Earlier this year, I made a conscious decision to stop doing anything I didn’t want to do, unless I was being paid to do so (look: I even wrote about it!). No more going to events out of obligation. No more forcing myself to attend parties just to show face. No more agreeing to activities that I knew I wouldn’t enjoy (escape rooms, public speaking, sharing a room, bowling, big group trips—actually, anything in big groups, anything too cold or sporty, pop-up events that involve loitering on the side, the list goes on).
I made adjustments to my social life. I stopped reaching out to people who didn’t make an effort, or who didn’t really get me. I stopped replying to people who only got in touch when they needed something. This was a life cleanse, a mass excavation of everything that was not in alignment with how I wanted to spend my limited time on earth.
Though this may all sound drastic, a bit “late-stage capitalism,” like the living embodiment of an Instagram infographic from an unlicensed therapist, it was in many ways a response to a lifetime of people-pleasing and being overly anxious about what I perceived others to be thinking. I would have to throw myself in the opposite direction, the logic went, in order to ideally land somewhere in the middle.
So far, I have actually been much happier and more content. Endless social hangs have been replaced with quality time, and I don’t feel bad if I want to watch reruns of The Osbournes on a Friday night instead of going to a small plates restaurant, followed by the club. But my life is also much, much quieter. Like, last Saturday, I don’t think I opened my mouth once, apart from to brush my teeth. I rarely ever take risks anymore—I can’t remember the last time I sent a risky text (I am married, to be fair), or ended up in the house of someone I did not know (in my 20s, I was always seeing into other peoples’ houses). I prefer it like this, but I also feel like a Reductress article made sentient. Have I, as the common parlance goes, protected my peace a little… too much?