Let’s talk about – US.
You are reading right.
That’s a topic that bothers me for a long long time now and I always thought I was alone with this issue, but overlooking Instagram, Blogs and People in real life showed me – I am not alone. We are not alone. 🙂
So I teamed up with Elena from The Bibliotheque and prepared this super important Blog Post for you all We will both say some eye opening and encouraging words for you and will also give you some tips and solutions in the end so you’ll never have to spiral down in stress situations or your own pressure again
The pressure of the world on our shoulders (by Ariana)
We are young, but not as young as our parents were when they had a job, children, a house, just everything. You probably know too well what I am talking about. Our generation is supposed to be more intelligent, more educated, stronger and easier under pressure. We shall work, but also want children, we shall be better than our parents were – and reach everything they never had. They never mean it as mean as we understand it. We shall have a better life than them – but everyone has to understand something.
But we aren’t living in the past.
Today we do not only have the pressure of family and friends on us. There is also social media, television, school and university, teachers and professors. There are different – and even more expectations on us. We are a cluster of all their wishes and hopes for our life. We do not only see our own little world. But we can compare ourselves to everyone – everywhere. And we do. We all know the 16K Girl we like every pic of, though we hate her inwardly a bit, because she is just so perfect and every picture of here shows her gorgeous face and lips or her great photography skills. We all know the hours spend in the gym or jogging outside, sweating, eating clean and never getting the body we so desperately want.
I remember myself writing a book, while also writing my bachelor thesis, working 20 hours a week, plus university, plus helping in my mothers shop on the weekend, doing the housework and trying desperately to still hold my friendships intact. I remember sleeping only three hours a day, forgetting to eat and still feeling bad because I did so little.
The number of people with social anxiety, bipolar disorder, depressions, burnout syndrome and mobbing are increasing into unbelievable ones!
Instead of being educated to honor others work, to work with them, are we educated in school and university to be better than everyone, more intelligent and still be cool, super social and especially loadable above else. A 8 hours work day AFTER a university day is normal, 12 hours straight working aswell. That we don’t have weekends or just timeouts anymore is also normal. Shift working fourteen days in a row like my best friend – nights included. Studying like a maniac, losing weight and hunger so we can get the degree just in time. Or worse – after working your ass off while studying you don’t get a job in your genre at all and have to take two or three jobs to pay for your daily life, cause you are not a specialist in anything at all. You are not as good as you always thought. And here we are again with the mental health issues.
This is not a single story – but our story.
We think ourselves only good if we always have an A in every subject, get the highest position in our company or get a bunch more money than our friends. I exaggerate here a bit on purpose, so you can see what I have seen for a long time now. Because eating disorders and suicide attempts aren’t an exaggeration. They are real.
We are generation workaholic.
Generation unhappy.
We are not able anymore to have serious relationships, because there often isn’t enough time while pleasing your choleric boss. We feel bad when we watch a season of our favorite tv show or take a longer bath. Relaxing is a luxury and exhaustion became normal. Do you find yourself feeling bad when you’ve spend the evening reading instead of learning for an exam? Or do you feel bad when you rather chilled in your pjs instead of going out after work? Do you feel bad?
I often do.
And additional to all that there is our hunger for more. For not only existing but leaving a footprint on the earth we lived on. For doing not only, what we have to, what we must do, but also what we WANT to do. 😉
Like writing this blogpost right now Like writing a book, travel around the world, doing sports for fun – like surfing, getting drunk with friends under the starstruck sky, having a instagram account not for success but fun, doing art, kissing in the ocean and falling in love. There is an unseen HUNGER to LIVE in our generation. Its on the edge to desperation.
Because it seems we have all the opportunities but aren’t really allowed to take them.
How we push ourselves off the cliff (by Elena)
Like a wise man once said “Um bu bu bum da de. Pressure pushing down on me”.
You, the one reading this right now, you belong to a generation of entrepreneurs. To a generation that, like Ariana very well says, is in many ways workaholic. We are living a technological era. Lifestyle, entertainment and career have evolved and now revolve around networking. Our social lives are not social anymore unless we share them online. The way we interact with the world has changed and in the same way, the way the world affects us too. We live under constant and deliberate surveillance: how much fun we have, how many countries we visit, how many friends we count, how much success we have in our careers… Then we are quickly getting to the point where we ask ourselves: if it’s not online, did it really happen? We are a generation that follows entrepreneurs and influencers on a daily basis. People that we regard in awe and even jealousy. People whose lifestyles set an example of the lives we wished we were leading.
We live under pressure.
The pressure to be great. Amazing. Successful. To leave our mark on earth. To throw ourselves into work and having a million plans afterward. And to work from Monday to Friday and explore the world Saturday and Sunday.
I often feel like there is an invisible force pushing us to keep our schedules as busy as we can handle, if not more. There will always be time for relaxing at home later in life, we say. But will there? Are we letting this pressure pushing us too hard? I am inclined to think so. Young people my age is slowly losing perspective and they are no longer able to stop the clock and take a deep breath.
Along these past years I have noticed an exponential increase on the life-coaching books offer. Now more than ever, people is demanding books to help them navigate life, to learn how to be happy, how to deal with anxiety or how to handle stress. Are we then less happy now, or are we just getting worse at picking the things that will actually make us happy?
Stop and think about those questions for a second.
When was the last time you took a full day off life and dedicated 24 hours to yourself? To make yourself happy and content with life?
Self-care is not only about taking bubble baths and painting your nails pink. Self-care is also about taking time. About being at peace with yourself. It’s a state of mind as much as it’s about pampering your body. It’s unbelievably important for us to stop the clock and release some pressure before we burst like a balloon too close to the sun. After all, life is about indulging as much as it is about breathing. Don’t feel like you need a full schedule or a life filled with success and a billion experiences to be happy. The road to happiness is far simpler than that.
And now to the message we want to spread!
Live! Without a bad conscience.
Don’t feel bad for the hunger for marshmallows in a cold summer night. Never feel bad for your hunger for art and adventure. Sure jobs and carrier, school and university are important. But we are too. Our dreams, our wishes. If you don’t want to feel bad anymore when you only relaxed a day, its hard work, but work we all should be willing to do. I am dying in a pool of bad conscience some days and I bet dozens of you do too – and we have to stop. Sure bringing output, power, service is important for us and everyone around us, but we should never forget one thing:
We only have one life and we should live it instead of wasting it for the pleasure or others.
No one can live from love and air. Sure we need to work and bring service in every job. But we should also honor our free time. We should laugh and eat with friends, watch movies and travel. We should be able to stay in our pjs on Sundays and just be happy about it. And we should work on secret projects, on music, art, poetry, because thats what our souls need – not society. Search for things that make you happy, small as they may be. For me it is traveling, doing yoga, a hot cup of coffee, reading and having a looong dinner with my family and friends
So here is our Tips and Tricks Checklist ♥
- Indulge in life! Take a few hours off and dedicate every single minute to yourself. Go shopping for candles so you can light them up that very same evening while chilling with a glass of wine or get flowers for yourself and top it up with a bubble bath.
- Make yourself some tea or coffee, cozy up and just waste some time cause that’s all you have. Kill some zombies on your PlayStation, watch that super cheesy movie/ tv show you wanted to see for ages or just stare at that black point at the wall until you have a brilliant lifesaver idea!
- Pamper your body but pamper your soul as much. How about you try that meditation tutorial you’ve always been curious about?
- Give your life and body balance. Do Sports, Yoga, Walk around the hillside or go swimming with your friends. Your body needs as much care as your soul and brain.
- Nourishing your social life is important, but what if you spoil yourself with a little bit of alone time? Grab a feel good book and escape reality to a far away land.
- And most important of all: eat that cake, kiss that boy/girl, stop thinking, go travel, listen inside of your soul and dedicate some days a month only for your inner well being and happiness, cause yes we have to work to get the life we want, but what is a life full of work without the joy of living?
We hope we could help you a bit and whenever you have more tips or questions just pm us via our Instagram handles @thebibliotheque and @solaire_writing
Kisses
Your Elena and Ariana
(For more wisdom, gifs and cheesy fun head over to The Bibliotheque Blog ♥♥♥)
(I see, how all the humans around me are acting and felt the need to talk about it. And you should and can too! I am sorry if this blogpost got a bit too depressive, but its just something that happens to all of us every time and I just wanted to give you a platform to share your fears and thoughts about it. To help each other and get help )
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