Cut yourself some slack
We're all going through a lot right now
My friend once told me a funny story about a colleague’s first day of work.
He showed up looking like hell — messy hair, hungover, wrinkled clothes, bags under his eyes, and for weeks after that, everyone wondered if he was okay. They didn’t expect much of him. They cut him lots of slack.
Months later, this colleague divulged his secret to my friend: it was a deliberate strategy to set low expectations from the outset. He showed up on his first day at his worst, and no one expected much more from him after that. Kinda mercenary but pretty brilliant, right?
[Granted, this guy was a cis white dude, so he could get away with it in ways that lots of other people probably couldn’t.]
I bet you, like me, are the kind of person who tries to show up at 100 percent most of the time. And I bet you, like me, are very tired and, despite trying to be at your best all the time, frequently feel like you don’t measure up.
What if you cut yourself a little slack?
Maybe don’t show up to work hungover and disheveled… but maybe you also don’t have to show up at your best ALL. THE. TIME.
Maybe there’s middle ground, and maybe that middle grounds looks like reasonable, restful expectations that give you room to breathe, room to create, room to be human…
Room to just be.