You Don’t Have to Be a Pick-Me

This reflection explores the pressure to be noticed in a crowded world—and the choice to resist urgency, embrace stillness, and trust that meaningful words will find the people who need them most.

Photo by Tuaans on Unsplash

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I just read Ann Handley’s newsletter about email and how AI filtering your inbox can be the deciding factor for whether your email gets read or not.

And suddenly I was thrown back to high school and the pick-me personalities we all knew. How much we battled each other in competition to stand out and be noticed and liked.

It’s no different now—and I’m 53.

Here we are in saturated markets, battling each other to get noticed: for jobs, for social media likes, for subscribers.

We all desperately want recognition and validation, financial security and stability, and to be valued and genuinely known.

I find myself stressing and struggling too.

I read her email and suddenly felt this urgency to hurry up and write more reflections, post more on LinkedIn, start new social media accounts, build a platform…

Hurry up. Hurry up. Hurry up.

AI is taking over, and you will soon be buried under known names with loyal subscribers and secure followings—silenced and unnoticed.

But then I came out of my worst-case-scenario daydream and challenged that.

Why am I doing any of this anyway? What is my heart motivation? What am I trying to accomplish?

And in that moment, I had to make a choice—to land in stillness and trust.

Jesus sought the one who got lost. He didn’t chase the ninety-nine.

I’m doing this to help myself process the wilderness season I am in.

I’m also doing this to be a source of encouragement for other caregivers who are finding the path they’re on to be bumpy and painful and long. This journey is difficult and conflicting and exhausting.

Over the years, I have realized that it’s ultimately God who directs your path—whether you believe that or not. Whether or not we are found or discovered or followed—and the timing of all of it—is determined by Him.

Not algorithms. Not chance.

God knows who needs me in their inbox. And He knows the timing.

My dad, in his sleep, often says, “Take your time. You don’t have to be in a rush.”

Jesus Himself was never in a hurry. He was steady. Methodical. Strategic.

He never lost sight of His end goal. And He never tried to speed up the process or accelerate the timing.

Be still and know.

So Ann, I hear you.

The aim is to be chosen. True.

But you don’t have to become a “pick me” person.

Wait.

Allow yourself—and your words—to be pursued.

Like a needle in a haystack. Like a hidden gem.

Standouts can still be found.

Natural seekers find by searching and digging and investigating.

They think for themselves—with and without AI.