How to Seem Like You Always Have Your Sh*t Together https://medium.com/s/notes-on-changing-your-life/how-to-seem-like...

Illustration:
Joanna
Mackay/Getty
NOTES ON CHANGING YOUR LIFE
Images

How to
Seem Like
You
Always
Have Your
Sh*t
Together
For those of us who
don’t — which is
everyone

Brianna Wiest Follow

Dec 17, 2018 · 7 min read

Illustration: Joanna Mackay/Getty Images

It’s hard to nail down exactly what it means to “have your shit together,” but you
always know when you meet someone who does.

These people are functional and competent, but never pretentious or elitist. They make

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49K do their jobs and always seem to be level-headed about all the nonsense
their beds and
When Mindfulness
the rest of us conBate into huge crises.
Hurts
Keith
NoKearney
matter what your personal goals are, at the root of them all, you just want to have
your shit together too.
The Mental and
But, while this
Metaphysical might be hard to believe, the truth is that nobody really has it all
EMects
of Microdosing
together—notLSD entirely, not all the time. But aspiring to function well in your life, own
personal
Erica Avey responsibility, have real diplomacy and social grace, a healthy temperament,
and other similar traits is deFnitely noble, if not crucial, to being well-received by the
world.
Why AA Doesn’t
Work for Everyone
Therefore, here is your oGcial cheat sheet to getting your shit together… or at the very
Rachel Mullins
least, convincing everyone else you do.

1. Have a Uniform Style

Decide what you love and then wear it often. Either have a signature scent, accessory,
or color scheme that sets you apart. When people see you, your appearance should
align with who you say you are and what you say you care about. Your style should
match your personality, and it should stay as consistent as possible. Think of CEOs who
wear the same thing every day or cartoon characters who stay in the same clothes.
People respond well to consistency.

2. Don’t Flaunt Weaknesses

If you don’t want people thinking your life is a hot mess, then stop talking about it
being a hot mess on every platform every chance you can. There’s a huge, enormous,
world-altering diPerence between being authentic and capitalizing on your struggles
to earn sympathy or whatever else some dark corner of your mind thinks you’re
achieving by complaining every hour of the day. You can keep it real without
overemphasizing what you’re not that great at. What you share is what builds other
people’s image of you.

3. Stop Oversharing
On the same note, realize that the 2012-2014 era of confessional essays is over. Not
every single person online and in your personal life needs to know every single detail
about your life. Not only that, but they don’t even want to know. If you feel truly moved
to share your struggle in some part of your life hoping it will be therapeutic and help
another person going through it—amazing, please do that. But if you are just

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constantly telling people way more information than is appropriate to share, it might
seem as though you don’t understand healthy boundaries.

4. Keep Things Clean

This might seem really obvious, but it’s totally overlooked: People who have their shit
together have one really simple thing in common—they are always clean. They clean
themselves, their spaces, and their belongings. They take care of themselves, their
spaces, and their belongings. This doesn’t require much money and really only
minimal ePort. Keeping your life a little more tidy and organized will go a really long
way.

5. Assume What You Say in Private Is Actually Public

I’m not saying nobody is trustworthy, but we are all dealing with what I’m going to call
the “one person” phenomenon. Every single time you tell a secret or important
information to someone, if it’s interesting enough, they will tell their one person. Then
that person will their one person. Ultimately, what you tell one person is what you tell
everyone at the end of the day—so don’t say anything in private you do not want
repeated in public.

6. Minimize Drama
Instead of being someone who creates drama and issues, be someone who problem
solves and innovates with new ideas. Instead of creating more chaos around a
disagreement or issue, create a solution.

7. Talk About Things, Not Other People

Other people and their lives are not topics of conversation. This is a lazy way to forge
connection with others if you have nothing more important or interesting to discuss.
Ultimately, being a gossip isn’t a good look. It makes you seem vindictive and
judgmental. Find things to talk about that aren’t other people’s business. Your
relationships will be better for it.

8. Be Clear About Who You Are

For people to respect you, they Frst have to understand you, and that really begins
with your language and approach to explaining yourself, both online and in person. In
general, you should have a single sentence explanation that adequately sums up what
you do professionally and then another that sums up what you’re interested in

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personally. If you can’t sum it up easily, you’re assuming your life is too complex and
nuanced—but you’re achieving the opposite ePect than you desire because you’ll just
seem sort of lost.

9. Don’t Act Like an Authority When You’re Not

We do one another a disservice by insisting on answering immediately and impulsively
in conversations and arguments. This is not how brains work. This is also not how
intelligent people behave. Instead of spewing out whatever Frst comes to mind when
you’re questioned about something, pause, think about what you want to say, and
calmly express that you haven’t done enough research or hold enough expertise to
speak on it with authority, but you’d like to share your opinion or viewpoint. And what
isn’t in your authority? Anything you’re not an actual expert in or don’t have personal,
direct experience with. So most things you talk about—but that’s okay. The point is to
try to share opinions with one another to generate more conversation, not to convince
one other about what’s absolute fact.

10. Keep Your Composure

People who By oP the handle at every little thing do not seem strong and tough, they
seem weak and weak-willed. Anger is like gasoline when there’s some kind of friction
between people. It raises people’s defenses and pushes a resolution farther away. If
nobody else can manage it, be the person in the room who can keep their composure
and speak clearly and calmly.

11. Stop Complaining

Complaining isn’t venting. Venting is what you do when you need to get something oP
your chest. If you have to vent every single time you see one of your friends, there’s
something wrong. Otherwise, you’re just in the habit of complaining, and you need to
get out of it. It’s ungrateful and, a lot of the time, shortsighted. If you really think
about it, you have a lot more to appreciate than you have to stress about, but
emphasizing the latter will make your life seem worse than it is, and that’s not what
you want.

12. Have Principles

Principles are the rules and guidelines you use to govern and manage your life. If you
value relationships, prioritize them by principle. If you want to improve your self-care,
do it regularly by principle. No, you will not always want to wash your face, put on
moisturizer, or drink another glass of water when you need to. But if you succumb to

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your impulses all the time, you’ll end up a shell of the person you’re meant to be—all
because you don’t have principles.

13. Receive Help When You Need Help

Behaving as though you can do absolutely everything yourself limits you. When you
need help, you need help. Ask for it, receive it, and understand that it does not make
you less digniFed.

14. But Remember You’re Responsible for You

You are ultimately responsible for whatever experience of life you want to have. You
are responsible for your electric bill, for how well you keep up with current events, for
how you interact with others, for how well you do at work, and for how much you
sleep. You have to take an active role in your life, not a passive one. Don’t think and act
like life is just happening to you and you have to accept it. Start taking creative control.

15. Compliment Others

Your willingness to uplift others is a sign of real conFdence. People who are not happy
with themselves cannot be happy with others. And there’s even more beneFt to you
because the more you are willing to aGrm and love others, the more you are going to
see yourself with more love and appreciation. Remember, your relationships with
others are reBections of your greatest relationship—which is the one you have with
yourself.

16. Organize Your Paperwork, Clean Your Linens, and Know How
to Cook At Least One Meal
Absolutely no adult is beyond this.

17. Be Aware of Your Finances

If you don’t want to be the person who questions whether their card will be declined
somewhere, make sure you’re checking on your accounts before you actually go out
and spend money. You should know your debts, your incomes, and your goals. You
shouldn’t be in the dark about your Fnancial health.

18. Know Your Limits

Feed yourself when you’re hungry; rest when you’re tired; know how to gracefully bow
out of a social situation, relationship, house party or job when you need to. If you wait

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until you’ve passed your limits, you’re going to burn out and burn bridges at the same
time.

19. Stop Thinking Everyone’s Thinking About You—They’re Not

In the age of social media, so it’s easy to become victim to the spotlight complex, which
is the idea that everyone is thinking about you and evaluating your life decisions
frequently. They aren’t. Everyone is thinking about themselves all the time, in the
same way that you are thinking about yourself all the time. Those coincidences you’re
so sure mean everyone deeply cares about the intricacies of your life? It’s probably
conFrmation bias, your brain’s way of Fltering information to aGrm what it already
believes. The Frst step to being self-aware is recognizing that other people’s thoughts
do not revolve around you.

20. Keep It Simple

People who are able to simplify their lives come across as sophisticated. People who
complicate their lives do not. People who have their shit together are able to live
simply, to enjoy simple things, to show up as they are, and to sort through issues with
clarity.

Most importantly, remember that the point of getting your shit together is to make
your life easier and more enjoyable—not to impress anyone else. But like most
anything else, getting your shit together is a matter of faking it until you make it, and
this is the best place to start.

49K claps

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WRITTEN BY

Brianna Wiest
I write about how to use your
emotional intelligence.
instagram.com/briannawiest

Follow

ABOUT THIS ANTHOLOGY

Notes on
Changing
Your Life
Stories exploring the
whys and hows of habits,
selected by Medium’s
editors.

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of Microdosing LSD Harm reduction is a more Numbing
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