Hustle culture is lying to you. Here’s how to set yourself free.

Yesterday, I had a conversation with a new-old friend. She asked what I’m working on, and I found myself speaking my vision aloud for the first time.

As I rambled through my dream, I noticed how right it felt. My heart shined, ablaze with the certainty of my calling. And I realized that it’s time to share this with the world, not because it’s ready, but because the world is aching for it.

The lure of hustle culture

When I was a child, my parents taught me that the formula for success was to go to a good college, then go on to graduate school, collecting degrees like merit badges. Eventually, I’d get a job, most likely something academic, so I could continue to be a good little intellectual.

I went to a good college, but I didn’t go on to graduate school. Life had other plans for me. I spent a few years working for other people, then started my own business at the ripe old age of 24. I’ve been self-employed ever since, enduring a neverending series of highs and lows that had me white-knuckling through life like I was riding in the front car of a dilapidated roller coaster.

The academic life is well and good, I thought, but these days it’s all about hustle.

Hustle culture taught me that all I had to do was have a great idea and work 18 hours a day, forever. If I kept going, hard and fast and without a break, soon I would be swimming through a pile of gold coins like Scrooge McDuck.

Spoiler alert: that never happened.

Every new offer, every new business idea, every new marketing campaign brought meager results or failed outright. I read all the books and took all the courses and tried every approach there is: hiring employees, using freelancers, doing everything myself. And I talked a lot about how successful I was, even though I wasn’t.

Every high was followed by a low. Every business relationship faded or otherwise became unsustainable. I was doing the things the world told me to do, but instead of showering me with riches, it just demanded more and more. The ride got faster and faster.

All the while, my heart whispered not this. But I couldn’t hear her over the rush of caffeine and adrenaline through my veins.

Unsurprisingly, my body revolted. First fibromyalgia. Then cancer. Then infertility. My anxiety got so bad I couldn’t walk into a Walmart without having a panic attack. (Too many people.) I pushed through. I walked for charity. I showed up for every networking lunch. I redesigned my website. I endured.

There has to be a reward at the end of all this, my brain reasoned. Otherwise, why would everyone be doing it?

In our conversation yesterday, my friend said, “One of the best things about mid-life is that you’ve racked up enough life experience to know what you don’t want.”

She isn’t wrong.

The invisible track

Obviously some people who follow the hustle path are wildly successful, but most aren’t. It’s considered bad form to point that out. Because we’re all running around with a raging case of survivorship bias. We cling to the rags to riches stories:

  • Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team
  • Steve Jobs started Apple in his garage
  • Oprah Winfrey got fired from a Baltimore news desk

Yet the people who worked hard and didn’t make it? They’re invisible to us. And there are lot of them.

For so long, I thought there was something wrong with me. But,

What if it isn’t me. What if something’s wrong with the rules?

The rules of success, as our culture defines them, are an invisible track that your train cannot deviate from as long as you believe you’re one viral tik tok away from that pile of gold. Any minute now, you’ll pull into the station.

Or you won’t.

Are you sick of the invisible track? I’m here to suggest there’s another way. A way of authenticity. A way of honoring who you are.

The hard truth

Today I asked, what life would I allow myself to live if I decided that our cultural rules for success are not for me? Here’s what came up:

I would allow myself to live a life of wandering. A life of trust. A life of creation. A life in time with the seasons. A life of receptivity, where powerful, inspired thoughts and ideas flow through me into the world. A life connected with nature and all her bounty. A life of abundance, not of money, but of time. A life where I generously share my gifts and the food from my garden. A life of experiences shared with others. A life of expressing what’s real and true, authentically. A life of quiet power. A life of peace. A life where I know in my bones that the perfection of nature is in her imperfection. A life of love, discovery and wonder. A life of appreciation and peace.

Recently a different friend dared to suggest that I might not ever win the jackpot hustle culture promises us. “You’re meant to have just enough to support your dream,” she said. “And what you’re doing now isn’t it.”

Oh, I was so mad.

Of course I can win! Of course I will stumble on the key that unlocks life’s riches and grants me access to the rarified air of those whom society deems successful!

But now I understand. She wasn’t saying I’m doomed to fight for every nickel. She was saying the Universe will provide exactly what I need when I make my own rules. When I follow where my heart leads.

I am ready to receive, not the trappings of what our socieity calls success, but what my soul needs now.

While I have an inkling of what that might be, I will gratefully accept what the Universe sends, because I trust that whatever comes is exactly right.

The rules I’m ready to break

In order to reject hustle culture, you first need to understand how it works. Like Picasso said, “Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.”

Here’s are the rules I’m ready to break:

1. Control

  • Over bodies, time, choices, emotions, nature, and outcomes
  • Linear thinking: plans, rules, punishments, strict roles
  • Suppression of intuition, softness, and trust

2. Fear

  • Scarcity: never enough time, money, love, worth
  • Fear of punishment, rejection, failure, or being “too much”
  • Fear as a tool to keep people small and compliant

3. Hierarchy

  • Power over instead of power with
  • Worth assigned on the basis of status, productivity, wealth, or proximity to the top
  • Some lives valued more than others

4. Extraction

  • From the Earth, from bodies, from labor
  • Productivity over presence
  • Burnout as a badge of honor

5. Perfectionism

  • Be good. Be nice. Be useful. Be beautiful.
  • No room for mess, emotion, or becoming
  • Failure seen as shameful instead of necessary

6. Disconnection

  • From the body, from nature, from the divine feminine
  • From each other, competition instead of community
  • From cyclical time: no seasons, no rest

7. Dualism

  • Either/or thinking: good vs bad, right vs wrong, logic vs emotion, man vs woman
  • No nuance, no in-between, no spectrum
  • Divides instead of integrates

8. Domination

  • Of nature, of the feminine, of the unknown
  • Aggression masked as strength
  • Vulnerability shamed or weaponized

Maybe you’re thinking, “Oh no, Ann. This is a bad idea. If we didn’t live by the rules, society would fall apart. We’d be living like animals!

What, praytell, is wrong with that?

There is another way

The path I’m inviting you to choose is one of embracing the mystery:

  • Trust. Rest. Listen. Receive. Know.
  • Honor the rhythm of the seasons and the rhythm of your heart.
  • Share authentically. Live gracefully. Leave only your footprints.

We’ve all heard we should take inspired action. What we missed is that first we have to listen: to our heart, our soul, ourselves.

You say you can’t?

Hear me now. Every objection your mind raises is the internalized voice of a system that’s designed to keep you working, striving and hustling while you wait for your ship to come in.

  • I need to make money
  • I need to prove myself
  • I need to stay in control
  • I need to fix myself first

Lies.

It’s so hard to recognize that the voice intentionally misleads you. You need to believe it, because if you didn’t, it would mean you’ve spent all these years chasing the wrong thing.

What you don’t realize is that you’re living on a treadmill – running fast, exhausting yourself, but never getting anywhere.

It’s not because you’re wrong. It’s because the world is.

And you can step off that treadmill any time you choose.

Your turn

Before you go, take a deep breath. Put your hand on your heart and ask yourself:

  • If you let go of everything the world has taught you about success, what life would you allow yourself to live?
  • What would you release if you really trusted the Universe to provide the ideas, inspiration and heart-centered vision that will allow you to live authentically?
  • What becomes possible if success is redefined as peace?

If this post resonates with you, please subscribe. I’m building something cool over here and I think you’ll want to be a part of it.

And tell me about your experiences with all of this in the comments. I want to hear your story.