May 02, 2024 Audio

Congrats, You're Human!

But let's do a little test, just to make sure.

Photo by Sam McNamara on Unsplash and modified by me.

I'm going to make an assumption about you. If you're reading this, you're probably a human.

Let's do a little test to make sure.

Are you tired of:

1) The Never-Ending To Do List

Even the most ardent productivity gurus must be tired of slaving away day after day, only to discover that the to do list never ends. Sure, you can knock off a few items daily, but somehow more keep showing up.

Funny how that works, huh?

If you’re tired of this, you are most definitely not alone. You’re surrounded by people who feel the same.

Look at all those fellow humans!

2) Wondering What Your Worth Is

Whatever doubts and insecurities you have, you can be sure that millions (billions?) of other people also have them.

Are some people better at hiding them? Absolutely!

Do some folks do their utmost to make sure they never show signs of weakness? You betcha!

But you’re not alone in feeling unsure of what your worth is. What value you bring, outside of what you do for work or for people.

What is your innate worth, as a human? At some point, the rest of us humans over here have wondered the same.

3) Being Afraid of Real Honesty

Ah, here we go. Real, honest-to-goodness honesty. Scary!

We’ve become so accustomed to turning on “performative mode” that it’s difficult to know whether we’re even capable of honesty.

Even with ourselves.

I struggle with this several times a week, wondering whether my own thoughts and feelings betray me. Can I be honest within the human body I’m riding around in?

Extend that to other humans, including friends, family, co-workers, people online…who am I, really?

It’s not just you. I feel it too.

4) Dreading “That Conversation”

If not today, then recently you’ve had one of those conversations.

The one you know you need to have. But for the life of you, you can’t bring yourself to do it. The dread is overpowering. Crushing!

Historically, I’ve not been great (still working on it) at difficult conversations. Over the past 18 months or so I’ve been getting better, but I still feel that dread.

If you think the rest of us humans are walking around having all the difficult conversations with ease, while only you are dreading them…pssssh.

You might just be human, after all.

5) Comparing Yourself to Others

As I write this, I already know that I’m going to compare it to the writing of others here on Substack (and elsewhere). It’s all one big comparison game, and humans do it better than any other animal.

We’ll torture ourselves, wondering why so and so is able to accomplish X. Why such and such was able to succeed and you weren’t.

Some people are better than others at doing their own thing and (at least pretending to) not care or compare.

But they can’t always keep that comparison beast in check. It’ll get all of us humans at some point.