i’ve been locked in since the womb
my thoughts on the great lock in of 2025
What a time to be alive. I love social media. I love trends. I love TikTok. I love the fact that we live in a world where, on a random night in August, this notion of the “Great Lock In” was born. No context. No backstory. No long explanatory video. Just a trend that half of the internet has now tuned into.
If you don’t know what the Great Lock-in of 2025 is, then where have you been? I bet you’re one of those social media hermits. You think you’re better than us because you don’t doom scroll or because your screentime is less than 37 minutes a day.
Essentially, the Great Lock-In is a call. An awakening. A pledge to spend the last 4 months of the year (September - December) bettering oneself or improving one's current situation. Just “locking in” and fully focusing on the goals or aspirations you want to achieve. This is particularly beneficial as we draw closer to the end of the year. A time when we are starkly reminded of the goals we set on January 1st, and how dangerously far some have fallen from the beaten path.
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The Great Lock-In is a Great Equaliser. A chance to catch up on 8 months of missed opportunities and realign yourself with the person you envisioned you would be by this time of the year. I don’t know how we’ve managed to rebrand the “winter arc”, but here we are. Sound great, right?
If I‘m being honest, I’m not sure I’m fully sold on the idea. I’m not sure I’m the biggest fan of the way we’re conceptualising The Great Lock In (even though I’m participating in it). This post isn’t pushing forward an anti-Great Lock-in agenda. I’m not the fun police. This post isn’t “5 ways to stay consistent in the Great Lock In” or “Why the Great Lock In won’t help you reach your goals…here’s what will.”
What I would say is this: I don’t think many of us need to participate in the Great Lock-In.
Summer has just come and gone. The character flaws and woeful decisions that come with 25+°C weather and eerie sounds of the ice cream van are still enthralled in our memory:
Monzo saving accounts that are collecting dust due to transfers to pay for overpriced Shoreditch brunches and underwhelming day parties
Missed calls from your personal trainer because they saw you in the back of a TikToker’s day in the life video, eating all types of filth
The Duolingo bird misses its favourite egg and wonders why you’ve given up your daily Portuguese lessons.
Recency bias is a crazy thing. Last month’s mistakes will have you thinking that you are in a deficit when it comes to your goals. It will have you believing that if you don’t force yourself to regain the miles you lost over the summer, then truly it’s been a bad year.
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You’ve been grinding hard for most of the year. Even if not towards your goals, you’ve been frantically treading water to stay afloat. You may not have been locking in, but you haven’t been locking out. Okay, that was cheesy and poor from me, but you get my drift.
Our society’s hyper fixation on making up for lost time will have us all hurting ourselves to restore us to a position we were already in
I get the notion. But my issue with it is that it relies on sentimentalism and not facts. Data. Truth. Truth is, many of us have been locked in this year. But all we remember are the moments of not going to the gym, not saving our money, and not taking our new hobby seriously. We don’t remember the new PBs, the decreased monthly expenditure, and the improvements we’ve made in said miscellaneous activity.
I’m not going to hate the version of me that carried me over the line to September. Who bore those long January nights, pushed through those gloomy March days, and kept going when I wasn’t feeling like Floyd in this May weather. That guy deserves some credit too. Sometimes we muddy our dreams so much that they become nightmares. The Lock In is great, but in the words of Rita, “I’ve been locking in since I was in the womb”.
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As I Grow Older, I’m not rushing to play “catch up” with my goals. I’m spending time taking stock of how far I’ve come, as well as chasing my targets.
Regardless of all I’ve said in this post, I really love the concept of the Great Lock In. I’m even doing it. But I’m not going to beat myself up over the past 8 months. Am I going to hone in on my goals? Yes. But let’s not allow revisionism to discredit all the work we have already put in this year. Have some fun. Go easy on yourself.
But those are just my thoughts.
Love, Peace & Blessings,
Abs