Dear ones, I’ve always been a stranger to the phrase „You can achieve anything if you want it bad enough“. But when it comes to the topic of family planning, for example, I find it highly offensive.
Because some women want to become mums and want to do so as much as possible, but then biology throws a spanner in the works. Or the lack of a partner or they want another child and it doesn’t work out or whatever. You know what I mean. Not everything can be achieved simply by working hard.
And no, if you start your working life with a normal job today, you will hardly be able to build a little house on your own if you haven’t inherited well – no matter how much you want to. That’s just not enough these days and that’s why we can simply smash Insta slogan mugs with sentences like „You can achieve anything“ against a wall.
Let’s be realistic
You know me for being optimistic, I know – and I don’t mean that in a pessimistic way and I don’t want to spread fear of the future, on the contrary. I mean that REALISTICALLY. Because our children compare themselves. They compare themselves with many, many, many more people than we did at their age, because they have the internet. They use social media. And what they see there can quickly put them under pressure.
That’s what they say: you can lose 15 kilos in a week with ten minutes of wall Pilates a day. You can simply fly yourself to Dubai as an influencer. And if you want it really, really badly, you can even look like Daisy Duck, you just have to spend enough tens of thousands on lip injections. Phew. (And yes, Wandpilates is definitely only advertised for over 40s, but there are also similar programmes for younger target groups). And if you can’t do it? Did you just not want it badly enough?
One of our sons has always had a very specific career aspiration and is seriously considering not pursuing it because he doesn’t think it will earn him enough money. The other of the two was asked yesterday at his work placement what connection he had to the field, because you only get in through vitamin B. Does that seem like „You can achieve anything you want if you try hard enough“?
You can achieve anything?
I think this „you can achieve anything“ sentence is mainly PRESSURE. Because we can then assume that we’re doing something wrong if we can’t fulfil all of our dreams in life. That we’re not trying hard enough. And yes, of course we have a lot in our hands, but not everything.
Sometimes we also need a bit of luck. Sometimes privilege accelerates careers (unfortunately often!). Sometimes the chosen sport is simply too expensive for the parents, sometimes luck is perhaps on the side of the road and not at the finish line.
And yes, of course we can make an effort. But that doesn’t mean that everything will work out. Haven’t we all messed up a maths test even though we’ve studied? Haven’t we ever lost a tournament even though we were the better team? It’s up to us to celebrate the journey, to recognise the effort and not the result. And we can also pass this on to our children:
We can try everything in life, but that doesn’t mean that everything will work out or go the way we imagined it would. And we don’t have to bury our heads in the sand about that, but instead look at how we can deal with what comes out of it.Life sometimes surprises us. And not doing a job because it „doesn’t pay enough“? Nah, as a mum, I’d say: if that’s your passion, then you’ll get so good at it that other sources might open up.
I like to use the example of the midwife. She certainly doesn’t earn „well“ in the conventional sense (especially not thanks to horrendous liability insurance costs). But maybe she can write a book about her work, which she is passionate about, or develop online courses or whatever other secondary sources you can think of.
In this respect: Yes, we can perhaps achieve a lot if we want to. But not everything – and especially not under the pressure and promise that this is always possible in every area of life. But we can try and see what highs and lows we experience… and then save these as experiences. Or how do you see it?
