It’s 11:23pm on Tuesday, January 31st.
I’ve just come home from work and I still have a considerable amount of work to do, but I am here to finish what I’ve started - getting a post written and edited for Wednesday morning. I’m tired.
I would much rather be tucked into bed or watching mindless television, and that is what I usually would do after a long day. But I really want to see what I’m made of and what is on the other side of this commitment to writing and sharing with you all.
In the past, I would resign after a long day and push off everything that I wanted to do. I’ll do the writing tomorrow, I’ll call my friend tomorrow, I’ll get the workout in whenever I can. Then six months later, I look back and realize that tomorrow never actually came. I’m realizing now that I have the power to make tomorrow happen today.
Would things be easier if I didn’t work an intense corporate job or had some assistance with domestic and personal tasks or didn’t live in NYC? Maybe, but I choose not to dwell on these kind of questions anymore because ultimately this is the life that I’ve chosen. This is the life that I get to live.
I used to fantasize about how differently my life could be if I had the dream job and lived in the dream apartment. If I had the dream friend group and partner, then my life would be so much better. I’ve come to believe now that ‘the dream’ is the enemy of the now because despite it all I am living in generations of answered prayers.
I am living in my own answered prayers.
Life is a delicate balancing act, and I intentionally chose the word balancing because it is a ceaseless endeavor. There will be seasons where you have the beautiful apartment, but there will be likely be seasons that precede it where you’re saving and viewing apartment after apartment every evening. There will be seasons where the job is good, but that might also mean becoming more dedicated to your craft and spending more time researching than spending time with friends.
There is a season for everything, and life is not when everything beautifully comes together. It is in fact the confluence of rest and work, peace and strife, harvest and planting.
This week a friend playfully but seriously asked me how are we supposed to be good at our jobs, workout consistently, socialize, date, manage our finances, have tidy homes, pursue our passions and be mentally sound? Believe me, I’ve asked myself this question more times than I could even count.
My response? Question what each individual thing means to you. What does it mean to be good at your job? And by that I mean what does it actually mean to you, not your boss, colleagues or parents. How do you want to socialize? Are there tasks and chores you can outsource to create more capacity to do other things?
Up until the early 1900s, priority was a singular word. Because it is actually impossible to focus on eight different things together, at the same time and be doing well in every single area. So let some things go, and honor what truly matters to you.
A fulfilled life isn’t always a life that is full to the brim, but a life where you have been courageous enough to pursue what matters to you.
'A fulfilled life isn’t always a life that is full to the brim, but a life where you have been courageous enough to pursue what matters to you.'
Thank you.
Needed to read this today, thanks for soldiering on to get this out 💜