Yes, guilty, are happy. Today, lost none of our number. All still here. Will not be here forever. But all here now.
~ George Saunders, from The Moron Factory
slip:4utema4.
This short story is written in a style that feels like text messaging. However, do not let that make you miss reading it.
É
I think freedom, ideally, is being able to choose your responsibilities. Not not having any responsibilities, but being able to choose which things you want to be responsible for.
~ Toni Morrison
slip:4a1518.
Maybe it’s the nature of the binary times that we’re in that makes it very, very difficult to applaud one thing without condemning another. I think we’re afraid to take a victory lap, and maybe we should be. Maybe that’s just a bit premature or arrogant.
~ Nick Gillespie, from Mike Rowe on Patriotism, Paul Harvey, and American Progress
slip:4uremi1.
The same question (can we applaud one thing without condeming other things?) arises with eulogies. I say we can. The key is to know and understand the broader context that we’reājust for a little whileāignoring.
É
The essence of professionalism is the focus upon the work and its demands, while we are doing it, to the exclusion of all else. The ancient Spartans schooled themselves to regard the enemy, any enemy, as nameless and faceless. In other words, they believed that if they did their work, no force on Earth could stand against them.
~ Steven Pressfield
slip:4a1517.
But what about self-forgiveness? Is it morally valuable, or just something we do to make ourselves feel better? And what is self-forgiveness, anyway?
~ Mordechai Gordon, from Self-forgiveness is more than self-comfort ā a philosopher explains
slip:4utese2.
This is one of those topics that I thought I understoodā¦ until I started reading more about it.
É
I will keep constant watch over myself andāmost usefullyāwill put each day up for review. For this is what makes life evilāthat none of us looks back upon our own lives. We reflect upon only that which we are about to do. And yet our plans for the future descend from the past.
~ Seneca
slip:4a1516.
And so Iāve been learning to find the complainer in myself, and bring love to him. This is transformative! It means itās OK for me to have complaint, to feel put upon, to not be happy or grateful. This is a permission to just be how I am right now ā which is sometimes full of complaint.
~ Leo Babauta, from Transforming Our Complaints into Something Generative
slip:4uzeco3.
Some days I really wish I could just let go of all this blogging shenanigans. But it does force me to do a lot of reading, and that means I’m periodically reminded to pay attention to what Babauta is saying.
É
The fact is one’s own voice is not heard anywhere else. It’s a challenge to be yourself. It makes a lot of courage.
~ Yusef Lateef
slip:4a1515.
What you realise, the moment you ask āwhat would it mean to be done for the day?ā, is that the answer canāt possibly involve doing all the things that need doing ā even though thatās the subconscious goal with which many of us approach life, driving ourselves crazy in the process. If there are a thousand things that need doing, youāre going to need to arrive at some definition of āfinishedā that doesnāt encompass them all.
~ Oliver Burkeman, from What would it mean to be done for the day?
slip:4ucabu1.
And defining “done” for the day is just the first step. How can I be done at the end of this week? ā¦month? I need to keep pulling back to larger timeframes to imagine: How do I ever stop having a, “the next thing I should do isā¦”?
É
Self employment, for me at least, is a never-ending contest between the world’s worst manager and the world’s laziest employee.
~ Daniel Akst
slip:4a1514.