You Have The Right To Choose…
“Choose Wisely”
Recently, I felt like I was settling. After all this time, I was about to settle for half the pay, half the attention. “You did not come this far to only come this far,” I told myself. Settling is defeat, especially after all the hard work.
We often settle for the comfortable 9–5 when we know we were born to be entrepreneurs. All the videos you watch on business TikTok, all the books you’ve read next to your nightstand, and yet you clock in and out like the rest of us. We choose to settle because we are scared. The world can be a scary place, and it’s really good at keeping us scared.
The fear comes from war, poverty, and the need to consume and compare. We consume even when we don’t want to because we are bombarded with advertisements telling us otherwise. We are not beautiful enough or happy until we have the latest and greatest. I fall into this trap often. As a minority millennial woman, I just want to fit in and look as good as my peers, even if it puts me in debt. I don’t want anyone to know I am a first-generation American imposter, that I don’t come from money or have family wealth to lean on or call on if I’m ever in trouble. I am my mother’s American dream, working a six-figure job even if taxes take 35% off, and it’s no longer six figures. Never mind the inflation, because in my mother’s dream, that wasn’t accounted for…
Today, I choose not to settle. I choose to love myself more by giving up something I thought I really wanted. The truth is, if I didn’t give it up, I would grow to resent it. All the work I’ve been doing on myself and my self-awareness led me to believe I have to make a choice. I choose to love myself, to nurture myself, and to grow for myself. It was hard. I cried, I denied, I prayed. You know it’s real when you pray. But it had to happen, and it was painful. I dried my tears, and deep down, I know my intuition knows it’s for the best.
So I ask you, what’s your choice? Do you choose to settle in love and work? Deep down, you know the truth: You can’t predict the future, but you can make an educated guess about what will happen if you continue to stay where you are not happy.
