2025 Is My Year Of No-Chase — 'Better To Be Alone Than In Bad Company'
My time and my sanity are more important that chasing jobs and people not meant for me.
Getty | Unsplash Everyone has a New Year’s resolution or a set of goals they want to achieve. How aggressive we are with them tends to vary, but the idea of a “new year, new you” seems to be almost universal.
A lot of people have asked me what my goals are. One, in particular, tends to stand out among my full list. It’s a lesson I learned the hard way last year — only to have it bolstered by the end of the year with a proverbial booster shot.
2025 is the year I stop chasing people.
When I say everything, I mean it. My primary source of income collapsed. So I started desperately chasing a job, gigs on Upwork, and even sugar daddies. The more I chased, the worse it got.
Eventually, I lost my home and had to declare bankruptcy. At one point, I was even considering shutting down my Substack and Medium accounts. I didn’t even know what I wanted to do. I just figured I’d lay down and rot.
My love life also suffered. After being dropped like a hot potato on one of the most important days of my career, I wasn’t feeling hot. I tried to find a replacement guy to soothe my wounds, only to get stood up and breadcrumbed repeatedly.
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There was a certain point in my very recent life where I genuinely couldn't take any more rejection.
As I saw it, I didn’t know what people wanted anymore, but I did know it wasn’t me. Even if they did want me, I got fed up with being treated as an afterthought. I wanted, desperately, to be someone’s priority without demanding it or being let down.
Or really, I just wanted actual proof that I was enough. I call the letdowns of my career and my dates my Breaking Points.
After the Breaking Point in my career, I stopped trying to reach out to people for work. Sometime right before I got a job offer, my Substack blew up. I saw a massive deluge of new paid subscribers just as I was about to shut it down. I decided, “Okay, it stays up, I’ll work on myself.”
I made a quiet note to myself not to reach out to people who bailed on me with my publications. And then I quietly stopped applying for jobs on Upwork, because I stopped getting business on there that suited my needs.
I’m now squarely in the, “Reach out once, then never again. Don’t speak unless spoken to” slot in careers. I no longer pay money trying to get gigs on Upwork. It’s not worth the money and I won’t reinvest until I get an offer on there.
I’ve learned to take it as a sign that the universe doesn't want me to be Jane Everyguy. My income might be down for now, but the truth is that I’m happier.
After my breaking point in my social life, I stopped chasing people around.
After being stood up on dates with civilians where all I asked them to do was buy me a drink, I didn’t want to deal with that kind of hurt anymore.
My time and my sanity are important — more important than giving the whiny “Nice Guy” a chance. So, I barred anyone who wasn’t an actor, music star, manager, or sugar daddy from contacting me.
As I’ve told friends, my mantra is, “I don’t know what mainstream men want, but it ain’t me. That’s fine. I’d rather just not waste my time when it’s turning into a form of self-harm to do so.”
Much like with my work, I generally stopped speaking to people unless I was reached out to. It’s easier for my mental health.
In recent weeks, I’ve been loading up on stoic pep talks.
Stoicism is a philosophy that encourages people to master what they can change rather than what they can’t. It’s a philosophy that encourages people to stay silent, to walk away from others, and to not chase others.
The more I’ve walked away and looked into videos on how to emotionally distance yourself from things, the more Stoic philosophy has been ending up in my feed.
And you know what? I think the stoics of yore might be onto something. Silence keeps people guessing.
Silence is scary because it’s a feeling of emptiness that few other things can give. That’s why it’s such a powerful move to make.
If you’ve ever been ghosted or shunned, you know a person’s silence messes with your mind in a bad way. Silence and the willing absence of your person have a weird way of taking power back from people.
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In recent weeks, I’ve had people pop back out of the shadows to talk to me.
Some of them bailed on me when I tried to book dates with them. Others were former clients but weren’t good to me when we worked together because they didn’t offer feedback, didn’t pay me a living wage, or just used me as a punching bag.
Only a month ago, I would have been rolling on the ground trying to push things forward. However, I’m not the same person anymore. My two Breaking Points seemed to have made something change in me.
I’m tired of being the one bending over backward for everyone just for scraps — and frankly, it never seems to be appreciated. And honestly? The breadcrumbing behavior started to leave a bad taste in my mouth.
Getting those calls now feels a lot like wanting a specific toy as a Christmas present as a kid, having your parents give you a dog toy instead, and then getting it later in your 40s after your parents realized they needed a caretaker.
The gestures don’t hit the same when you don’t need them. It’s fake, cheap, and too little, too late. So, I told the people who kept making me do the “pick me” dance to leave me alone.
If they were not there when I needed them, I’m not there when they want me. I know who has been around me for the worst of it, and they’re the ones I will work with, tap for partnerships, and more.
I’ve always had to bend over backward for people — my parents, my classmates, my coworkers, my bosses. It never ended well for me and frankly, I’m tired.
I’m tired of reminding people that I deserve recognition for all I’ve done. I’m tired of having to explain to people that I have value. I’m tired of having to flag people down for things that often benefit them just as much as it benefits me.
So, I won’t. I know my value. If others don’t see it, that’s fine. It just means that I free up more time to work on the things that matter in my life — the relationships I care about, the things I build, and the things I need.
People know where I am. People know what I provide and what I’m about.
2025 is the year when my stoic side will come through, the year when I will become the priority of others.
As for my finances? You can’t put a price tag on self-respect. You also can’t put a price tag on the time you take back for yourself, which would have otherwise been wasted.
If you have to build yourself up by moving with family, getting on welfare, or signing up for a military career for the shelter perks, do it. As long as you have a roof over your head and food on the table, you have what you need to say no to bad treatment.
I’m going to quietly believe that the right people are going to show up when I need them. The wrong people have already proven their worth to me by treating me as an option rather than a priority.
What about my love life? I’m nonmonogamous by default, and both I and my husband have interests that require more than two people to do. Having people stand us up or treat us poorly, hurt. It was a letdown.
And you know what? We both agreed it was better to shelve those interests than to deal with the disrespect I got. Even if I was single, I think I’d stick to being alone rather than try to bother with the awful behavior of men I’ve tried to chat with.
As the Spanish say, “Better to be alone than in bad company.” Bad company will break you. Bad employers will break you. People constantly disrespecting you will break you. And if you break too many times, you might not be able to put yourself together again.
I might be broke this year, but I’d rather be broke than broken. I might be somewhat lonely in the area I live in, but I’d rather be lonely than hurt. And that’s the attitude I’m taking in 2025.
Here’s to 2025: the year when I recognize my value and let those who see it come to me.
Ossiana Tepfenhart is a writer whose work has been featured in Yahoo, BRIDES, Your Daily Dish, Newtheory Magazine, and others.