Why “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” is bad advice.

The present day understanding of the phrase “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” is saying to try harder and make more effort.

It’s saying rely on you and only you; You don’t need any outside help.

Also, if you just try harder you will succeed or accomplish the thing.

It ultimately tells me that any failure or current struggle is a reflection of my lack of motivation, and desire and efforts to change or fix.

What are the consequences of believing “pull yourself up by your bootstraps”?

Feel worse

If we think we shouldn’t ask for help and that getting ahead or over something requires only more effort and motivation, we end up feeling worse when the situation requires something different. 

Only relying on you and not having help when you need it can leave you feeling overwhelmed, stressed, lonely, and burdened. We all have our limits of what we are able to accomplish, to say just “power-through” is not acknowledging that our bowl may already be overflowing. 

It also says because you have the emotional capacity that you should push forward and do it on your own. This is bull. I am an advocate of people having more ease. If you can bring in another person or access other resources on your journey, then do it. We cannot believe that if you have a little left in the tank you must drive it. It’s linked to the idea that you must always be useful or accomplish something. 

As well, we don’t just simply get over emotion because we decide it’s time to move on and “pull yourself up by your bootstraps.” This is so true when we think of mental health and the stigma of accessing help. There can be shame in feeling emotional pain or suffering, thinking we should just be able to deal. Many only get help for their emotional or mental health when they finally reach ‘crisis’. What if leaning on others sooner were more accepted?

Judgement

If we believe these things we might judge others who don’t do things on their own and ask for help. This doesn’t feel so good when you’re the person on the other side in relationship with you.

Then you end up judging yourself when you struggle to do it all on your own. You berate yourself for your lack of motivation, skills, perseverance, or whatever else. This ultimately impacts your self-esteem and how you see yourself overall.

Relationships

If we believe we should rely on ourselves and just try harder, we can end up keeping everything inside. We don’t share thoughts and experiences that are sensitive or vulnerable. Sharing is not only a way to process emotions and find release for your strong feelings, it is a way to connect with others. 

Our relationships can feel distant and disconnected if we don’t share vulnerable and personal things. Simply “getting over it” and keeping it in can make for a frustrating experience for your partner or others. They may see you in a low mood, irritable, or stressed, but your words are saying “I’m fine” because you’ve convinced yourself that maybe you are and even if you're not you don’t reach out.

You may be showing your partner that you aren’t a safe place to share either because they’re not getting the same thing back from you. OR you may be displaying the “judgement” we just spoke about. Their sharing, wanting to lean on you, or asking for help may feel very uncomfortable and lead you to dismissing and minimising their emotional stuff.

Pull yourself up by your bootstraps says “get over it”

It’s saying “get over it.” It’s sending the message:

That thing that keeps you up at night? Get over it. It’s not that big of a deal.

The deep feeling of emptiness and hopelessness? Get over it and suck it up.

That goal you didn’t reach that was really important to you? Get over it. Your feelings don’t matter.

Get over it is saying the emotions that you are feeling are either not valid or you shouldn’t still be feeling them (or both).

Firstly, having an emotional response to literally everything is normal.

The intensity of it and how long it persists varies though for so many reasons. What I know for sure is that believing that my emotions are meaningless or invalid, or trying to stuff feelings away only makes them persist longer, and increase pain and suffering. 

I’m a bit of a broken record on this topic, but: Ignoring feelings does not make them go away. They’ll just show up shape-shifted. They may end up presenting in feelings that are more socially accepted, like anger or aggression for men for example. That pain may surface as depression or anxiety. It can even have repercussions on your physical health. Long-term emotional suppression has impacts on our system. 

There are studies that tell us the more of certain childhood experiences leave you more risk you are for chronic disease for example. The take-away here is that if you don’t process your emotions and painful experiences, it has negative consequences. Pretending and pushing away feelings doesn’t work.

I’ll specify that pushing away feelings can be a short-term solution in certain situations. So I’m not talking about putting aside upset feelings about the fight you had with your spouse so you can take a work call. That’s fine. This is about persistently how you interact with your emotions.

Simplifying complex problems

By believing we should only rely on ourselves, get over it, and try harder, we are not acknowledging the very real complex barriers to reaching our goals. 

You may want to be over the loss of your dog for example, but you're not. And if you’re not, that’s normal and okay and there may be steps to get there, but it’s certainly not keeping it all inside and pretending everything is okay. Because that’s what it is, it’s pretending. You say you're “pulling ourselves up by your bootstraps,” but you’re really just tucking away your feelings to manifest in some other way or setting yourself up for feeling worse when you realise you didn’t in fact get over it.

We are interdependent people. If you believe we are not, then you cannot see how others are intertwined with you overcoming and getting ahead. For example, I rely on you to stop at a red light in order to feel and be safe. All aspects of our lives are set up this way. There may be ways that others are actually helping you and allowing you to perceive yourself as relying on only you and that only your strong efforts lead to your success. 

Importantly, we all have capacity. Capacity is based on so many factors: Current mood, available time, other priorities, and current physical state including fatigue, hunger, illness. Perseverance and effort does not give us more capacity when we don’t have it. If your tank is empty then it is. 

There may also be barriers that we cannot have influence. We must accept this. You don’t just get over your mental illness for example by trying harder. You don’t just get out of financial difficulty as a single parent with no care by working 24.7. It is so much more complicated.

Why do we need to make things harder than they need to be?

Purposeful struggle and making things hard is not something to strive for or be proud of. Some people struggle because they genuinely don’t have the resources to make their hurdles less burdensome. If you have people in your life or other resources that you can lean on or just bring along for the ride, then practise ease and be grateful you have relationships and community.

Ultimately, let’s stop believing and putting this idea or advice on ourselves and others. Sometimes you can’t get over it when you want or the thing you didn’t accomplish wasn’t because of lack of effort.

Check out this article if you want to learn about the real origin of the phrase, that actually meant something different.

Why The Phrase 'Pull Yourself Up By Your Bootstraps' Is Nonsense | HuffPost Entertainment

Disclaimer: This is general advice. Like all self-help information, it is not personal and tailored to fit for all people and situations. This content should not be taken as a substitute for individual mental health or relationship support.