Thank you for choosing to exist. Your life comes pre-installed with Potential, a powerful feature that, if activated, may lead to growth, achievement and people asking you to do more things for the same money.
This manual will show you how to keep it switched off. Most owners need no instructions. You’re a natural.
Section 1: What’s in the Box
- 1 x Potential (unopened, gathering dust, losing value)
- 1 x Talent you noticed at age eleven and haven’t mentioned since
- 1 x School report reading “could do better if applied himself/herself” (he/she did not)
- 1 x Online course, 4% complete, renewing annually
- 1 x Guitar, decorative, out of tune since the previous decade
If any components are missing, don’t look for them. You won’t anyway.
Section 2: Safety Warnings
Potential can activate without warning. Common triggers:
- A documentary about someone who started a business in their garage. You have a garage. It contains a bike you will never ride.
- A second glass of wine and a notepad.
- January.
- Any sentence beginning “You know what, I should really…”
If you feel a sudden urge to “finally write that book”, lie down. Open a streaming service. The urge will pass within 20 minutes or one episode. So will the year.
Your potential is like a gym membership. It’s comforting to know it’s there. It’s also quietly taking money out every month.
Section 3: Standard Operating Procedure
Step 1: Research indefinitely
Before starting anything, learn everything about it. Watch 40 videos on starting a podcast. Compare microphones. Read three forum threads from 2013, written by people who have since given up too. By the time you’re fully informed, podcasts will be over. So will your thirties.
Step 2: Wait for the right time
The right time is after the holidays. Then after your birthday. Then after things “calm down at work”, a phrase never once followed by things calming down at work. The loop is self-sustaining. It runs until you don’t.
Step 3: Buy the equipment
Buying equipment feels exactly like doing the thing, without the doing. A pair of running shoes is 80% of a marathon, emotionally. Keep them in the box. They’ll stay new forever. Your knees won’t.
Step 4: Tell people about it
Announce your plan to friends. Their encouragement releases the same chemical as achievement, so you no longer need to achieve. They’ll stop asking within a month. They’ve seen this before. They’ve seen you before.
Section 4: Troubleshooting
Problem: Someone says “you’re so talented, you should do something with that.”
Solution: Laugh modestly. Change the subject to their kitchen extension. They have a kitchen extension because they did something with theirs.
Problem: You accidentally became good at something.
Solution: Immediately take up a hobby you’re bad at. Mediocrity is restored. It was always going to win.
Problem: A school friend just got promoted and posted about it.
Solution: Like it. Lie on the floor. Make toast. The friend is now your manager’s manager in a parallel universe and, increasingly, in this one.
Problem: You’ve started something and it’s going well.
Solution: Reorganise your desk. The momentum will pass. It always does. That’s how you got here.
Section 5: Warranty
Your Potential is guaranteed to remain in mint, unused condition for the lifetime of the owner. Unlike your knees, it will never wear out, because it has never been taken anywhere.
Misuse, including “trying”, “starting” and “just seeing how it goes”, may void the warranty and result in accidental success. The manufacturer accepts no liability for personal growth. The manufacturer is also not hiring.
Section 6: Disposal
Potential cannot be thrown away. It lives in the back of your mind like an unopened letter from the tax office, clearing its throat at 3am.
You can ignore it for decades. And one day, aged 74, you’ll pick up the guitar. It will still be out of tune. You’ll put it down. Your grandchildren will sell it online, listed as “barely used”. Accurate. Like you.