Actually, GIVE UP!

How Calvinism destroyed the powerful tool of giving up

We spent our entire lives praising the importance of persistence. There are hundreds of books, articles, gurus, pieces of art that stress how much you shouldn’t give up. On top of that you can find 5, 7, 10 ways on how not to give up and go on fighting for your dreams despite the hardships. If you take a closer look to the core of what we are expected to do, it’s just sick and in vain. If what you’re doing right now doesn’t make you happy, it’s wrong!

Let me break it down for you, after my disclaimer of course. My whole life I've been a strong believer of hard work, strategic planning of goals and the importance of failure in personal/professional growth. As a result, by no means you’re about to read a positive thinking nonsense on how to give up on everything and go live in a cave with no stress and pressure (unless that’s what you want to do, in which case be my guest).

Our society has a twisted idea about success! We don’t want success; we prefer suffering, which somehow rises us to a state of worthiness of success. If you don’t suffer either you don’t deserve your achievements or those achievements are not valuable enough. Based on that, sacrifices must be done in order to fulfil a dream, but if you enjoy them then there are not sacrifices (despite the fact that are still resources allocated and never taken back). This is rather a Calvinistic approach to life, where fear and pain are essential trade off for any (if any) pleasure. Essentially, don’t give up means; you don’t have the right to an enjoyable journey to your success.

My advice for you today is to GIVE UP. Give up on all those things that don’t make you content. Look at the grand scheme of things and don't give up on what really matters. Give up on those goals that you know are not a priority and that’s why you don’t put enough effort in them. Give up on what you’re doing either if it’s not working or if its sacrifices aren’t enjoyable. You’re not meant to suffer even when you fail. If you’re suffering, you’re doing something wrong.

Let’s take a step back and think one’s life as a small company. There are resources, targets, competitors, a market, parts that take care of production, planning and decision making and so on. Since we all are going to die (unless technology beats that, too) your time is so limited you can’t afford to spend it otherwise than you please. As a result, it’s crucial to chase your dreams and even more crucial to actualise a few of them at least. In order to do that, you need a clear vision, a set of goals, different ways to achieve them, hard work, balance and recalibration based on reality shocks. All these under the assumption that this dream is something you enjoy all the way, including when you work hard, when you fail, when no one believes in you, when you're sick and away from home.

Giving up is coated with guilt and is perceived as failure. It might be. But failure in what? What is your goal? If your goal is to do thing “x”, as long as you make it, does it really matter the different things you gave up for it? Base you judgement of what you should be doing, on whether or not it brings you closer to where you want to be, when you want it. Many times we get caught up in fear of failing, seemingly working less hard, when what actually should be happening is escaping a non productive action that doesn’t makes us feel content.

Do you know when hard work pays off? When you go to sleep, all exhausted with a smile on your face and a warm tiny sunbeam in your chest and the feeling you’re going to make it. That’s the hard work you need to do. Cause hard work, you will always have to do. It’s the only way to achieve anything. It’s the single trait that depends only on you and no one can take it.

Giving up is hard. Giving up is admitting you thought of the wrong plan and spent many resources for it. Also, it has as prerequisite self awareness. You don’t want to be busy chasing your dreams; you want to be effective paving the road for them. Fall in love with the journey, not the destination.

If something doesn’t work, while you gave it a fair shot, it’s not because you’re not good enough (it doesn't matter), it’s because IT is not good enough for you and what you want it for. And you have the responsibility to find what could/should/would work for you. Given the limited of our time and the importance of a balanced life, giving up on things is a powerful tool that creates room for potential. This could even mean give up on small dreams for bigger ones. Giving up is being adaptive and flexible in using the current state in your favour, based on your goals.

Take the control of your life in your hands. Make a new year’s resolution to give up on a failed job search, a passive position, a bad company, anything and anyone that doesn’t make hard work an enjoyable experience.

Success is meant to be hard not suffocating!