Ugh, delegating. I hate delegating. Asking for help is so awkwaaaaard. What if the person you ask doesn’t know how to do the thing you need them to do? What if they do the thing but not as well as you would have done it? What if they say they’re going to do the thing, but then they forget and you have to constantly remind them until you sound like a total nag? What if the very act of explaining the thing is so stressful that you end up tripping over your own words and sounding like an idiot? AACK!* I give up! I’ll just do it myself! 

This has been a demonstration of a very common but not-super-healthy thought process that I have fallen prey to many times! As an artist by trade, I know that doing things myself is easy (if exhausting) and communicating with people is hard (if ultimately more rewarding). And to be fair, there isn’t always a good solution to these problems—sometimes you do just have to do the thing yourself. But if that becomes your default solution to every problem, that gets toxic pretty fast. 

*Why yes, I have been listening to Jamie Loftus’s excellent podcast on the triumphs and shortcomings of Boomer women through the lens of the newspaper strip Cathy, AACK! Cast.