So you know how you have dreams of being a  fire-baller-ani-sci-presi-bus-amagician-avior? But it’s so hard and you just don’t want to put that kind of effort in? And so therefore you are a lazy McLazerson who can never do anything?

Yeah… No… It’s not lazy to not try to do something ridiculously hard, it’s just normal.   People avoid doing ridiculously hard things all time time because they have other things they’d rather be doing. Why shoot for the stars when you could watch TV? And why go climb every mountain and ford every stream when you could sit on the couch and eat ice cream sundaes?

If you don’t want to do something because it takes a ton of work, then that’s fine. Since you’re depressed, you probably have a decent amount on your plate to start with, so even taking care of the day-to-day is pretty fucking great. And you should get to feel productive from checking anything off the list. Anything at all.

Chasing after the hard stuff or being all special is impressive and shit. It means you’re taking extra effort to get what you want out of life. Keyword: extra. Plenty of people take the easy way and live perfectly contented lives. The road that is more travelled by is better worn, and you can follow in the footsteps of those that preceded you.

Now, if you want to do better than just taking care of things, then that’s great. Go for it. The point is that you’re not lazy if you choose to just live your life and take care of your primary responsibilities. It’s okay to meet baseline expectations, and avoid holding yourself to ones that are unfairly high. By giving yourself credit for fulfilling your day-to-day responsibilities you can avoid that whole rationalization thing. There’s no need to explain or excuse your being content with putting in an average amount of work.

So go ahead and be a lazy McLazerson. If it means that you get to take care of your life and get through the survival stuff, then there’s nothing wrong with that. And if you want more after you’ve gotten the basic shit down, then that’s a bonus. You can grow your passion, energy, and drive to experiment and explore life as you get better at keeping your depression in check. Then you can unleash it on the world and go beyond the basic to achieve your larger goals.