Useless, Inadequate, and Still Trying

Every night, I spend time in bed with my two kids, talking about our day—the good parts and the bad. It’s a quiet moment we share before sleep, and often, something deeper comes out.

One night, my son told me he didn’t want to go to school anymore. When you hear that, you know something’s off. I asked him what happened. He explained that they were playing a game in gym class, with three players per team. He was on a team with his best friend and another boy—the most athletic kid in the class. He was excited at first, thinking he was on a strong team.

But my son isn’t very athletic. He’s a slower runner—something he likely inherited from me. During the game, the other team scored on them, and in frustration, his best friend told him he was “useless.” I guess the other two felt like they were the only ones really playing.

This cut deep. As you can imagine, this touches on one of Morgan’s biggest insecurities—and hearing it from his best friend only made it worse.

I told him that what his friend said wasn’t fair. He was upset about losing, and he made a mistake—but that doesn’t make him a bad person. Everyone is good at something. Running just isn’t his thing, and that’s okay. I reminded him that he’s an amazing artist, that he makes people laugh, that he’s incredibly generous—with his snacks and his time. He is not useless.

Ironically, that same day, I had been having a terrible day myself. I told him that I felt inadequate too—like maybe I should quit the project I’ve been working on. It’s not going how I imagined. Every step feels like climbing a steep, dangerous mountain. Problems seem to outnumber solutions. It’s overwhelming, and anxiety has been creeping in. I wasn’t sure it was worth it anymore.

Morgan sat up and asked me, “If you quit, can I quit too?”

I told him no. You can’t quit school just because you had a bad day, or because it gets hard.

And then he hit me with it: “It’s the same for you, Mom. You’re just having a bad day. You can’t quit just because it’s getting hard.”

There it was. The irony. It’s so much easier to give advice than to follow it ourselves. But he was right. I can’t quit—not yet.

Technically, he can’t quit school until he’s 18, by law. But I can quit my project any time. Still, I realized that if I gave up now, I’d be teaching both of us the wrong lesson.

That feeling of being useless or inadequate—it’s awful. And if you didn’t believe it, it wouldn’t hurt. The truth is, it hurts because part of me did believe it. I was at war with that inner critic, the one that whispers, “You’re not good enough.” And I had to fight back. I had to remind myself: I’m not an idiot. I can do hard things.

It’s such a delicate balance—being kind to yourself, while also pushing yourself to grow. Quitting is sometimes the easy way out, but what does that teach my kids? Or myself?

When you fail, you have to find a way to get back up. If you don’t, you’ll avoid anything hard ever again—and where’s the growth in that?

So I’m trying. Not to the point of burnout or self-loathing—but just enough to get past the hard part. Every few days, Morgan asks me, “Did you quit yet?”

I smile and say, “No. I’m still trying. It’s getting a little better every day.”

“Okay,” he says. “But remember, if you quit—I quit.”

Somehow, that’s enough to keep me going. Proving to that little boy that I can keep climbing, even when it’s tough, is all the motivation I need.