Knowing when to quit | Sarah Weiler | TEDxNewnham

I'm not a quitter I don't quit I'll stay on and finishes I'm not a quitter I don't quit I'll stay on and finishes I'll stay in a job I think every day I get home late undervalued all drenched but odds risky to provide best in fact I liquid I don't do it I'll see ya I'm not [Music] completely mad and the piggy is pretty bad and it's making me quite stressed but I'm not like all the rest because I'm not a quitter I don't quit I'll finish I don't quit I'll do my confidence is plummeting I'm not sleeping got quite min voice is breaking feel depressed but I'm not gonna take a rest cuz I'm not a quitter I don't quit I stay on and finish it I'm not a quitter I don't quit I'll stay on and finish it I'm not a creep come quick update on and finish it I medicate I don't quit a day on finish jots a word they sent me home I've just been drinking here alone marriage broken I'm a mess can't do anything but rest but I'm not a quitter the hardest part of any challenge I think it's that moment you realize just don't want to do it anymore that sinking feeling that something you once loved just isn't working but you're wondering am i miserable enough to go through the process of quitting I know that agonizing indecision of quitting so well I left a career and teaching made the difficult decision to fold to startups that were very close to my heart decided not to run a marathon I accidentally signed up for and don't get me started on dry January 12 days but in each of these situations even though I knew it was the right decision even though after the initial uncertainty there was this space for new and great adventures even though every time I quit I learned more about how I wanted to live my life nevertheless I felt so much shame and guilt for quitting was I just being a coward maybe someone else would have been able to cope better in the situation maybe I just hadn't worked hard enough in the past few years we have been force-fed buzzwords of resilience and grit we've been told the strongest people are those who never give up but I've seen one too many friends and myself push themselves to breaking point in the name of stoic resilience not quitting even though you're on P is like buying a pack of cigarettes smoking - and being like oh I feel sick but I better finish the pack anyway because that's what everyone's expecting and I might like it if I keep smoking so last year I put on face book my proposition that our societal aversion to quitting was keeping many of us in really unhappy and unhealthy situations for much longer than necessary in the next 48 hours I was inundated with responses everyone had a story about quitting commuting three hours a day there and back to be bullied by my boss giving up a dream career as a professional musician because I was miserable being in an unhappy relationship but not wanting to have that conversation getting two weeks into a two-year job abroad and throwing I'd made the wrong decision and I had so many more so I sent out a survey 84% of people said they would not want to be called a quitter one in ten said they had been unhappy in these situations for over four years of their life and the impact mental health problems loss of confidence depression alcoholism giving up on creative dreams wasting years of my life and why do people why didn't people quit even though 90% of people said once they did quit / / improve their overall well-being happiness as one person put it I felt there would be a black mark forever if I quit at what point did we put not being a quitter on a pedestal above our own happiness nature quits all the time leaves don't hang on the trees worrying what their boss the oak tree is gonna think of them they don't deliberates hanging on for one more winter hope it gets better in the spring no once they've given their nutrients the tree and it no longer serves them to be there they fall down the leaves that fool are still useful because they decompose and the nutrients go back into the soil do you not happens to the leaves that stay on the tree they freeze to death remember this it may feel selfish to be leaving a situation like you're abandoning ship like you're only thinking of your own needs if you leave at that moment you still have energy to put into other projects are the relationships to your next steps if you stay you're basically as useful as a frozen leaf and I want to be clear this isn't about quitting being better than staying it's about asking a different question altogether imagine if you're in a difficult situation at work and it's getting you down if you ask should I go it if immediately brings in connotations of not coping of giving up what if we were like the leaves on the tree and simply asked does it still serve me to be here suddenly there's a shift from one of a poisoning of failing and not coping to empowerment choice responsibility this puts you in the driving seat and you can make an informed decision when you're hungry you eat when you're tired you sleep when something no longer serves you you quit how do you know if something no longer 30 because quite frankly so often the stress that has been normalized in our society is insane and I know that when I was teaching I found it hard but I hadn't realized how burnt-out I was I woke up every morning in my final year of teaching dreading going to work I was often so late I was on the bus with my students and I actually ended up in the hospital because I was so dehydrated from my back to back coffees and not drinking enough water and I lay in the hospital bed my baked the doctor to let me leave because I had to take my students on a school trip and she was like no you need to stay in that and when I finally left I remembered a summer but your music and dancing my kitchen and having this realization that I hadn't had that much energy for years and she started crying because I was like how could I have been this out of touch with myself like I was REME eating the me before I started that job and that really scared me because I knew I'd been tired but I hadn't realized how bad it had been so when you're in the thick of it how can you tell well what if we did something we very rarely do anymore what if we could take a moment sit in silence and ask our bodies ask our bodies this is something I didn't do at all when I was teaching but this summer I had a different experience I spent five weeks walking across northern Spain doing the Camino I don't know if anyone has done it and every day for 35 days I had to ask myself how far I wanted to walk and some days I drove myself mad trying to logically work out what the right thing to do was like had I walked far enough had I pushed myself enough what would it mean if I gave up after six kilometres after a while I started to ask my feet I was wearing different shoes to these that's my feet what they wanted to do and at first it seemed really weird but I always got a response some things they'd be like yes let's walk another 10k and some days they would go we are stopping at the next town and we were getting a beer and it was always the right thing the other question I asked my feet was what option feels like a relief and again it was the right thing like you may feel the relief is going to be the easy option or the one that takes less effort but sometimes it's a relief to continue and we just need that reassurance and in those moments we need to draw on our grit and resilience but to stop we need to draw an honesty and courage and it doesn't matter what anyone else is doing yes other people may be able to walk further work harder love longer your body always intuitive ly knows what's best for you so many of us are putting our lives on hold with this quitting paralysis but what I fling fascinating is that in the startup world failing fast and changing direction is essential for the evolution of any idea Steve Jobs famously looked in the mirror every day and asked am i still happy with the way I'm living my life and his company did all right in that what if we saw ourselves as the entrepreneurs of our lives instead of quitting we'd be innovating updating adapting and pivoting so that we could function at our best and bring real value to the world what if when people said they wanted to quit instead of judging them we championed them on their great life innovation they're a cute awareness of what they need it at that stage in their life how would that change the amount of people signing off work with burnout unhappy marriages continuing people feeling totally lost we all have the power to shift this stigma around quitting I want in future generations people to be saying apparently in the olden days you weren't allowed to quit it was really shameful we can do that but it takes every single one of us and it takes that question and getting really honest does this still serve me the leaves don't deliberate on when to leave the tree they just fall off when they're ready they'd freeze to death if they stuck around but instead they decompose and give their nutrients to the ground and how many changes has it take to take a light bulb what if our lives were just the same twisting and turning adjusting learning innovating every day see you gotta asked us this still serve me and know the answers right for you take a moment of quiet does this still serve me here you know what you've got to do Steve Jobs looked into the mirror every day and asked if he still liked what he was doing if the answer was yes you'd carry on that's why every one of us carries an iPhone remember that life is a constant innovation today is just one prototype it's not about who's holding on longest it's a question for you what's right sowhat's yourself does this still serve me here and know the answers right for you take a moment if quiet does this still serve me create space for something new remember the trees freezing to death one the trees remember the leaves freezing to death on the trees remember I know what I've got he change I've gotta ask right for me take a moment of quiet they still love me I know what I've got to do the leaves don't ask permission to fall down thanks very much [Applause]

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 36,952

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, Life, Failure, Life Development, Music (performance), Social Change, Success, Work

Id: WWtRied_Tsk

Length: 14min 17sec (857 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 20 2018