Why I'm Saying No To The Cynics
Resolutions, Promises & the Future
“The beauty of beginner mind is the quality of the experience of wonder, of gratitude, of joy in all that is and all that is to come.” - Shellen Lubin
The idea of the beginner mind is so simple and yet so difficult to achieve.
It’s an idea that comes from Buddhism. It’s not new to me, it just hit me differently this year because I started making some changes in my life.
I started a new job, I took my YouTube channel in a different direction and started writing this newsletter among other things.
I still feel like a beginner - in many areas of my life. Rather than allowing this to make me feel insecure I am actually enjoying being a beginner again. it is easier to feel wonder, gratitude and joy when you approach things with the mindset of a beginner and this is something which I will continue to cultivate.
Isn’t this a bit cliche?!
Resolutions are something which I usually roll my eyes at. Hundred of thousands of people make resolutions every year and most people never stick to them.
But this year I thought why not ignore the cynics and give it a go.
One of the reasons for this is that recently the algorithms keep recommending me information related to the regrets of the dying. I’ve no idea why this is but I do think it’s a useful framework for setting resolutions and has in part inspired this letter.
So, my resolutions are to:
Deprioritise my career - Free up more time & energy for other areas of my life.
Be true to myself - Live life on my own terms.
Write everyday - Improve thinking & work out what I really want.
1. Deprioritise work
Success is your kids wanting to spend time with you when you are an adult.
It is so easy to get caught up in work. Especialy if you have a big project or take on new responsitbilities it can really sap your energy. So much so that you don’t have anything left for your own personal relationships outside of work. This can be the case if you are self employed or run a business it’s not just a problem that employees face.
Bonnie ware, the Australian nurse who wrote about her experiences working in palliative care found that a repeated regret of the dying was that they worked too hard and neglected their own personal relationships.
If you think back over the past year it’s probably not “going to work everyday” that stands out but maybe an adventure that you took with your friends, or a birthday party or a wedding or a swim in the sea.
This regret is something that I want to avoid at all costs.
There’s a lot of power in imagining your nightmare future and taking steps to make sure that never becomes a reality.
By “deprioritise” I mean things like taking time off when it suits me - not going to extra out of work hours events and finding ways to reduce the amount of time I spend thinking about my career.
A couple of weeks ago there was a training at work scheduled to start an hour earlier than usual work hours. Initially I accepted it automatically while grumbling to myself about more overtime.
But then I thought this will be recorded virtually anyway and i can just check it when there’s a lull at work during the day.
This might seem pretty inconsequential but it was a huge step for me. I am highly conciencous. Being reliable, being someone who follows through and is always there is built into my identity.
So saying no even when all my collegaues said yes was painful.
Humans survive on the conceptual level and it might sound dramatic but a little part of me died through this decision.
It will take many more of these tiny decisions for me to get comfortable with deprioritising work and I'm excited to see where this will lead to.
2. Be true to yourself
Thinking and acting in ways that align with your own values and feelings—rather than the values of others.
This is very hard to articulate - and even harder to set as a resolution.
I think it’s so difficult because values and feelings change with time. I value time infintely more now than I did when i was 15 years old. Which is another reason for me to deprioritse work
You are not the same person at 20 as you are at 30 or 40 and so being true to yourself will change over time. It’s very easy to loose track of how these things have changed.
As I said in some of my previous letters I used to value discipline, I tried to impose my will on the world with a lot of force and effort. That doesn’t work for me anymore. The older I get the more I find that I have to let go.
“Those who flow as life flows know they need no other force” - Lao Tze
Another huge regret of the dying is that they were not true to themselves and did not live a life on their own terms.
I think we all know this on a fundamental level and yet so few of us are consistently true to ourselves.
This sounds so easy and yet i think it is something that almost all of us struggle with. It’s not easy to be yourself, it’s a question that we need to be reminded of constantly - is this really what I want? Am I doing this thing because I want to or because I think I should want to or because someone else wants it?
“Between the banks of pain and pleasure the river of life flows. It is only when the mind refuses to flow with life, and gets stuck at the banks, that it becomes a problem” - SRI Nisargadatta Mahaaraj
I recently recieved a call from my brother who was very keen to talk about the next steps to take with my aging parents. It’s not something I had not spent much time thinking about before but it helps to put things into perspective.
They are my strongest link to the UK - the country in which I grew up in - and I imagine that when they are gone I may feel a great sense of loss. Not just for them but for everything which they represent for me.
So be true to yourself, think about what you want and take steps to achieve that.
3. Write every day
Become a collector of good ideas.
This unlike the other two is a concrete actionable habit that i have started to cultivate about a month ago. This will be the foundation on which my previous two resolutions are built upon.
Writing is changing my brain. It is literally changing the way I think. If you are interested in mental clarity, in increasing your understanding of yourself and complex issues then writing is a must. Writing is a vessel for mental clarity and articulation. It’s nothing new and I have written on and off for many years but never publicly and never daily.
Dwell upon ideas for an unreasonable amount of time.
Writing is a way to develop and explore your own thoughts. Thinking without turning thoughts into words is like trying to catch smoke. Only when you try to put pen to paper do you realise that you actually understand nothing.
It is something which I am really enjoying at the moment.
Process saves us from the poverty of our intentions.
All of these resolutions are focused on action and process. The outcome is out of my control. I can only focus on what is within my own reach.
So if you’ve made it this far congratulations - This letter was way too long. Don’t worry they will not all be this long winded.
What about you? Do you have a resolutions, goals or dreams? If so, what steps are you taking to achieve them?
Feel free to hit reply. I’d love to hear about your plans.
Bye bye now.
All the best Benjamin.
Inspirations for this letter:
Blog Post - Regrets of the Dying
Youtube Video/Podcast - How writing online will make you a millionaire
Blog Post - Where did new year’s resolutions come from?