[SPEAKER_00]: what's up everyone welcome back to girls with goals with your hosts and Catherine and Caroline.
[SPEAKER_00]: Today we're talking about a quarter-life crisis and a little bit of the feeling of having one.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, kind of kind of, I have been struggling a little bit.
[SPEAKER_01]: With the thought of like defining my identity, I thought of this, I thought of the word struggle the other day and the first they'd not came into my head was Cody Coe.
[SPEAKER_00]: Stir struggle.
[SPEAKER_01]: The milk boys.
[SPEAKER_01]: Stir struggle.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh my god.
[SPEAKER_01]: Don't want to be this for struggle if you're having a quarter-life crisis.
[SPEAKER_01]: No.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, but I have just like,
[SPEAKER_00]: been having a lot of internal conflict about the choices that I'm making at this point in my life.
[SPEAKER_00]: From conversations I've had with friends from the little bit that I've shared about it online like I truly think that this is a universal experience to some extent not in the sense that every single person is going to hit like 20 to 25 and have this existential, oh my god, who am I crisis, but every single person that I know at this age right now is.
[SPEAKER_00]: Struggling with navigating something, whether it is a post-grad change, whether it is trying to find a job and starting a career and trying to figure out what direction you want to take, whether it is whether to stay in a relationship or leave a relationship, whether it's where to be in your life.
[SPEAKER_00]: For some reason, it feels like we get to this age and decisions feel heavier.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not actually because the decisions are heavier in themselves, but because suddenly,
[SPEAKER_00]: there is this attachment of permanent and identity to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think this is kind of one of the first eras of life where it feels like the choices we make can have really permanent long lasting effects and I don't know about anyone else listening but that honestly kind of freaks now it scares me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have always been a pretty big dreamer and go gutter but like I can I can see so many different paths for my life and I can see myself being happy doing so many different things.
[SPEAKER_01]: what I want to do it's that like I do want to do so many different things and it's really hard to determine what to focus your efforts on right and it's obviously way easier to think about something and plan for something that actually do it so when you get to actually doing it or when you realize you're not doing it that's when the quarter life crisis might come in.
[SPEAKER_00]: It feels like the choice is not just what do I want to do next, but that it determines like, who am I going to be in this era?
[SPEAKER_00]: What side of my personality am I going to tap into?
[SPEAKER_00]: What is going to be my story and what's going to be my narrative?
[SPEAKER_00]: And that just it just feels kind of daunting.
[SPEAKER_00]: And for me, I think the struggle has been a little bit more in like, oh, where do I want to be space?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I travel a lot.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've lived in different places and I've seen different sides of my personality come out in different places.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've done really well in cities before, I've done really well in kind of a beachy more laid-back lifestyle before, but it's definitely two different sides of my personality.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm having a bit of this existential crisis of like, I feel like where I choose to live.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now that I know, you know, I want to leave Boston because I'm done with school there and I want to move on to something different.
[SPEAKER_00]: It feels like where I choose to live taps into those different sides of my personality and I'm just not really sure which one feels right right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I think, you know, kind of those main buckets where you might be feeling this are that where you want to live, are that career path, because even though we know that you can change career paths a million times so many people have probably a lot of like the people we look up to have, our dad even has and I always think about that
[SPEAKER_00]: How many times has changed his career but like continued to be really successful?
[SPEAKER_01]: I share his like career journey if any of our friends are stressing over their career.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you didn't go to school for what he's doing now and he's doing it really well.
[SPEAKER_01]: And he has done it really well for years and years and years and years and years.
[SPEAKER_01]: But like if he at our age,
[SPEAKER_01]: was told where he would be now, he would, wouldn't understand it, wouldn't know what was a thing.
[SPEAKER_01]: He would just like, not probably.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, he went from civil engineering to business in supply chain, which is, you know, right.
[SPEAKER_01]: Which is like, obviously, he's always had the thought pattern to be able to be successful in both.
[SPEAKER_01]: But you never expect where you're going.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I've even said this one, you know,
[SPEAKER_01]: We have a lot of friends that are currently in the job application process of seeking a new job and we've watched so many people go through it and I'm even experiencing my own career journey of things like if I wasn't open to a lot of things I would never be in the position where I am now but I didn't say yes to something that I didn't expect to pop on my play or I didn't like try something and learn I didn't like it or fail at something or just like say yes and figure it out as I go.
[SPEAKER_01]: I would never be in the position I am right now or be doing the things that I'm doing right now because I never would have been exposed to it and you can't plan for that.
[SPEAKER_01]: You just have to like roll with the punches and yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: See where go.
[SPEAKER_01]: So if you are in a quarterly life crisis or are stressing about where you're at and where you want to be or where you're at and where you're going.
[SPEAKER_01]: Don't waste your energy on stressing about it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Put that energy into actually doing something about it and practicing things.
[SPEAKER_01]: and learning to fail or literally just put that energy into failing because you don't get anywhere if you're stressing about failing.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, they get somewhere if you actually fail and get up in succeed or don't fail in succeed.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: We can look at other people who have changed career paths and have had, you know, all different journeys of their lives and we know, you know, there's always potential to change our mind.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's always potential for things to evolve into something else.
[SPEAKER_00]: But when you're kind of sitting at the starting line of that and you don't know
[SPEAKER_00]: where that journey is going to go and take you and what other opportunities are going to come.
[SPEAKER_00]: It does still feel daunting to make that first decision of like, where do I start my career?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where do I start this?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because it does set up that course instead of that trajectory.
[SPEAKER_00]: Even though it's, you know, where you start isn't necessarily where you're going to end, it still is a pretty daunting choice.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I think
[SPEAKER_00]: when it comes to like this quarter-life crisis and things that I see my friends around me struggling with that's definitely a big one.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's definitely something I've thought about a lot too, whether like it's continuing with an independent career or, you know, doing something more corporate because I've had experience in both.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've definitely had that internal struggle a little bit.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we want to talk about why this quarter-life crisis happens and some of the thought patterns and things that are happening behind the scenes that might be making you feel this way.
[SPEAKER_00]: being the paralysis of choice.
[SPEAKER_00]: We've talked often before about choice overload, choice breeds apathy is my favorite thanks.
[SPEAKER_01]: And the way I like this saying, you know in high school when you're going over like a vocab list, well the vocab list was apathy and when I googled,
[SPEAKER_01]: the word apathy to come up with like use in the sentence.
[SPEAKER_01]: The sentence that I found was choice breeds apathy and I've thought about it very frequently since and every time I use the word because it is so true.
[SPEAKER_01]: When you are faced with such an abundance of choice, you're overwhelmed, you get lazy, you get you shut down and you don't make the choice.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a lot of different ways that you can piece together your life and the abundance of choice,
[SPEAKER_00]: While it is a privilege and while it feels like, you know, oh, there's so much opportunity, it actually becomes more overwhelming than I think it is.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's an illusion of freedom in a sense.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because it actually just can create added pressure.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because now you're not choosing between, oh, do I have two clear things?
[SPEAKER_00]: And there's a right and a wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're choosing between what feels like a bunch of different paths that could be right, but you don't know.
[SPEAKER_00]: And a lot of the time when we get that,
[SPEAKER_00]: choice paralysis where we can't even choose and we put off making the decision because it feels easier and more comfortable to stay in a place of oh i'm not sure and delaying that then it does to just you know jump into one and see what happens and that leads into psychological opportunity cost opportunity cost opportunity cost is like one of those things that i learned in school that i actually think about so often like you say it so i love it i love the concept of like
[SPEAKER_00]: opportunity cause because every choice that you make is giving up like another opportunity or another path you could have taken.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's something that I think about in my life all the time because every time you make a choice you're in a sense giving up the opportunities of the other choice.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can feel like if you're choosing to open one door, well at the same time that could feel like you're choosing to close other doors and when you combine that with the abundance of
[SPEAKER_00]: It honestly can feel very paralyzing to be like, well, which door do I go through knowing that if I go through this, it's shutting other doors.
[SPEAKER_01]: at this time, you can't just go back and open them, but obviously when you're faced with every single option at once, like you might be in a quarter-life crisis, people have quarter-life or mid-life crises when you graduate college, when you're retiring, when you're changing jobs, when you, you know, have to consider moving cities with these kind of big life changes.
[SPEAKER_01]: And a lot of it is because you're starting fresh for a lot of things and making a lot of different choices at once, or a face with a lot of different,
[SPEAKER_01]: possible solutions for certain choices.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like where am I moving?
[SPEAKER_01]: Which job should I take?
[SPEAKER_01]: So a lot of times we've made choices that are obviously made up for us or don't take that much effort to choose.
[SPEAKER_01]: But it's the times that we're faced with choices that are quite even, in quite abundant that we shut down and have a harder time actually making the decision.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: we also overestimate what we're losing by giving something else up and under estimate what we're gaining by doing something truly I think like that if you have the drive and if you have the personality you're going to find a way to be successful no matter what you do it's not necessarily that you're going down one path that is going to lead to your demise and another that is going to be like the best thing ever a lot of this is intrinsic and is your ability to
[SPEAKER_00]: find happiness and find success and find community like no matter where you go, and so when it comes to this opportunity cost, I think we usually look at that opportunity cost as like, we make what we're giving up seem more valuable because it's full of what ifs.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's kind of like a rose tinted glasses type situation.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like you can look at the what ifs of one path when you don't know the answers and we can
[SPEAKER_00]: over exaggerate what we might have given up by not going down that path.
[SPEAKER_01]: When really I think the biggest point is that you just choose one path and you keep moving forward because they're going to be good in bad things no matter what you do right but the scary part about these decisions are that when you choose something you have to trust that you're going to make the most of it that you're going to show up in the best way for yourself and actually.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, if it's a new job or if it's moving to a city, you're going to hit the ground running and you're actually going to create a life for yourself and make that fitting for you.
[SPEAKER_01]: So when you're faced with these decisions that aren't predetermined for you, you have to have like an unwavering confidence in yourself and have to trust yourself, that you are going to make that the right decision for you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because you can make likely if you're faced with a lot of similar decisions
[SPEAKER_01]: pretty equal outcomes.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what makes it harder to choose, but it also makes it harder to follow through with them, which is where you're getting the paralysis, because you know that regardless of the decision, you have to put in the effort to make that work for you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, because there's a lot more in these kind of ambiguous decisions like where am I moving?
[SPEAKER_01]: Do I take this job?
[SPEAKER_01]: Do I quit this job?
[SPEAKER_01]: Kind of these
[SPEAKER_01]: bigger things that cause order-life crises or big crash-outs, you have to take the steps by yourself to Follow through with it and to make those choices fit for you in these scenarios where you have to put a lot of weight on these decisions and you have to follow through and you have to rely on yourself That's when obviously you're gonna have a higher likelihood of crashing out or having a middle crisis
[SPEAKER_00]: True.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think the element of social comparison really plays a big part in this because it's really hard to make a decision in isolation without having any other external thoughts, external opinions, external pressures.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I say that because
[SPEAKER_00]: We have this weird access with social media.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're seeing like everybody else's lives in a way that is quite abnormal.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like if you think about times before social media, you knew the people that you knew, and you knew what they told you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now we see, you know, these curated lives of other people.
[SPEAKER_00]: we have access to millions of other people who we are going to be comparing our own life path and our own choices too.
[SPEAKER_01]: You just know more about what is out there which makes it makes your choices more abundant and allows for so much more granularity in your choices because
[SPEAKER_01]: you've seen the inside of a thousand people's homes today when you scroll down social media, you've seen what a thousand people were, you've seen what a thousand people ate today.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you're not only thinking about the options that you've presented for yourself or the options that are immediately presented to you, but your face was such an influx of options that we were never built for as people.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, we weren't built to
[SPEAKER_01]: make decisions on 30,000 different things at once.
[SPEAKER_01]: We were made to make decisions based on what's in front of us.
[SPEAKER_01]: And this is not scientific at all.
[SPEAKER_01]: Please don't quote me.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is just from my assumption.
[SPEAKER_01]: I assume the Neanderthals and the cave people.
[SPEAKER_01]: didn't think about six different options for breakfast and make that into a big choice for themselves.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think they just ate what they had and what was in front of them and they could kill what they could gather.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like we weren't made to spend so much energy and transparently waste so much energy making these decisions and causing ourselves so much stress, which is why
[SPEAKER_01]: In these moments where you're faced with larger-scale decisions or even on the day-to-day, you have to know how to practice simplifying your life for yourself.
[SPEAKER_01]: And the more you practice it, it's going to become second-ature and you are not going to care and not going to interpret all of these choice options, you're just going to make the choice and not actually
[SPEAKER_01]: Expend energy thinking about making the choice and then make you know what I mean Yeah, so you kind of break the cycle for yourself when you just decide to say fucking and stop making these decisions or stop making these decisions so big Because we were never made to have an anxiety attack over what we're gonna eat for breakfast We're gonna wear to school today like that's just such a waste of your energy when you could be putting that into doing things that you actually enjoy or
[SPEAKER_01]: working on things that actually benefit you.
[SPEAKER_00]: It makes it so much harder to actually, I think listen to yourself, get to know yourself understand yourself when we are constantly being exposed to an abundance of other people's lifestyles, personalities, choices, and that definitely comes at the cost of thinking like,
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, should I be doing that, too?
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, they're doing this better than me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not spending enough time on that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Or would I enjoy doing what they're doing?
[SPEAKER_00]: We're just comparing your own timeline to somebody else's timeline.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it definitely creates this weird abundance of choice.
[SPEAKER_00]: Where we're like liking Athens, and we're not supposed to have that many choices.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're not supposed to, like,
[SPEAKER_00]: Completely over-analyze every decision we make and every little thing about ourselves, but it's really hard not to when we are directly and constantly exposed to so many other people's choices and personalities and styles and all these things, but you're also constantly comparing like your own personal timeline and feelings to just like what you see of somebody else's.
[SPEAKER_00]: Social media creates such an illusion because we think that visibility,
[SPEAKER_00]: equals certainty.
[SPEAKER_00]: We think that because somebody is posting something about that life and they're showing their life, they must be so certain about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: They must have it all together.
[SPEAKER_00]: When that is not true, what we see is the small elements that somebody curates and decides to show, but what we'll never see is their actual thoughts and internal struggles.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's just
[SPEAKER_00]: Just so interesting because literally every single person I talk to and have actual real conversations with in real life, especially at this age, is going through some sort of level of uncertainty or some sort of choice or struggling honestly with a lot of the same things that you might be struggling with.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it's really easy to just post a photo dump of like happy moments or vacation photos from last month and things like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it absolutely creates this illusion that just because other people are sharing things about their life.
[SPEAKER_00]: They completely have it together and they have the sense of certainty when I truly think at this age nobody does.
[SPEAKER_00]: We've talked about a few reasons that you might be experiencing this quarter-life identity crisis, the paralysis of choice, social comparison, this psychological opportunity cost.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think a huge thing that every single person also feels in one way or another is imposter syndrome.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a really big shift to step in from thinking about something, planning something, wanting something, and then
[SPEAKER_00]: actually being in the position of doing it.
[SPEAKER_01]: We oftentimes brand ourselves maybe when you're trying to get a job or, you know, when you're talking to new friends or you're doing a new workout class and maybe you've done like reformer parties once or twice or you've only done map parties, but the instructor asks if you've done it before and if you know you're doing it, I don't want to be embarrassed like, you know, you know.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you're like, oh my god, yeah, like I'm so good, okay, or maybe you've done it and it's like been a while and you forget what cables go where and you forget like bring the carriage and slowly or if someone calls out the name of an exercise, you don't actually know exactly how to do it, but you've hyped yourself up not only to yourself, but to the instructor to people around you and this can apply to
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, when you're introducing yourself to new friends, you can inflate the things that you're interested in or the things that you've done or the people you know, even.
[SPEAKER_01]: And definitely in a job interview, you're likely going to amp up your experience and your skills and your abilities and kind of.
[SPEAKER_01]: Cherry pick the good and share what you can do and kind of oversell yourself, which is what you should be doing, because you can always learn and make up the gap.
[SPEAKER_01]: But the second you then get into the position, we're like, oh, shit.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Pilates class is starting and everyone around me knows exactly what to do and like there.
[SPEAKER_01]: Where are they on their backs?
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, are we, does this how we start?
[SPEAKER_01]: Or, you know, how many springs do I have on or oh, shit?
[SPEAKER_00]: Or even just I just a little bit hard.
[SPEAKER_00]: And you're like, oh, no.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and you're with me around and no one else seems like or like,
[SPEAKER_01]: Sorry, but some I don't go to our former parties all the time and sometimes I do go and I'm like the carriage lamps.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm like, sorry everyone.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know that that wasn't right, but I forgot.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think another piece of it is if there's something that you always do in private or by yourself, then it also feels weird for the first time like doing that publicly doing it in front of other people are claiming it like that actually made me think a lot about the gym because I go to the gym almost every single day by myself.
[SPEAKER_00]: I get so nervous working out with other people, because mom today, well, no, no, never mind my own mother, but like, if people want to, you know, hang out and go to the gym together, I'm like, yeah, that's what I'm going to do, because I'm going, but like,
[SPEAKER_00]: It actually always makes me nervous because they're going to see something in my form that's bad.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're going to see me like, no, actually be able to lift that very heavy or they're going to be you're they're going to see me tired.
[SPEAKER_00]: Honestly, I think I get more stressed out about like form thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: That someone's going to watch me do something and that like, I don't know that I'm actually like, I actually have always been doing it this way, but I'm secretly have been doing it wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they're going to like expose me for like not knowing actually how to properly squat.
[SPEAKER_01]: fear that may go into the gym with our lifelong like since birth, since before birth childhood, best friend, who is very strong.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I'm like, I can't, I can't do a pull-up.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I don't know what you're talking about.
[SPEAKER_00]: Another element that I think creates that is like, we always see where we're going to.
[SPEAKER_00]: We build up this internal confidence that, you know, you want to think of yourself highly.
[SPEAKER_00]: I try to think of myself highly.
[SPEAKER_00]: I hope you all do as well.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes
[SPEAKER_00]: that you see yourself for who you think you're becoming a little bit too, and then I think it's kind of uncomfortable if you get in a conversation or you get in a jobs scenario.
[SPEAKER_00]: And you feel like you're having to step up and explain yourself, but you're like, not necessarily aligned with where you know you're going yet, and so you kind of feel like you have to
[SPEAKER_00]: prove to people that you are capable or that you have this potential kind of and it's a little bit scary feeling like someone's not going to see what I see in myself or someone they're going to like secretly expose me for actually like not being the shit and so maybe I shouldn't act so confident and maybe I shouldn't actually
[SPEAKER_00]: step into this room feeling like I know what I'm doing because I don't actually know what I'm doing.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just, you know, I feel like I'm getting there.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I think there's definitely that element of, you know, a lot of the time we have only done things alone and now we're kind of claiming them publicly.
[SPEAKER_00]: it's also an age where we are constantly learning and growing and that's that's a hard thing to do in public like we're gonna mess up like you're gonna mess up whether it's in a Pilates class or whether it's in your job like that's the point you know and that's scary and it's daunting but like that is what it is and if anybody doesn't understand that and doesn't support like you're continued growth then I think that's weird of them too like if anyone is making you feel weird or exposed or if any single person is like putting this
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that's weird of them too because every single person should have the room to learn and grow and mess up Right, and you should be embarrassing yourself.
[SPEAKER_01]: You should be making mistakes.
[SPEAKER_01]: You should be trying things and being like, oh shit I don't really like that.
[SPEAKER_01]: When you take on this mindset of just like not caring as much about the outcome or not caring about
[SPEAKER_01]: how the processor, how your progress goes.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're going to eliminate a lot of the crises that you experience in that Carolina's experiencing right now, and don't know.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's obviously the prompt for this episode.
[SPEAKER_01]: But the only advice that I can give to you
[SPEAKER_01]: is just like stop caring because when you remove yourself from taking these big personal hits or taking these ego hits when you fail or when you're faced with kind of an in between decision where you're not quite there yet you know where you're going but you don't know how to get there and you know that maybe other people perceive you at where you're at currently and not at where you are at in your head or where you're planning to be at.
[SPEAKER_01]: Obviously, that's a difficult thing to digest, but the second you separate yourself from that and just trust that you will get there somehow you're taking a lot of the impact off of these decisions so that it's easier to make the decisions and you spend more energy actually doing the things instead of thinking about making the decisions and
[SPEAKER_01]: You're actually probably going to learn more and get more out of what you are doing, because you're separating yourself from the outcomes and putting yourself into just doing things and spending your energy on being yourself, even if it's an in-between phase where you're faced with a lot more challenges and difficult choices, it doesn't feel as different because you know you're equipped to handle it and you're not going to feel a lot of the negative and extreme feelings that come with it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, which is the goal.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's such a good advice and I need that.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think anyone who listens, who has been listening to this show for a while can probably understand by now that like, I'm very introspective and I'm very much an overthinker and in Catherine in, you know, a far more eloquent way, just as fuck it we ball.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, well, I don't think I'm not like introspective for now.
[SPEAKER_00]: You are you are, but I think the answer I overthink and I often need to balance myself out with your advice of like stop caring do things for yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, that's okay, and I'm, you know, let's go.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not like a selfish bitch, but because I will overthink and I will do things for other people.
[SPEAKER_01]: much more often and much better than I will do them for myself.
[SPEAKER_01]: But for the most part, I think a lot of things can be solved or be initially solved by just like not caring and not giving things energy or weight.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like maybe it's more than I like kind of rumenate on things and I can let feelings take over from some times and you are more so just like ignore it, stop it.
[SPEAKER_01]: There are so many things that we face throughout our day that if you just like
[SPEAKER_01]: neutralize it and not give it the way and not give it the attention.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like it's not going to impact you.
[SPEAKER_01]: It'll still exist.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's not changing the fact that something is happening or maybe someone's being rude to you.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're like really bothered by someone at work.
[SPEAKER_01]: The reason we work on our baseline and the reason we work to become more confident to have these healthier habits and lifestyles is to increase our baseline.
[SPEAKER_01]: So that no matter what we're returning to and where we use our foundation is solid and good and interesting and where we want to spend the most of our time.
[SPEAKER_01]: And the more you get okay with that and the better you make your baseline, the easier it is to just neutralize things and ignore them because you actually enjoy your life and you enjoy where you're at and no matter what changes or what's coming towards you, that's fine.
[SPEAKER_01]: So all these little things and of spiraling into a quarter life crisis, you can just eliminate from your life and then you're not faced with a quarter life crisis.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, I feel like I actively have had to stop some spirals recently and in that's how you know you literally tell yourself if you if you acknowledge the fact that maybe you're spiraling or maybe something's bothering you just proportionately to how much it should bother you say we're a and get over it like and these are again
[SPEAKER_01]: you might say I am.
[SPEAKER_01]: But so much of the bullshit that we face day-to-day can be solved by saying, I do not care.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like I don't give a fuck and I shouldn't because it doesn't this thing is not actually impacting me.
[SPEAKER_01]: That much and you don't need to have a disproportionate reaction to it correct So all you have to do is take yourself away from the moment and just like you get to the side at the end of the day The mindset is just like I don't care about this thing I care a lot more about my actual life and I care a lot more about my actual interest and things that I'm doing and the people in my life And my work and career all these things that are longer term and part of your foundation Or what you need to put your energy on instead of the things that come in and try to shake it
[SPEAKER_00]: No, that's that is really good advice and I've been having to actively be like I'm not going to smile about this.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not going to let it disproportionately affect me that all that you were saying about like caring about what is your actual life and what is your foundation more than the things that are trying to shake you literally last weekend.
[SPEAKER_00]: We were on a studio with our friends.
[SPEAKER_00]: I checked my phone in the middle of like a slope on the mountain and I saw like one negative comment I don't get negative comments all that often and honestly whenever I do I just like I can't imagine people who are Far more public than I am and far more famous like how they maintain their mental boundaries because literally I saw one comment and it like I it made me want to swing and it made me want to bite and
[SPEAKER_00]: It was like really, really bothering me and I was like, this is the stupidest thing ever because like literally look around.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am outside.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have like five best friends around me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why is this like actually what is ruminating in my mind right now when if I look around I have like actual good people in my life.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm doing something fun.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm outside.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's the weekend.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm enjoying myself and this like no name.
[SPEAKER_00]: No profile picture person who does not know me whatsoever wrote one comment thinking that they knew me like I cannot let that shake me because if I let something like that shake me
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm done.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my, like, I'm, I'm done.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's, there's, you just, you can't.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so that's the, that's the thing.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's the practice of saying, like, I don't care.
[SPEAKER_01]: And letting the smaller things roll off your back.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you can't do that, like, yeah, there are some big problems coming your way when you're faced with a real child.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was honestly like a little bit of a wake up for me because I was like, I cannot keep myself in a place where things so minor have the power to affect me and take me out.
[SPEAKER_00]: of my actual real life and the things that are like actually important and matter to me because when it comes to imposter syndrome, I honestly am feeling a little bit nervous and anxious about this next era in New York City because which might I say I don't get that because no, I don't get it because sorry, they're everyone we know lives in the city.
[SPEAKER_01]: We've spent so much time to know you know it and if you don't I'm
[SPEAKER_01]: shame on me for not allowing you to learn the grid system that is New York City.
[SPEAKER_00]: But like less of being in this city and more so that, you know, I have been in this comfortable little space at home doing my routine, doing work not necessarily interacting with like too many people for a few months now.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's what you're scared to be so.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_00]: That has become a comfort zone.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm honestly kind of nervous because I can think up, oh my god, this is gonna be so much fun.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have so many friends there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna network.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna meet so many people.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's gonna be career opportunities.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to interview people for the podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wanna meet other creators.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wanna, you know, work with brands and break myself into the industry.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wanna meet new people, you know, even though all my college friends are there, I wanna like reconnect with other people.
[SPEAKER_00]: But then one, like, I actually step foot and the time comes, I'm like, am I going to actually be able to step up and do all those things?
[SPEAKER_00]: And I know myself and I know my character and I will.
[SPEAKER_00]: But like, it's still daunting that I've kind of, you know, dreamed up in my head what I think could come out of this era.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then it feels like, you know, I have the pressure to actually make that happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: Even though I don't, and it's also often posed.
[SPEAKER_00]: But there's also a level of imposter syndrome of like,
[SPEAKER_00]: are people going to actually like me are people actually going to like god really can you be so dead asked you're going okay sorry going to New York City for two months subletting
[SPEAKER_00]: you're going to be fine.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just compared to what my life has been for the past few months.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's going to be very little fish big pond and that is a little bit daunting.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I know myself and I know all survive and I'll be fine.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I'm feeling a little bit I'm feeling a little bit.
[SPEAKER_01]: Take a deep breath and move on.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's because it's not that deep.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's the difference between you and I like I actually could not care less about things like that.
[SPEAKER_01]: like moving.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh my god.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just put a lot of pressure on like I'm only giving me as of a couple months there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want so much to happen.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like I just want to go somewhere where like if you don't if you don't get some things done like I'm sure you'll be back or you can go back or you can stay.
[SPEAKER_01]: But like people who are emotional and sentimental over things like that like that is so great for you.
[SPEAKER_01]: I had to be forced to attend my college graduation because I simply like
[SPEAKER_01]: didn't like I already did the work.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't really care about walking across a stage in one second.
[SPEAKER_01]: Doesn't matter what you pack.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure you're going to like pack the essential things.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you've worn it in the last months, you're going to wear it in the next month.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is like Australia, New Zealand, two months.
[SPEAKER_01]: I had a carry on.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_01]: That was I got a carry on in a backpack.
[SPEAKER_01]: That was it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Big ass, Carolin over here, Big ass suit case.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, the Terry on oversized.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, my God.
[SPEAKER_01]: We had to go through so many levels.
[SPEAKER_01]: I got some of that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Good to carry ourselves.
[SPEAKER_01]: oversized suit case, carry on Big Bag, probably an extra bag.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like she's, she's got things everywhere.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you know who packed actually well.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm even aware everything that I packed.
[SPEAKER_01]: I had a carry on for two months.
[SPEAKER_01]: Things like that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Just like,
[SPEAKER_00]: Just like do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do it.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's fine.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's going to happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's one thing I know about myself is that I always do make everything happen, but I'm going to be a little bit anxious about it beforehand.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I, oh, I step up every single time.
[SPEAKER_00]: I always do the things that I say I'm going to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: I always bring the visions to life, but it does not stop me from having a little bit of imposter syndrome and getting anxious beforehand of thinking, can I actually bring my life vision to life?
[SPEAKER_00]: And then to close, I think, one more element that really impacts this is the fear of judgment.
[SPEAKER_00]: A lot of decision anxiety isn't even really about the decision itself.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's about how we think it's going to be perceived by other people.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do you want me to practice judging you so you can get kind of over that fear?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, we can just do like a little bit of a practice round.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I think there's always this sense of like,
[SPEAKER_00]: you're trying to make a decision for yourself and trust your intuition, but then you're also thinking about, well, what are other people going to think about this?
[SPEAKER_00]: If it's, you know, a little bit off to be in pat, there's something.
[SPEAKER_00]: Are people going to understand it?
[SPEAKER_00]: Or am I going to be scared of having to explain myself and having to make myself understood to people?
[SPEAKER_00]: If I do something and then I change my mind, are people going to think I'm a mess and I'm lost in all of these things, you know?
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, yeah, and they're going to post about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they will.
[SPEAKER_01]: And they're all going to talk about it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Everyone's talking about it already.
[SPEAKER_00]: We have talked a lot in recent episodes about the fear of judgment and making choices for yourself rather than, you know, how it's going to be seen by other people.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I won't remanate on it, but one thought that I don't think we've said in other episodes is that you live with the consequences of your choices, nobody else does.
[SPEAKER_00]: so you can't give other people's opinions too much weight on the choices that you make because at the end of the day your choices don't change their life they change your own.
[SPEAKER_00]: So yeah, I don't honestly necessarily have answers to this.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just kind of wanted to talk about the feeling.
[SPEAKER_00]: because it's something that has come up with so many friends in my life.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's something that I've doubled with starting conversations about on social media, and I think it's really hard to fit all of these thoughts and all of these feelings into like, you know, a 30-second reel or a caption or something like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I figured the podcast would be a really nice place to have a longer conversation about it and kind of dive into why all of these feelings of confusion and conflict and maybe struggling with your identity a little bit in our 20s is so common.
[SPEAKER_00]: If I can leave you with anything, it's that the goal really isn't to make the right choice.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just to make the next choice, honestly, because you don't, you can't predict the rest of your life.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can't predict what is coming behind each of these hypothetical doors that you might open.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the best thing that you can do is just open one.
[SPEAKER_00]: Go full ahead.
[SPEAKER_00]: Continue to always just make
[SPEAKER_00]: the most honest decision for yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's in front of you.
[SPEAKER_00]: You don't honestly need a five-year plan.
[SPEAKER_00]: I always end like fuck a five-year plan because you don't know what's coming.
[SPEAKER_00]: So don't stress too much about what the choices you make now mean for the rest of your life because they don't really have to mean anything.
[SPEAKER_00]: As long as you are making whatever choice feels right for you right now.
[SPEAKER_01]: And with that, I hope if you were having a crash out, you stopped.
[SPEAKER_01]: And if you were
[SPEAKER_01]: Because that is the waste of your energy and you have more important and interesting things to be doing and one of the more important things You could be doing is following all of us on social media So adding Catherine canine at curling canine and at girls with girls pod on Instagram check talk all of them whatever It's also all linked in the show on its blows So you can click over and check that out and follow us throughout the week until we talk to you guys next Monday
[SPEAKER_00]: So in this episode to a friend who you think might relate to it, if you've had any conversations with friends who are feeling similarly, if anyone's struggling with the thought of what to do next or that post-grad feeling or struggling to find a job that's literally half of everyone I know right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you feel like this could be helpful for somebody else so let's do it, definitely send it their way, make sure you're following the show wherever you listen on Spotify and Apple Podcasts and we will see you next Monday.
[SPEAKER_00]: Bye!