Confessions of a Type-A Girlie: Are We Actually Living, or Just Postponing Our Happiness?

The Efficiency Trap: When Productivity Becomes a Disguise for Postponing Your Life

Does anyone else find themselves falling into an endless pit of productivity and putting things off? I’ve noticed about myself is that I will put things off to the point where I am no longer even living. I keep postponing and postponing. And the thing is, it’s not coming from a place of procrastination but rather from a point of being super driven, super ambitious, and highly goals-orientated.

But the chase gets exhausting. I found myself asking 'What is wrong with me?'. I love that I am driven but when does it end. It feels like I am constantly spinning my wheels but never ever arriving, a stationery bike. So I did some light research. It turns out I have a strong sense of logic and a strict inner rulebook. I always feel like, lets say I have a list of five things I’ve identified and would like to accomplish, my type A planning brain will search for the most logical way to complete the five steps, and once it is locked in, it must be done in that exact order. I must complete one task before I can allow myself to move on to the next. Is anyone else like that? I am wondering so badly if anyone else feels the inside of their intestines grate when they try to deviate from the plan. And this is not limited to the simple things but the grand art of living, I must become a financial success before I can even think of igniting my dating life, for example. When I was younger, I was a massive planner. Now, I’m all about action and moving forward, slowly leaning to balance this rigid mindset.

Earliest Childhood Example and Realisation: The Little Perfectionist

There is a story from my childhood that has always stuck with me. One day, my younger brother, and I were spring cleaning the house. In my head, the goal was to get things done. My brother and I were both kids at the time, but he was younger than me, the baby, which meant I was in charge. So we were going about the jolly morning cleaning to some music. Then at some point he said to me, 'Sis, I’m tired, lets take a break'. But me? Soldier in line of duty, never back down never surrender! Haha. I was like, Let’s go, boy! We’ve got to keep pushing. We’ve got to get this toilet clean, we’ve got to scrub those windows down. Then we will rest after. I was so laser-focused on the goal. And when all was said and done, it was mission accomplished, our chores were done for the day and the house was sparkling. Which was great. However, I distinctly remember looking at him and seeing the sheer exhaustion in his face. I could see the hunger. After being blinded by productivity, only when we were done did I realise that I needed to get some rest and food into the little guy.

And then the guilt set in, I felt so bad. I felt terrible, because it was almost like I had neglected a basic human need all so that we could get the job done. It wasn't from a malicious place at all; it was just so natural for me to want to finish the job before moving on to anything else. And granted, I was just a lil kid who knew nothing. My brother had lunch and hot some rest but I had learnt something that day. As a perfectionist, I ended up putting the goal before basic human needs. And in that mindset, happiness comes last. You hustle, you grind, you do what you need to do, and the good things, the things the soul actually needs, fall to the very end of the line. I had become aware of the tendency I had to put off the little things that are important, in the name of getting the big thing before me in that moment done. Little did I know how much this habit would pour into my adulthood.

Adulthood and The Perfect Conditions Illusion

As an adult, I push out enjoying my life in order to hit a certain goal. I don't allow myself to experience certain things until a prerequisite task is complete. A simple example that I’ve gotten way better at, thank God, is reading a novel. I used to observe this with my sister when we were younger. She was a super quick reader, but she would literally skip through the pages or jump straight to the end just because she wanted to see how the book wrapped up.Oh my word, that would drive me nuts. It triggered my inner OCD. Seeing her do that felt like looking at pure chaos on display. Because my rule is: I need to read the book word-for-word. Every single word. I cannot skip a thing, and I need to get to the end sequentially. DNF (Did Not Finish) was simply not in my vocabulary. Why would you not finish a book? Again, that rigid, goal-driven mindset.

Don't get me wrong, this trait has serves it's purpose. It helps you become a person who accomplishes things. You end up living a pretty normal, comfortable, successful life. But you also end up missing out on a massive measure of life itself. Take corporate, for example. Being an overachiever is exactly what landed me a big corporate girl job. I have been very blessed and privileged in my career, but if you know corporate, you know it's demands can come with anxiety, stress, and pressure. You have to be incredibly strong. And as an over-achiever who tries to do everything and be everything at once, at some point, the pressure that you cause in your own mind based on your high standards can cause you to crash.

And being driven by logic rules was starting to take its toll. I would say 'work is my priority right now', and into neglect when it came to cleaning my house. Because if I can only do x or y...one of them must suffer, when in reality, life is not black or white. Its a picture, an array of beautiful colors.

Hiding Behind Productivity

So I mentally developed these blocks from living my best life due to logic sequence rules like I will deep clean my house when I am not stressed, when what would be helpful was 10 minutes of tidying up a day to prefent a huge overwhelming clutter later. Another rule, I will date when I am successful in my career, which is not necessary right, many couples grow an empire together, you don't just wait to get rich before allowing yourself to date because that limits the life experience. Another rule, after I had gained the freshmen 15 and the corporate 10, the weight gain came with deep insecurities, and the rules started to sound like, I will wear the clothes I want only once I have lost the weight. What did that mean, postponing living my life some more. No sleeveless tops. No tank tops. No bikinis.

There were summer days when the temperature was scorching hot, and there I was, wearing a jersey, a pullover, or a hoodie. Even a long-sleeve top felt uncomfortable because it contoured my body, and I was terrified people would see my big arms. My friends would be wearing the most beautiful, free-flowing dresses, people on the beach would be living their best lives, and I was stuck in winter wear in the middle of summer.I spent five years trying to lose that weight, eating healthy, going to the gym. I only finally dropped it in my sixth year of trying (and honestly, I look incredibly hot right now, so I’ll definitely drop a separate blog and video on how I navigated that for my girlies!). But looking back, that was five years of wearing heavy clothes in the heat. Five years of missing out on free-flowing, joyful summers because I was holding onto fear. I would look at a friend who was maybe five pounds heavier than me and think, Wow, she looks amazing. I looked up to them because they looked great. But when it came to myself? I had such a harsh, rigid standard. Flexibility was completely unacceptable.

So I kept putting things off. No dating til wealthy, no nice clothes til hot, no clean house if I had a stressful workday. While the reality is, these things can coexist and we do not need to hold off one for the other. The truth is, sometimes, we aren't putting things off because of a logical sequence. Sometimes, we are pursuing a goal purely to avoid a specific pain. We hide beneath the goal and call it productivity. For example, I put off wearing nice clothes after gaining weight because I was hiding behind body insecurity. The exact same thing happened with dating. Around the same time, I had been single for over five years.My friends would ask me about it all the time, and my go-to response was always, 'Girl, I just really like my presence. I like being alone. And while I do love my peace'. When in reality, I was afraid of being vulnerable.

So, what did I do? I swept it under the rug. I put it under the guise of productivity. And I stuck to my excuses: I am working on my finances right now. I need to get the money, I need to get the bag. Once I am financially comfortable, then I will start dating. But like I had said, people build wealth together every single day. People build entire lives from scratch together. Why did it have to be different for me?

Moving the Goalposts

I have all these incredibly complicated rules for myself, right down to the smallest habits. We attach our goals to our joy, and in doing so, we put off living. The more we keep doing this, the more we risk waking up one day realizing we haven't actually lived our own lives. I was listening to Mel Robbins the other day and she mentioned it as well. This idea of delayed living and delaying the joy of life. Eventually, you’re going to find yourself at 83 years old, realizing you spent your entire existence chasing massive goals that did nothing but distract you from the things that truly mattered.

If you are a Type-A, high-achieving, go-go-go person, it is terrifying to realize that the goalposts will always move. There will always be something new to work on, another milestone to hit, another insecurity to fix. I'm still figuring it out to, but what matters is that I am now intentional to live my life. Learning how to balance being naturally driven without using that drive as a disguise to avoid the things that matter. Learning how to slow down.

But if you're reading this and you are anything like me, the fact that you have identified these patterns is a huge initiation. first step to overcoming any pattern is identifying it. Once you name it, you have a problem statement, and you can begin to work on those solutions.

I just want to write this out so that anyone else trapped in this cycle feels seen and heard. You are not alone. A lot of us are suffering from perfectionism, even if you didn't know thats what it was, in our own way. It is time we start living our lives to the fullest in the everyday spaces, not making happiness a final destination, but making it a massive part of the journey.

As always on this glow-up journey, I leave you with a tool for your own journey as you to expand your mind as you level up. I create monthly ebooks and audiobooks, pouring into them genuinely to help others with some targeted learning. Because the more you expose yourself to something, the more you become it. And eventually, you wake up one day as your highest, hottest self.

🤍 Here is the link to this week's ebook: https://safehavencornerstudio.com/how-to-be-yourself-again-guide

💛 Audiobook for the listeners : https://safehavencornerstudio.com/the-audio-deepdive-how-to-be-yourself-again-

🧡 Chitchatting and unpacking on YouTube : https://youtu.be/17eDLH1fopw

TTFN, ta ta for now.

Haven ✨️ in

Connect

Join the journey toward balance and healing.

Email

safehavenstudio.co@gmail.com

© 2025. All rights reserved.