FCP S2E3 - Should You Bother Keeping Up With the Joneses?

Have you ever found yourself feeling stuck? Stressed? Inadequate? I think we all have at some point.

While there are many reasons you could feel this way, one of the biggest reasons people struggle with feeing stuck in their lives is because they aren't living according to their values.

Instead, we tend to get caught up in keeping up with the Joneses, wether that be by buying things we don't want or need, or pursuing things in life that we don't really value.

We could be trying to keep up by buying a new car, a big house, going on expensive vacations. But you could be trying to keep up in a lifestyle sense by pursuing what society tells you is important.

In this week's episode, we're talking about how we've found ourselves trying to keep up in the past, as well as the steps we've taken to focus on ourselves instead of keeping up with the Joneses.

The Problem with Keeping Up

If you are keeping up appearances or keeping up with the Joneses, you may be in bigger trouble than you think. Of course, you could be in financial trouble for spending money you don't have on things you don't want or need, but there are other dangers too.

Following the crowd and keeping up can lead to unhappiness with your life and the choices you've made. You might even wake up one day and think "How did I get here?". This can be common if you are going along with society and those around you instead of focusing on yourself, your values, and what you truly want to do in life.

Focusing on Yourself is a Process

This is a continual process that you can't just think about one time. You have to continually check-in with yourself to make sure you on are the right path. Plus, it takes time to learn what your values are so you can pursue them in all areas of your life.

For example, you might find yourself feeling stuck in your career like we did. All three of us took risks and branched out from traditional employment to pursue our own endeavors. But even once we'd achieved that, we still have to make sure we continue to focus on ourselves and not end up "keeping up" with those around us.

Once we because self-employed, we all found ourselves in this community that continually promotes hustling, working 24/7 and earning more money continually. These all sound like good things, but as the saying goes, too much of a good thing is still too much. Or something like that. ;)

Even though we'd broken free from keeping up in a traditional career path, we've now found ourselves having to re-evaluate our focus once again.

How Can You Focus on Yourself?

In this week's episode of the podcast, we are talking about specific things we've done to stop keeping up and turn our focus toward ourselves.

If you've tuned in to our previous episodes this year, then you know we're focused on self-care this season. All 10 of the episodes in season two will be related to that overall theme.

This week we're sharing our best tips for turning your focus toward yourself and breaking the desire to keep up with others.

In this episode we discuss: 1:30 - How we have tried to keep up with the Joneses in the past with money and other ways 5:11 - Who are the Joneses? 11:45 - Keeping up with the Joneses can be bad, even if it's related to a good habit, like frugality 17:00 - Social media's impact on the desire to keep up with others Related Links to Check Out: FCP043 – How to Deal with the Obsession of Earning More Money The Importance of Defining Your Values

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