How to Stop Trying Quotes

“Trying to find closure in a situation can keep you locked in that very situation and prevent you from rolling on, because now you’re looking at the person, or thing, or experience they hurt you so much and asking that very same thing to make the hurt better. You are looking to what made you feel incomplete in the first place and now asking it to make you whole.”
― Kate Williams, How to Stop Trying: An Overachiever’s Guide to Self-Acceptance, Letting Go, and Other Impossible Things

“[…] and there is not a minute of the day that they are not maximizing in every way they can.”
― Kate Williams, How to Stop Trying: An Overachiever’s Guide to Self-Acceptance, Letting Go, and Other Impossible Things

“This is especially true for Gen X and millennial women (like me) who were the first generations raised with the belief that we could “have it all”—if we tried hard enough. So we doubled down on trying from an early age. We didn’t quit, pushed through pain, stayed positive, worked harder than everyone else, got shit done, refused to settle. We never let ourselves get comfortable, never stopped believing that we could do better and be better. And yet, no matter how hard we tried, no matter what we accomplished, we never felt like we really had it all. Instead, the more we proved what we could do, the more we were expected to do. The more we exceeded expectations, the greater they became, and now we’re here, in an era of overachievement, a time when we’re bombarded with messages that good enough isn’t good enough anymore and that we must keep getting better.”
― Kate Williams, How to Stop Trying: An Overachiever’s Guide to Self-Acceptance, Letting Go, and Other Impossible Things

“Because here’s the thing about trying: it’s tiring. Trying turns whatever you’re doing into labor.”
― Kate Williams, How to Stop Trying: An Overachiever’s Guide to Self-Acceptance, Letting Go, and Other Impossible Things

“And why is that? Why is it so important for us to learn that we can’t quit something that is making us miserable? Could it be because this world needs us to stick with stuff we don’t want to do, with stuff nobody wants to do, because who else is going to do it? Probably not men.”
― Kate Williams, How to Stop Trying: An Overachiever’s Guide to Self-Acceptance, Letting Go, and Other Impossible Things

“[…] but women who don’t conform still become the subjects of gossip and ridicule and bullying and exclusion.”
― Kate Williams, How to Stop Trying: An Overachiever’s Guide to Self-Acceptance, Letting Go, and Other Impossible Things

“Overachieving was my humblebrag, and I told myself that I just liked being someone who got a lot done and had a full plate. Sure, I regularly found myself nearly immobilized by how much I had to do, but I always figured that was no big deal, a small price to pay for the validation I got for working so hard and doing so much. And if I kept my head down and stayed that way, then I didn’t have to admit the truth: I got a lot done, but just barely. And that full plate? It was cracked.”
― Kate Williams, How to Stop Trying: An Overachiever’s Guide to Self-Acceptance, Letting Go, and Other Impossible Things

“Worry is a form of self-punishment that keeps us from enjoying anything good that happens, and that keeps everything we really want—relaxation, joy, or a sense of accomplishment—just out of reach.”
― Kate Williams, How to Stop Trying: An Overachiever’s Guide to Self-Acceptance, Letting Go, and Other Impossible Things

“For me, one of the few things I know for sure is that I do not want to live the second half of my life in the same way I lived my first. I have spent so much time trying to make myself small. I tried to fit into the little space that was allocated for me.”
― Kate Williams, How to Stop Trying: An Overachiever’s Guide to Self-Acceptance, Letting Go, and Other Impossible Things