Hello, this is Asato, a life coach with a journal. I am writing this newsletter from Rwanda, in the heart of Africa. Thank you so much for taking time to check out my post!
Early this year, I overloaded myself with work, family and passion projects. There are so many things I wanted to do, and pushed myself too hard. It only led me to serious burnout and I had a panic attack.
After that experience, I decided to aim for 70%, not 100% or 120%.
Coming from the hustle culture, this 70% rule was a game changer. Since that miserable end-January, I have been navigating my life in a positive attitude.
Today I want to unpack how I decided to aim for 70%.
January tends to be overloaded for hyper-achiever
Am I the only one who tends to have super high standards in January?
After the year-end reflection and new year goal setting, there is always a long list of things that I want to do.
I will not fail to update my weekly blog post
I will update Instagram every day
I will create a strategy on XX….
But I also want to spend time with kids
And there is another passion projects I want to kick off
When I took my personality test a while back, the top character was the Hyper-Achiever, followed by Restless and People Pleaser (yes, they describe me so much).
To be honest, I thought it is good to be a hyper-achiever, to have the motivation to challenge myself and aim for the higher version.
Thanks to this characteristic, I have achieved many goals which I thought I cannot attain. So, on one hand, I am grateful for this aspect.
However, because of this characteristic, my expectation for January tends to get too high. And by the end of January, I was so exhausted to keep up and felt burnt out.
“For everyday task, 70% is good enough”
I read this nice quote while I was burnt out and couldn’t do anything but just read some simple essays.
Something about this lady who is running her own boutique struck me. She is running her own business, but because it is an everyday task, she keeps telling herself not to over-stretch. 70% is good enough.
When I read this phrase, I had to question myself. What am I trying to achieve every day?
Hyper-Achiever of me would always aim for 100%
I get frustrated when I can only reach 90%, which is already good enough
When I feel like I can reach 100%, I would shift the goal up to 120%
Then by reaching 110%, I get frustrated for not reaching 120%
My Go-Go mindset was opposite from this lady. Rather than celebrating the everyday wins, I was pushing myself too hard by even shifting the goals to a higher level. And get really frustrated for not achieving what I aimed for.
Just after the panic attack, I knew I had to change something. And this is how I met this 70% rule.
Don’t over-do even if it is something exciting
In the book, the owner of a small boutique mentioned she would not over-do things, even if she knows that is expected by her clients and that would bring in more revenue.
She closes the shop at 16:00. This is her way of setting boundaries so that she can go home, cook for her family and have dinner together with kids.
She says her clients want more events or expositions and that would be successful if she tried. She even mentioned she would love to do more, but to keep her priorities, she would not push herself.
It is not easy to stop at 70% when you are doing something you like or enjoy. There is always an urge to do a little bit more. I am so guilty of aiming for higher, higher and higher.
But she knows that once she breaks her rule and the rainy day comes, her life would lose its balance. Thus, she decided that she would remain with her 70% rule.
To enjoy for a long time, I introduced 70% mindset
I have so many things on my table already, and there are various items I want to try, too.
Since there are many, I mean, a lot, I need to make sure things are in a good balance. To avoid burnout and to enjoy the projects for a long time, I decided to introduce this 70% mindset.
If I push myself a little harder, I can finish it off today.
If I did a little bit more, I think I’d be closer to success.
If I wrote a little more frequently, I might gain more Substack Subscribers
When those kind of mind starts creeping up inside me, I keep telling myself to stop. This change is quite difficult, but I remind myself of this 70% rule.
It is very ok to aim for 70% and to celebrate the fact that I’ve done 70%. This will reduce the burnout risk and help me go forward with peace in mind.
Almost 6 months have passed since I made this decision, but so far, things are going very well and I no longer have panic attacks.
If you think you also have a tendency to overload yourself, maybe it is time to rethink how you set your expectations!
Today’s journaling prompt: How am I balancing my work, life and passion projects in balance these days?
Ooh I love this! I think writing on Substack has been good practice for me with this. I aim to publish on Friday, but if something comes up or I'm not quite ready, I give myself until the end of the weekend. I also have to remind myself that every post doesn't need to be perfect - because there will be so many more posts to come! If I leave out a bit of information, that's just a topic I can use in a future post. I think being a little more flexible has made it easier to build a habit.