Psychologist Thijs Launspach is a psychologist, stress expert and author of the book Breeding pressure. He marvels at modern working and gives tips every week for more happiness and less stress at work. Today: isn’t ‘everything’ a bit much?
This week is Book Week. Although I love the collective propaganda of the Dutch book, this year I am less happy with the theme: I am everything. Isn’t that a bit much? We already have to be everything in our modern existence, and now we also have to be everything.
We currently expect a lot from ourselves: to look beautiful and fit, to perform exceptionally at work, to be able to catch up on the news, to run marathons, to be an exciting lover, a great girlfriend or a nice father, to break our patterns, to be happy, to travel the best make, change our course and be the best version of ourselves. We are not fast enough as we are. Because we believe that all this can be done at the same time, we are chronically dissatisfied with ourselves. We never do well enough in our own eyes.
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Instead of telling ourselves that we have to be everything, we better accept that we are human too
The feeling that everything should be possible for us creates enormous pressure to perform. We ourselves have the responsibility to make something big and compelling out of our lives, and we don’t settle for anything less. In our drive to fulfill our potential, we regularly run ahead of ourselves. Trying to be everything and trying to do everything is a good way to burn yourself out.
Instead of telling ourselves that we have to be everything, we better accept that we are human too. With talents, but also with pitfalls. We are people with human limitations: we sometimes get tired, frustrated, disappointed, sad, distracted or despondent. We all have great plans for ourselves, but sometimes they go wrong. And that’s all part of it. We have options, but unfortunately not unlimited.
Accept restrictions
Instead of focusing on what we all should be, we can learn to accept our human limitations. You are not satisfied with all that you could still be, but with being able to settle for what you already are – as a human being, with your character flaws, your moods and your idiosyncrasies. I may be anything, but today I just happen to be grumpy.
They understand it better in English. There they distinguish between two different forms of ‘everything’, namely everything that is and everything that could be. They say it very nicely there: You can be anything, but not everything. You can be everything, but not everything at once.
Thijs Launspach is a psychologist and stress expert. He is the author of, among others, You are already enough – Mental health in a disturbed world (2022), Work can also be done (2020) and Fokking busy (2018).
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