If you feel the urge to brag after doing something, you did it for the wrong reasons.
Going to Paris to post pictures of the Eiffel Tower, Mona Lisa, and Crossaints on the Seine isn’t for you. It’s for other people. You're seeking external validation through doing "cool stuff."
Going to Paris to enjoy yourself, learn, and experience something new is for yourself. Experiencing different food, music, art, people, perspectives and ways of life teaches you more about the world, other people, and yourself. That is for internal satisfaction and development.
When you start doing things purely for yourself, perspective begins to shift. You actually do the things you want and become more content. Whatever you're doing doesn’t have to look cool. You just have to enjoy it. If you want to sit in a park all day and read, you just do it.
Status games are detrimental to being consistently content. They distract us from what we care about, and instead make us fit into the mold of what others care about. A recipe for never being or having enough.
Awareness is the key to being free from the status game. Being aware it’s a game, and you don’t have to play it. The irony of it all is that no one will miss you if you no longer play. They’ll be too busy worrying about their own status to notice.
Of course it is good and well to tell people what you’ve been up to, showing friends, family, and colleagues pictures and telling stories of what you’ve done. But next time you are about to post something unsolicited on social media or tell someone what you’ve been doing with the purpose of feeling good about yourself… think, did I do it for the right reason?
Once you start doing things for the right reasons, you no longer need to brag. You become content and secure with who you are and what you do with your time.
Internal satisfaction is the ultimate brag, and you don’t need to tell anyone to feel it.
*Reminder, these are notes to myself. I’m not telling anyone else what to do or how to live. I’ve fallen into this trap before and this is a reminder to myself that the status game is not one worth playing.