Your parents aren’t coming to save you. They’ve done that often enough. Or maybe never at all. Either way, they’re not coming now. You’re all grown. Maybe not grown up, but grown. They’ve got their own stuff to take care of.
Your best friend isn’t coming to save you. He’ll always love you, but he’s knee deep in the same shit you’re in. Work. Love. Health. Staying sane. You know, the usual. You should check in with him some time. But don’t expect him to save you.
Your boss is not coming to save you. Your boss is trying to cover her ass right now. She’s afraid she might get fired. She’s fighting hard to keep everyone on the team. She’s worried about you, but she has no time to save you.
Your high school teacher won’t come and save you. You were always her favorite, and that’s why she tried to equip you as best as she could. But the moment you tossed that hat in the air, you were out of her reach.
Your network is not going to save you. What does that even mean? Isn’t a network supposed to be just friends? How good are those contacts really? Are they just that? Contacts? Would you call them at 11 PM on a Friday? No, those people surely won’t save you.
Obama isn’t coming to save you. He already did his part. He played it well, didn’t he? We can be grateful for leaders like Obama. But they won’t come and save us. They can only do so much.
Your partner won’t come and save you. The last time they tried, they broke up with their ex, and that’s why now, they’re with you. You both agreed you wouldn’t. No more knight in shining armor crap. Just two people, driving in the same lane. Wasn’t that the deal? Honor it. Don’t force your partner to save you.
The news media aren’t here to save you. In fact, they couldn’t care less whether you live or die. The news media are here to exploit you. They sneak into your inbox and feeds, hoping to steal your attention. They throw nightmare headlines at you that’ll suck away your energy. Forget the news. The news will destroy you.
The internet won’t save you. There are some nice people on there. They send helpful things to your inbox. But they’ll also ask you for money. Yeah, they want more money too, just like you. Others aren’t so nice. They’ll also ask for money, but they’re not really helping. They just pretend to be your friend. You can’t live on the internet. It’s just a tool — and tools alone can’t save you.
Your college drinking gang won’t come to save you. God knows where they are. One in jail, one happily married, one on a yacht somewhere? That sounds about right. Unless you wanna have a drink, you probably needn’t pick up the phone. It was the drinking that bound you together. Not the saving each other. That was never part of the deal.
Your audience is not coming to save you. If you have one to begin with. Maybe it’s an audience of ten. They only follow you for your puns. They’re on Twitter for themselves, not for you. If you haven’t helped them with something big, why should they save you?
Your gym trainer will not save you. He’s mostly staring at your ass while hoping his influencer game picks up enough so he can get out of this dump. “Am I big enough to sell supplements yet?” “Yeah, yeah, do another 50 crunches.” By the way, those also won’t save you.
Your financial advisor won’t save you. In fact, he’s probably losing you money. Does he cost more than he earns? Index funds? Tech stocks? Really? You could’ve figured that out on your own. And yet, here he is, collecting his $2,000 fee. I wonder who he’s really advising.
No one is coming to save you — because that’s not how life works.
Naval spells it out clearly: “Doctors won’t make you healthy. Nutritionists won’t make you slim. Teachers won’t make you smart. Gurus won’t make you calm. Mentors won’t make you rich. Trainers won’t make you fit. Ultimately, you have to take responsibility. [You have to] save yourself.”
Every minute you spend wishing, waiting, hoping someone else will come and save you is a minute not spent saving yourself.
You’re the only one who can give you the gift of freedom.
Freedom from ignorance. Freedom from misery. Freedom from poverty, from sickness, from anxiety and judgment — even freedom from your own mind.
You have to do it. It has to be you. You have to own every single thing that happens in your life. The results you create. The curveballs life throws at you. The mess other people cause that you have to get out of. You must own it all.
You have to let go of people’s opinions. You have to let go of bad habits. You have to stop overspending, underworking, overeating, underestimating, overvaluing, or whatever else you’re doing too much of or too little for.
No one will do it for you. Not because you’re alone or because no one wants to help you or because the world is just a mean place. None of those things are true. No. No one will save you because no one else can.
You are the only one on this planet who can reach into the deepest depths of your soul and pull out every last spark of life that rests within it. You have to do it. It has to be you.
No one is coming to save you — and no one will have to if you save yourself.