'How Do I Do More Things?'

Should there be a focus on doing more things and doing them all well?

I feel like everyone around me is doing things I will never be able to do and I get discouraged when I try. What should I do? I'm not social, I can't make new friends. There's a lot more I can't do than I can at this point.  - Dan

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Hi Dan, mwah!

I feel like you're capable of more than you're saying you are. I think that you're selling yourself short, actually I don't think it — I know it. You're selling yourself short, babe. You're capable of more than you're saying you are. You're capable of more than you believe you are. 

Part of this issue may just be your verbiage, and even if it is just your verbiage, I think that is affecting you drastically. You have to consider the ways you talk about yourself. It has more of an impact than you would think, or more of an impact than you want to think. Even switching some phrasing around may help. It may be an unconscious thing, but that doesn't mean it does not have consequences.

It seems as if you're in a bit of a spiral, everyone around you is doing something, and you think you can't do whatever it is. I don't disbelive that you tried whatever this is, and just simply were not very good at it. But, everyone is typically very bad at things when trying them for the first time. You are not just going to magically be good at everything as soon as you try it. 

Last year, around mid-summer, I wanted to grow vegetables from seeds, but I had never done this before. When I did this, I did multiple things wrong. I ended up planting the seeds too late. I didn't give them a big enough space to grow in. I didn't water them enough. I didn't place them somewhere where they got enough sun. Some of them did sprout, but they didn't grow very large. None of them had anything that would be able to harvest, and eventually they died when fall came around. It was a bit disheartening, but what could I do? Nothing, I had attempted it and I had failed. All I could do was wait, eventually I would be able to try again. 

Now this year I wanted to try again, so I did. I got seeds, I planted them far earlier, I placed them in a location that got far more sun, I looked up which plants grow well together. I did a lot of different things, and you know what? My seeds are growing far better than they were last year. Have I gotten anything to harvest? No, I haven't. But my plants are growing bigger than they did last year. Which is great, and honestly all that I could hope for. If I can't harvest anything from them, I'll just have to try again next year. And that's okay! It is all about moving through and trying new things and acquiring new skills over time.

I also have to ask, do you even want to be doing whatever the people around you are doing? Is it something that is appealing to you? Or are you just doing it because you think you should be?

 If you're just doing it because you think you should be, then maybe you shouldn't be doing it. That does not mean that you can no longer interact with all the people around you that are engaging in one specific activity that you don't like, it just means that you do not have to focus your attention on engaging with them through that activity. If all your friends like hockey, and you don't like hockey, that doesn't mean you have to learn how to play hockey. All your friends probably like other things as well, you just have to figure out what they are. Suggest new things, do not be scared about what will happen by just suggesting something. Maybe you don't like hockey, but you like ice fishing, maybe suggest that. They both have the common ground of ice, but taken in two different directions. The worst thing that can happen is that you just have to think of another thing to suggest.

But if it is appealing to you, and you want to do it, and you're simply not very talented at it, you must approach it from a different angle. You have to remind yourself, someone is always going to be better than you at anything you do. That sounds mean, but it is true, and it can be relieving to realize that. If you want me to phrase it in a less mean way (or potentially an even meaner way. It depends on how you look at it), that also means that someone is always going to be worse than you. But no one is ever going to be able to do something the same way that you will do it. You'll always be able to do something in a different way than someone else would.

But you have to keep trying at something if you want to eventually do it well. You cannot decide to make one candle, decide you are the best at making candles, step away for a few years, and then assume you will have the same ability when you start making candles again. The repetitive motion of something is sometimes what makes it worth it. The repetitive motion of something is where you must find enjoyment. You must do it again and again, and do it poorly. Nothing is worth doing well if not done poorly at first.

I've found myself thinking about my personal hobbies when I sat down to write a response to your question. I wouldn't say there's one thing I'm especially good at, there's things I enjoy, so I continue doing them, but I'm not impressive. The point is, that doesn't matter, because I do them not to be impressive, I do them because I simply want to. 

I'm kind of talking in a bit of a circle here, so I'll take a shortcut through the middle and we'll come out on the other side.

I think you are assuming that you cannot do something because you cannot do it in a way that is impressive. So instead, you are focusing on how the people around you are able to do whatever this thing is, in a way that you consider impressive. It may even be multiple things that have all become part of the same hole in your mind. But do the people you're comparing yourself to think that they are impressive? I would assume that they don't. I would say that they likely are just doing things they want, just because they want to do them. You are allowed to give yourself the same freedom, and you should take a deep breath and do so. 

Let's walk backwards for a second, I want to retrace and maybe put something new in an idea from the start. I mentioned that I think that you're in a spiral. Cue that one song, you know the one I'm talking about (if you don't just pretend you do). I was watching reality television the other day. If you don't watch reality television, you might not know about this (recent) trend in longer running shows or franchises, where the people sometimes go to counseling or therapy and have the session recorded. I mention this because I have to admit that it sounds a bit strange if I just said "I was watching reality television and this girl's counseling session was part of the episode". 

But anyways, I'm watching and the counselor says to the girl, "if you want to slightly change how you think, if you're right-handed, brush your teeth every day with your left hand", which has stuck with me. I think it is a very easy way to say that by consciously changing one small part of a routine, something unobstructive, you find yourself approaching things differently. Do I know if that is true? No, I certainly don't. But I like the sentiment and the theory behind it, and I think it is something that is worth trying. 

I'll type the same sentence twice, once with only my right hand, and then again with my left hand and then I'll tell you how I feel about that. I will not include that sentence here, because that would be repetitive.

With writing the left-handed sentence, I felt the motion behind what I was doing more. It wasn't just second nature, but I still had the memory of how I wanted to do it. I found myself unable to reach the same keys that I typically would, and because of that I had to reconsider how I would move my hand. With writing the right-handed sentence, I didn't feel any difference in motion from my normal typing. It was second nature. I could reach the same keys I always can. 

I also learned that I move my right-hand more when typing even with both hands, as I look at my hands typing now, my left stays near the QWER of the QWERTY keyboard. My right slides everywhere, sometimes even going under the left, as well as further expanding into the rows of numbers that exist on the far right side of the keyboard.

Is this especially important for something? No, this specific detail is not. But I'm saying it because if I did not take the time to make this small little change, typing with only my left hand, I would not have realized this about myself. I did not change the environment, but I changed how I interacted with it slightly, and now I feel I have a better understanding of how I engage with the environment as a whole. 

So if you only take one away from this, I would suggest that you take the advice of the counselor I saw on an episode of a reality television show. Change one small little thing, and I have a feeling you'll feel its impact in other places. 

Mwah,

Remy

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Need advice? Send an email to remywritten@hotmail.com, and you could get an answer in a future installment.