TLDR: Embracing what’s in front of you instead of what’s beyond you.
New York City has this way of making you feel as if standing still is a crime.
As if not moving forward means you’re moving backward.
Or if not getting the things you want means you’re not good enough.
On Friday, I was talking to a friend who is training to swim the English Channel, and I’m thinking ‘boy, my 2023 goals weren’t nearly big enough.’
We’ve crossed off 19 of 41 by the way, smashing the number of nephew visits with more than 4 months to go and publishing the book, but with 90 days to ski season, neither the house nor the Misogi challenge are in sight, and it’s clawing at me.
It has to be that nagging New York State of Mind.
Later, I meet up with friends and there happens to be an art curator in the group who was friends with Andy Warhol, which in classic New York fashion comes with stories and invites to Art Basel and Burning Man. I suppose that would get me closer to #20 and #21, but all I’m thinking is, Tim Ferriss might be right, but he certainly wasn’t talking about New Yorkers when he said:
Ninety-nine percent of people in the world are convinced they are incapable of achieving great things, so they aim for the mediocre. The level of competition is thus fiercest for the “realistic” goals, paradoxically making them the most time-and-energy consuming.
As compelling as that may be at the macro, it doesn’t account for the aperture of individuality.
It doesn’t account for The Hunger Games mentality of being surrounded by the fiercest competition for the most unrealistic goals.
He does goes on to make some good points about unreasonable and unrealistic goals being easier to achieve because of the adrenaline infusion that leads to the endurance required to accomplish them. It reminds me of topics we’ve discussed like what’s possible when failure is not an option, but it also has me wondering if simply surrounding yourself with ambition and gaming your own dopamine is enough to sustain the energy required to go the distance.
Maybe it was preference or possibly subconscious, but goal #22 was David Goggins’ new book Never Finished, which coincidentally is nearly done, and we’ll check that one off soon. Early in the books he says:
We have to learn to stop looking for a sign that the hard time will end. When the distance is unknown, it is even more critical that you stay locked in so the unknown factor doesn’t steal your focus. The end will come when it comes, and anticipation will only distract you from completing the task in front of you to the best of your ability.
Maybe it’s cliché to say ‘focus on the effort instead of the results,’ but maybe clichés exist for a reason. Or maybe the scoreboard is personal and how you define it for yourself is all that matters.
Either way you look at it, I think the key is not to confuse chasing your dreams with deciding to be happy. Both can be true if you embrace what’s in front of you instead of what’s beyond you.
See you Monday.