thing for you to ask yourself

Who are you afraid of disappointing if you really go for what you want?

One thing for you to try this week

Choose one trade-off you want, and go for it—even if it means disappointing someone. Let me know what happens.

Then let me know what changes when your actions match what you say matters.

Last week’s breakthroughs

In last week’s newsletter, I asked you to pick one thing you say you value, and make a decision that proves it.

Shaun began living out his value of creativity:

I spent my whole 30s basically not doing creative work that inspired me, despite thinking of myself as a creative person.

In the last four months, I’ve written the first draft of a novel and a script for a play. Despite working harder and longer, my energy and mental health have got WAY better.

This was all down to deciding firmly that creativity was my biggest value (aside from generally being nice to people) and using that to dictate that I prioritize it above everything else. When I started living like this, my life got better. Quickly.

Aleks is committing to valuing himself:

I value sobriety. However, and without getting into decades of my journey, alcohol is also the best medication I’ve found for dealing with my brain, and I value not being overwhelmed by what’s happening inside my head. It works like a pressure cooker, where pressure builds up sometimes over a few days, sometimes over a few weeks, even months, and then it needs to be released. So, the question is, is there another value to sidestep this rollercoaster?

Looking over the last few years, it seems that whenever I am captured by a task that requires my full attention and commitment, my value of doing the best job I can helping someone, wins out. We are talking big projects here—taking over guardianship of an incapacitated relative, handling multiple estates, dealing with life emergencies, being on the jury of a difficult case.

These, I’ve learned through talking to Purpose, are all fueled by external validations and approvals. If I am useful and helpful, I have value, and that overrules my values around my mental state.

I see two ways forward here. One is to keep engaging with challenging, all-encompassing projects that require everything I can give and primarily benefit someone else. To be clear, this is not a bad way to live! But when there is no project, like during the last few months, the darkness rolls in.

The other is to find a place where I have value simply because I exist, because the universe creates what it needs to fill a space, and my purpose is to simply exist in that space and fully occupy it. Basically, to accept that I have enough value to warrant the same care and attention as my other projects, and I don’t have to prove every day of my life that I am good enough to deserve that.

I have no f*cking clue how to do that.

Maybe this is a starting point: This week, I am going to do one thing every day for myself, not because it’s good for me or serves a purpose, but for no other reason than that I might enjoy it.

Finally, Jennifer from our community is putting up a boundary to protect her time:

In creating boundaries at work, I made a sign to put on my classroom door that says I am grading. Please do not disturb. I don’t expect much pushback on this, but there may be some students and coworkers who feel like they need something from me at that time or maybe it just makes them feel anxious that I am unavailable.

I think the sign will help me uphold my grading time block. If someone requests something at that time, I can just tell them I can get to it another time and be specific about when that could happen. I can say, I’m not available for that right now, but I could work on that tomorrow at 11 o’clock. If that person can’t accept that, my plan is to say, then I’m not the person for this task. You probably need someone else to help you with this. Thank you for understanding.

If, like Jennifer, you’ve been wanting to put up a boundary to protect your values, you might want to check out The Solved Membership. This month, our thousands-strong members have been working alongside one another to define and protect the boundaries that matter. Learn more in one click here.

As always, send your breakthroughs by simply replying to this email. Let me know if you’d prefer to remain anonymous.

Until next week,

Mark Manson

#1 New York Times Bestselling Author
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