Refuse to Choose, Stand to Lose?

After my husband told me today for the 1000th time that the reason I am not seeing success in any of my goals is that I need to focus on one thing, I consulted ChatGPT to find out how to narrow my focus and why I can't just buckle down and pick one thing. It's funny because, for many people, the answer may seem so easy. Just pick the thing you are best at, the one that's most likely to succeed, or the thing you are most interested in. However, asking me to do that is about as easy as asking me which body part I'd like to chop off. If forced to choose, it would be similar in that I'd just be trying to pick which thing is the least painful to live without. The rest of my life, I'd have to adapt to its absence while honestly wishing it were still there. That is how it feels for me to give up my variety of interests and choose one thing.

This way of being is something I've always struggled with and has always felt hard in a world where people are praised for their skills and talents as specialists in one area. This way of being is why, when I was in college, I jumped from major to major until finally settling on a double major in English Literature and Business, while also pursuing a career as an elementary school teacher. Yes, it was a path that made no sense, but I much preferred taking business and literature courses along with my education courses rather than just focusing on one set. I couldn't choose until this path seemed most sensible for finishing with a degree and a career.

It is why, when I became a teacher, I had so many great ideas and a lot of passion for teaching, but couldn't manage a classroom with just one method. This led to confusion for both myself and the kids (though the real reason I quit teaching is more complex and detailed in my other blog posts). This way of being is also why I jumped around from job to job, doing very well at each, loving to learn new skills and working hard, but quickly getting bored and wanting to move on.

This way of being is also very familiar with ADHD, a diagnosis I have. People with ADHD get bored of things easily and do not tolerate boredom well. We may love learning and trying new things and be pretty good at them, but we do not like to stay with something once it is no longer interesting to us, which may be short-lived.

All this is against me when I decided I want to work for myself and have my own side gig that I turn into a full-time job. First, I wanted to be a YouTuber, then a full-time Twitch streamer, then an actress, then a voiceover actress, then a dancer, then a YouTuber again, and then a TikTok creator. And of course, there were all the different subjects for the YouTube channel: gaming, cooking and healthy recipes, beauty and health product reviews, voiceover, bedtime stories, Just Dance, acting, comedy sketches, and life coaching, to name a few. But everything in YouTube and life tells you to niche down and pick one thing to focus on, which, again, feels like giving up a limb. I just can't do it. Even thinking about it is enough to send me into a spiral where I do a thousand other things not related to my goals to distract myself and then get overwhelmed and give up on everything entirely.

It's kind of like raising a toddler where you, as the adult, could physically force the child to do most things you want them to do, or at least you could pick them up and put them wherever you want. But by using force, you might turn the child against you, lose their trust, make them very angry, worsen the situation, and lose the opportunity to teach them to be successful in life. That's what would happen to me if I forced myself to focus on one thing. It might actually happen physically, but I couldn’t keep it up any more than you can force a toddler to do something consistently that they refuse to do. If I did somehow succeed, I'd lose all my trust, make the situation worse, and make myself very, very angry.

😠

So, like I said, I went to ChatGPT searching for answers, and it gave me some pretty terrible advice. It suggested that I make a YouTube channel that includes all my interests and has different pillars of topics it switches between. The pillars of topics are actually a great YouTube strategy, but they usually involve subtopics within a larger subject. For example, a fitness channel may have pillars of yoga, stretching, and recovery tips. But ChatGPT suggested making a YouTube channel about everything with pillars of dance, voiceover, gaming, healthy food, and life coaching. And that just will not work.

Now, there are some creative ways you can combine multiple interests into one type of channel. Maybe you have a tech review channel with a twist: you let your dog help review all the products! Wow! You've combined your love of your dog with your love of tech! But the truth is, the type of videos I like to make are completely different topics and do not blend well with one another. I know because that's basically what I post to my TikTok now, and it’s just very confusing to people what I stand for. It’s hard to find the right audience when some people are there for my great tips on voiceover and others just want to watch a video of me training my dog.

But then I pressed ChatGPT further and asked it to share YouTube videos that talk about multi-talented people. That’s when I found a video by Pattern Talent by Darya Karenski, who, first of all, has the name Karenski, which is so similar to my nickname Korenski, and second, was talking about this book called "Refuse to Choose" by Barbara Sher. It was so fascinating that I downloaded the book and started listening, and I am learning some amazing things.

First, apparently, the fact that I have a million interests and can’t seem to choose one for a career or even a hobby is actually a positive trait that should be seen as a strength! There are many other people like me, and Barbara calls us "Scanners." Scanners have a drive to learn and love change. We don't mind being beginners and trying new things all the time. When you see someone with no tolerance for boredom, who is curious about almost anything new and has the ability to process fresh material, you're looking at a Scanner. As Barbara Sher says, “Scanners often jump from topic to topic and often move on to new hobbies or projects before finishing the first. Why? It’s because we are like honeybees. We go to one thing for as long as it is needed to get the reward we seek and then leave when it's been received.”

A honeybee goes from flower to flower, only caring about gathering nectar. Once it has enough nectar, it leaves and goes to another flower. Similarly, Scanners may be finished with a hobby or activity before the rest of the world would consider it finished. The Scanner has simply gotten the amount of nectar they wanted and then moved on.

So as a Scanner, we should not try to finish every project we start or continue down every path we begin. Instead, we should figure out what our reward is, the thing that motivates us when starting new projects or activities. For example, Barbara mentioned a woman named Ella who found reward in learning a new subject to help others. She would be excited to learn just enough to help someone with a specific task and then had no interest in going further. We only need to stick with a project long enough to get what we came for, and we discover that over time by noticing what isn’t there anymore when we feel like leaving.

So when you lose interest in something, consider at what point you started to lose interest and see what you had already achieved or been rewarded by. You may have already achieved what you came for and are ready to move on. Barbara suggests asking yourself: 1) "What was the most exciting or interesting part of the experience?" 2) "Why did you stop when you did?" 3) "What rewards did you get from that?" You lose interest, she says, because you finished your original goal.

Here are some examples to make this clearer: 1) Quitting things once they become too business-focused because you just enjoyed the self-expression. 2) Quitting after mastering the basics because you just enjoyed the challenge of going from beginner to intermediate. 3) Quitting after achieving a specific goal. When you’re getting the reward, you feel excited and energetic. When you’re done, you get bored and can’t go on. Barbara mentions that this kind of feeling is common with all people, but if you are a Scanner, it’s much more pronounced. Scanners tend to get more excited and enthralled by the things they are interested in than most people, except super specialists. Scanners also have less tolerance for boredom, which, like for someone with ADHD, is excruciating and unbearable. You can’t just live with it or push through; at some point, your subconscious behavior will sabotage you if you try to push through boredom because it’s so torturous for you.

I thought about some of my activities that I quit before "finishing" and why that might have been.

Karate - I quit when they forced me to hold my arms up for 5 minutes because it hurt.

Ballet - I quit on the first day when it looked and felt like all the other girls had been doing this for years already. I felt self-conscious and out of place.

Soccer - I quit because all the popular girls were on the team, and I was not popular. They treated me like an outcast. Also, I don’t like running and was afraid of the ball, which made it challenging.

Mortal Kombat - I quit because we got a Nintendo 64.

Super Mario 64 - I quit because I finished the game and other games came out.

Pokemon - I quit after finishing Pokémon Red and Yellow. I started Gold, but it felt more complex in a way that lost the magic of the original game, and I lost interest as I was becoming a pre-teen and real life became more interesting.

Dogz/Catz - I quit because The Sims came out, and it was even cooler.

Sims - I quit after several years because it started getting overly complex with all the add-ons and upgrades. Sims 2 was cool, but it got old, especially because it became too much for my computer to handle. But mostly, what killed it was learning the Rosebud cheat, which made it too easy to get money and everything else, taking the challenge out of it. Also, I realized that no matter how rich my Sims became, I was still a broke teenager, and that was discouraging.

A lot of these are video games because that’s what I did a lot in those younger years.

Art - I never really got far into art because I felt like I wasn’t that good. I’d spend a lot of time on a painting or project, and it would never really pan out the way I wanted. Months later, I’d look back on that project and think I did a good job and that it’s neat, and I should do more. But when I actually go to paint again, it feels like I’m not that good, and I just feel discouraged. Plus, now painting feels a bit boring and pointless because the world moves so fast, and it takes so long. And then you can’t really do anything with the painting except show it to people and hang it on your wall. Plus, it’s kind of a lonely activity.

Tennis - I tried out for the team and didn’t make it, but then the coach agreed to give me free lessons with the other tennis players. I did that and was pretty consistent until later that year when the coach got arrested for engaging with a minor. That’s when I really lost interest in tennis.

Piano - I never really lost interest in piano, but I can’t seem to get further in my practice. I love playing it, but I want to play full songs, and I find it extremely tedious to 1) memorize how to play a song or 2) learn to sight-read. So all I do is try to play things by ear so I don’t have to memorize or learn tedious things. But it’s really hard to play things by ear, so it’s very slow, and then I end up writing down the notes because even once you figure out how to play something, it still requires some memory to play it right with no errors. So I like the part where you touch the piano and sound comes out that makes a song, but I hate all the other parts of learning a complicated math language and rote memorization. My stupid smart brother somehow can play the piano perfectly without sight-reading by just doing the chords, but he already learned guitar from a young age, so I guess he has that foundation. I have found it very boring to try to memorize chords as well, though I don’t mind playing scales—that I am cool with. I would love to play piano any day, but then I remember I don’t know how to play and hate memorization, so I don’t.

Singing - I love singing, but I don’t really do it much because 1) I am not good enough to post videos of myself singing online—I have, and no one likes it, trust me—and 2) I am not good enough to be a singer. So if I can’t make money with it and I can’t make anything with it, then what’s the point? Even if I didn’t make money, it would be cool to perform, but it’s hard to perform when you live in Nashville and everyone is an amazing singer, and you are just okay. With certain songs and practice, I am actually quite good, but it seems like other singers are good at every song they try, and that’s just not me. I still sing flat sometimes, so why try?

Voiceover - I really enjoy this as well, and I haven’t really quit or given up, but my struggle is learning the recording software. It’s really intimidating. People say, "Then don’t learn it and pay someone to edit your material for you," but I don’t have money for that. Additionally, I don’t know where to start because I want to do audiobooks, but in the beginning, you don’t get paid well, and it’s a lot of hours of recording and editing for so little pay—that deters me.

Dance - Again, I haven’t quit this, but after years of trying, I am still not that good. Like, I can follow along in class, but I look like some kind of two-left-footed baby deer that is just learning to walk—and not in a cute way. Also, it hurts my feet and my body a lot.

YouTube - Haven’t quit this either, but I am stuck with trying to figure out what niche to go with. Making videos is hard. It requires a lot of thought and skill to make a good video that doesn’t suck, and I feel like I need so much practice and learning before I can make something good. The idea of having to put a lot of work and effort into sucking at this before I can actually do it well is disheartening.

Looking at all these, the common theme I see is perfectionism. I hate not being good at something and having to work really hard to improve with no guarantee of getting better. I feel like with all these, I have already put a lot of work in to make only minimal progress, and I start to wonder if I ever will get better. I also judge myself harshly and get impatient with my learning and growth. I get very discouraged by my own lack of skill, especially when comparing myself to others. People say, “Don’t compare,” but I can’t help it. I can’t turn my eyes off the rest of the world, and besides, watching others is required to become better. You gotta learn from somewhere. So I don’t feel like I really stuck with these things until I got a reward and got bored like Barbara is saying. I feel like instead, I stuck with these things only long enough until I got scared and overwhelmed. Until my comparison and perfectionist mind said, "You can’t do that; other people think you suck; you aren’t as good as them; if you want a chance, it’s going to be hard and painful, and it might never happen." I feel like that is what’s going on in a lot of these.

Pokemon, The Sims, and other video games may be the one thing I stuck with until completion. Maybe that’s because there aren’t as many people I’m comparing myself to with games, and I am playing on my own without others watching or judging me. I feel like, with most of the games I play at least, there isn’t really a way to lose, especially with games like The Sims and Pokémon. Now, I would get angry and frustrated with Mario 64 sometimes because that can be harder, but Pokémon and The Sims are great. You follow a simple formula that’s easy for anyone to figure out, and you just grind—you just keep showing up and putting in the work, and the work doesn’t make you feel like a failure. You are going to die like maybe 1 out of 100 times. You just feel constant progress and little increments of improvement, and it updates you too after every task you complete. Whether it’s a Pokémon battle you won or your Sim completing some piano time or making some food, you see instant results in the XP on the screen.

I guess I just want things in life to be that simple. You put the work in, and you can get to the next level just like anyone else. Instead, I find that I work hard and still barely progress, and compared to other people, I am slow and have barely gotten anywhere.

I think I was supposed to go through all the things I quit and realize the reward I was getting from them that lead me to move on. Based on the book "Refuse to Choose" the idea of reward seemed more like a positive thing. Maybe I am struggling to escape my own bias, but I find it hard to relate these to her idea of reward. Still I will try. 

With Karate, Ballet, and Soccer, I started with excitement and the idea of mastering something new. But once the initial thrill wore off and it became more about enduring discomfort or facing social challenges, the reward just wasn’t there anymore. I was no longer enjoying myself, so I moved on. It wasn’t about failure; it was about recognizing that the reward I was looking for—joy, mastery, or just a sense of belonging—was no longer present.

Then there are the video games: Mortal Kombat, Super Mario 64, Pokémon, Sims, and Dogz/Catz. These games gave me clear rewards—leveling up, completing a game, mastering a challenge. I loved the sense of accomplishment that came with each small victory. But once I achieved that, the excitement faded, and I naturally sought out something new. I didn’t stick around just to say I was still playing; I had already gotten what I wanted from the game, so I moved on.

Art was another story. It started as a creative outlet where I could express myself, but as time went on, the slow pace of improvement and my own high expectations started to diminish the reward. I’d spend hours on a piece, only to feel like it didn’t meet my standards. It was hard to keep going when the reward wasn’t there—when the joy of creating was overshadowed by frustration and self-doubt.

With Tennis, Piano, Singing, and Dance, I found personal satisfaction in the beginning. There was potential for growth and a chance to get better at something I enjoyed. But external factors—like the coach’s arrest in tennis, or the need for tedious memorization in piano—started to take away from that initial joy. I got stuck in the comparison game, seeing how others were so much better, and that made the rewards feel out of reach. The excitement turned into discouragement, and I lost interest.

YouTube and Voiceover have been similar experiences. I love the creative freedom they offer and the idea of building something amazing. But the reality of how much work and skill it takes to make something truly good can be overwhelming. The thought of putting in all that effort, only to produce something that isn’t up to my standards, is disheartening. The reward I’m looking for—creating something I’m proud of—feels so far away that it’s hard to keep pushing forward.

I honestly had to use ChatGPT to come up with these reward comparisons because it was challenging to see them clearly. My rewards seem to be chasing the thrill of a new activity, the excitement of learning something fresh, and the satisfaction of clear progress. Once I’ve extracted the knowledge or experience I wanted, I tend to move on.

In the book, Barbara gives examples mostly of people who go after a goal or start a project, receive their reward, and then get bored and move on. But in my examples, it seems like I went after a reward, and then my own self-consciousness or external factors caused the reward to be thwarted. I am like a honeybee that goes to a flower only to find an ant in it or discovers another bee has already sucked up all the nectar. So, I’m not moving on because I got my fill of nectar, but rather because my nectar plan was unexpectedly stopped by an external factor. Or sometimes, I fly up to the flower, but I think I see no nectar and leave before really checking, or the nectar tastes bitter to me, so I leave.

The bummer about this situation is that I’m stumped on how to apply this book to my problem. The book suggests that once you are bored and you’ve gotten the reward, it’s completely natural and normal to move on. But I can't move on from my hobbies because I haven’t gotten the reward—it was blocked. So, I keep moving on to other flowers that seem to have easier-to-get nectar with no ants in the way, only to find that almost every flower seems to have an ant or two you must overcome.

So, is the answer to keep moving forward and spend my entire life looking for new flowers? Or should I choose a flower and be willing to face the ants in that flower? Maybe I have to work for that reward before I move on to the next thing.

Okay, so say I’m willing to work for the reward—how do I choose which of the many hobbies and interests to work on right now? What do you do when you’re a honeybee in a field of flowers, and you’ve started to test every one of them, but you haven’t gotten all the nectar you need from them yet, and you can only focus on one at a time? Do you just choose one at random and hope it has enough nectar to get you what you need? The analogy kind of falls short here because the bee could still keep going to many flowers in one day, but we humans can only really become great at maybe a few things at a time, or even just one.

So maybe this book wasn’t the answer I needed after all. I guess it’s good to accept that I have lots of interests, but I still need to pick one thing to do for a career.

I'm honestly feeling lost at this point, but I don't want to end the blog post on a negative note, so I asked chat gpt based on my blog post what advice it would give and what advice it thinks Barbara would give me, and here is what it said: 

Chatgpt:

What I Would Advise:

1. Embrace Your Scanner Identity: Acknowledge that your nature as a Scanner is not a flaw but a strength. You're wired to explore, learn, and gather a variety of experiences, which can lead to unique insights and a rich, multifaceted life. Rather than trying to fit yourself into a mold that doesn't suit you, lean into this strength and use it to your advantage.

2. Create a Scanner-friendly Career: Instead of forcing yourself into a traditional, linear career path, think about how you can create a career or business that allows you to explore multiple interests. This could mean combining your skills in creative ways, or it could involve a portfolio career where you pursue several different projects or jobs simultaneously.

3. Set Boundaries for Exploration: One of the challenges for Scanners is avoiding burnout or becoming overwhelmed by too many projects. Set boundaries for yourself by choosing a few key projects or interests to focus on at any given time. You don’t have to pick just one thing forever, but narrowing your focus temporarily can help you make progress without feeling trapped.

4. Reframe Your Husband's Advice: Your husband’s advice to focus on one thing is well-intentioned, but it might be more about finding balance than truly limiting yourself to just one interest. Consider his advice as a reminder to manage your energy and ensure that you’re not spreading yourself too thin. Instead of focusing on one thing forever, try focusing on one project or goal at a time while keeping your other interests alive in smaller, less demanding ways.

What Barbara Sher Might Say:

Barbara Sher, in her book "Refuse to Choose," emphasizes that Scanners like you thrive on variety and that trying to force yourself into a specialist role is not only unnecessary but potentially harmful. Here's what she might suggest:

1. Identify Your Core Drive: Sher would likely encourage you to identify the core drive behind each of your interests. What is the "nectar" you're seeking from each project? Is it the thrill of learning something new, the joy of self-expression, or the satisfaction of helping others? Once you understand your core motivations, you can better design your life and career around fulfilling them without feeling the need to "finish" every project.

2. Design Your Life Around Your Interests: Rather than choosing one path and sticking to it, Sher would advise you to design a life that accommodates your varied interests. This could mean creating a schedule that allows you to rotate through different projects or finding a way to integrate multiple interests into a single career.

3. Give Yourself Permission to Pivot: Sher believes that it's okay to move on from projects once you've gotten what you need from them. You don’t have to finish everything you start. Instead, give yourself permission to pivot when your interest wanes, trusting that you've already gained what you needed from the experience.

4. Combine Interests in Creative Ways: Sher would also suggest finding ways to combine your interests creatively. Even if it seems like your interests don't fit together, there may be innovative ways to blend them into something new and unique.

Ultimately, Barbara Sher would remind you that you don’t have to conform to the typical expectations of success. Your path as a Scanner is valid and can be just as fulfilling and successful as a more traditional, specialized approach. Instead of fighting your nature, embrace it and find ways to thrive within it.

Thanks Chat Gpt that sounds good!