“What do you have to do tomorrow?”

“Write a blog, but I don’t know what to write about…”

“Write about Instagram and how people compare themselves to everyone else on social media.”

Done.

Because I do it all the time. I could eat clean and lean all week, crush all my workouts, and then I’ll open up Instagram and one of the fitness accounts I follow will pop up. Just like that, I’m deflated. I’m not strong enough. My waist isn’t thin enough, my ass isn’t fat enough, and my workout gear isn’t cute enough. My selfies aren’t perfect enough. I could have really good shows on air all week, write multiple blogs, produce a podcast, read a book, and sleep well through the night…and someone gets promoted to a job I didn’t want anyway. But my initial reaction is my life isn’t moving fast enough, I’m not successful enough. I don’t have enough money.

I’ve unfollowed accounts because even though I had followed them for inspiration and motivation, they have just left me feeling like shit.

It’s this constant feeling of not being enough. and social media exasperates it. For me, anyway. I’m so aware that social media lives are a highlight reel, but it’s what I’m seeing all the time. And seeing is believing.

“It’s about status…and shame is the enforcer.” Over the last two days, I also happened to be listening to a new episode of one of my favorite podcasts, The James Altucher Show’s “Akimbo: A Podcast From Seth Godin” which talks about the importance of patience and learning to see how status & shame are used to manipulate us.

Consumerism is designed to keep the system going. They don’t want you to feel like you’re enough, because then you don’t need Sephora’s makeup counter, or a Birkin bag, or whatever it is you’re buying to satisfying some itch you can’t scratch.

One of my resolutions this year was that I was not going to buy anything materialistic. With the exception of a $12 bikini top (shout out to Asos.com), I’ve stuck with it. It’s been a good lesson in “What do I really need; what do I really want?”

I have to remind myself that you don’t see the hours, days, and years that someone put into their business or their brand. That they put into building their body.  And I have to remind myself that there is no timeline for things to happen, you don’t have to have something done by a specific age. I’m working on patience and discipline, and what can I do today, right now, to help get me closer to where I want to be tomorrow.