Nobody sat you down and said "Stay small."

They didn't have to.

The expectations did it for them.

There are agreements running your life right now that you never actually made.

You didn't sign anything. Nobody asked for your consent.

But somewhere along the way, you accepted them. And now they're pulling you in directions you never chose.

Here's what I mean:

Your family expects you to be a certain kind of man. Stable. Predictable. Not too ambitious. Not too different.

Your friends expect you to stay at their level. Same habits. Same conversations. Same complaints.

Your coworkers expect you to play the game. Don't outshine. Don't rock the boat. Stay in your lane.

Your culture expects you to want the right things. House, car, vacation, retirement. The script.

None of these were agreements you consciously made.

But you're living by them like contracts.

Here's how invisible agreements become drag:

You have an idea. Something fires you up. A business. A project. A change.

And before you even start, you feel the pull.

"What will people think?"

"What will my wife say if I take a risk?"

"What will my friends say if I stop going out?"

"What will my family think if I do something different?"

That pull? Those are the invisible agreements. The unspoken expectations you've absorbed from everyone around you.

And they're heavy.

The worst part is you enforce them on yourself.

Nobody has to say anything. You've internalized the agreements so deeply that you police your own ambition.

You scale back before anyone can tell you to.

You play small before anyone can call you out.

You stay in the lane before anyone can question why you left.

The drag isn't coming from them anymore. It's coming from inside you—their voice in your head.

I had invisible agreements everywhere.

With my family: Be the stable one. Don't take risks.

With my friends: Stay relatable. Don't outgrow us.

With myself: Don't want too much. Don't be "that guy."

I was living a life designed by committee. A life shaped by everyone's expectations but my own.

The day I started breaking those agreements was terrifying. Some people didn't understand. Some people pushed back.

But for the first time, I was moving in a direction I actually chose.

Here's the exercise:

Write down the expectations you feel from the five most important relationships in your life.

Not what they've said. What you feel is expected.

Then ask: Did I agree to this?

If the answer is no, you just found drag.

And drag, once you see it, becomes a choice.

You can keep carrying it. Or you can set it down.

Done negotiating.

-Joel