500 Words a Week - Favourite Blogs from 2023
After going back through the blog posts for the year, below are some of my favourite.
Does this help me?
I’ve been having some battles with self-esteem recently. Feelings of not being good enough. Feelings of never amounting to anything or never doing good work. The thing about some of these thoughts are that they tend to spiral into each other.
One thing I’ve come across that has shed a little light into these feelings, is the question “does this help me?” The answer in always no, and it sometimes helps me let these thoughts drift away.
Many of us experience thoughts like this. Due to this we may look to gain some form of self-esteem or self-worth from other areas. For me it’s my job, for others in may be sport or hobbies. I have attached what and who I am to my job. Rather than my job just being a small part of me. I have attached my sense of self-worth to my job. The unfortunate part of this is when the job doesn’t go well, you feel worthless. When something is challenged, you feel challenged. There is a certain amount of dissonance that needs to be put in-between us and our work. We need to realise it’s not the only place we can derive a sense of meaning from, a sense of worth from.
A Lion Trackers Guide to Life
“I don’t know where I’m going but I know exactly how to get there”. – Boyd Varty
One of the biggest things I’ve been battling with is uncertainty. What do the next 3 years, 5 years, 10 years look like? We can get endlessly bogged down in contemplating the future, that we are completely unaware of the present slipping through our fingertips. We’ve been constantly told that we must have our path figured out. That we must know all our next steps. Whereas the quote above speaks to the process of discovery over outcome. We don’t need to know our final destination. What we do need to do, is become attuned and aware to that which is happening around right here and now. We are constantly looking for signs to guide us. These signs we are looking for, are centring around what brings us joy and energy, what invigorates us, what are we passionate about. We then follow these signs, and these paths. We see where they lead us to. We are continuously open to exploring where our curiosity takes us.
Giving the worst of ourselves to the most important people.
“If there were a recipe for accumulated disaster, it would be giving the best of ourselves to the least important things and the worst of ourselves to the most important things.” – Shane Parrish
Unfortunately, Shane’s right. Far too often do we give the best version of ourselves to those or the things of the least importance. Then we have nothing left to give to those who we really need to be there for. While referring to people as least important might seem harsh, in many circumstances it may be true. Think to the people from your past the above applies to, when you went above and beyond to give the best version of yourself to someone. Are they still in your life now?
Are we being pushed to the side?
“Something is pushing them
To the side of their own lives.”
- “Afternoons” by Philip Larkin
If we live our life on autopilot, going through the day-to-day motions then I do believe we are being pushed to the side. When we aren’t conscious of what’s happening to us and aren’t aware of how each decision we make impacts our circumstances, then we are being pushed to the side. If we play the part of the innocent bystander, allowing everything to be dictated to us, we are being pushed to the side. Which then is accompanied by feelings of angst, of no control, of despair.
Rather, if we control our outlook, if we are conscious and aware of what we are doing and understand how the decisions we make on a daily basis affect our lives far more than we realise. We begin to become more in control. We begin to be in the centre frame.
What if we never figure it out?
“It turns out my really big problem was thinking I might one day get rid of all my problems, when the truth is that there's no escaping the mucky, malodorous compost-heap of this reality.” – Oliver Burkeman
Oliver discuss’ how our many pursuits to become better people, fitter and healthier, more productive or organised have actually make this problem worse. As it’s impossible to pursue any element of personal change without the thought that upon completing the change you will transform yourself into the person you want to be.
However, the problem with the above, is that it detracts from the quality of life we are experiencing now. When we are constantly envisioning the future, we forget what’s in front of us. We believe that in this hypothetical future, all our problems will be solved, we believe we will have all the answers to the questions that plague us. Yet, we forget that in some form or another we will always have problems, we will always have questions.
