2023 was a packed year, full of travel, new hobbies, and new relationships. It is hard to believe that I’ve now been in New York for 2 years; the first year feels like a distant memory.
Last year I began long distance running, and this year I’m training for my first marathon. As I started on this journey, I thought I’d read Haruki Murakami’s “What I Talk About When I Talk About Running”.
This quote stuck out:
“After I closed the bar and began my life as a novelist, the first thing we—and by we I mean my wife and I—did was completely revamp our lifestyle. We decided we’d go to bed soon after it got dark, and wake up with the sun…”
“…It was a major directional change—from the kind of open life we’d led for seven years, to a more closed life. I think having this sort of open existence for a period was a good thing. I learned a lot of important lessons during that time. It was my real schooling. But you can’t keep up that kind of life forever. Just as with school, you enter it, learn something, and then it’s time to leave.”
I thought this characterization of life as open versus closed was a fitting metaphor for periods of exploration versus periods of focused effort. I often struggle with figuring out which “bucket” I should be in, having difficulty committing but also using quasi-commitments as reasons to avoid trying new things.
Last year, my life was on the open side. I explored new habits like running, new hobbies like pottery, and new places through travel. This year, I’m ready to narrow my foci into a few key commitments. Going along with the in/out trend:
In for 2024:
Committing to health: the software engineer lifestyle can quickly creep up on you. Though I made progress with running, it was quickly wiped out with periods of inactivity.
Committing to community: I joined some communities where I started to become a regular. I’d like to further commit to those and join a local running club, something that fits within the time I already set aside for the activity.
Out:
Being overly ambitious and setting too many goals: ever since I can remember (with too many Notion docs to prove it) I’ve set many goals that I then made little progress on. This year, for the first 6 months, my only goal is training for the marathon I’m signed up for in July. Anything extra is a bonus.
Frequent travel: I barely had 2 months that I stayed in the city continuously. Most of the year was peppered with short trips. It was great to have the opportunity to travel but it can also be jarring to transition mentally from place to place.
Being closed does not mean rejecting anything new, but deciding what is actually worth being open to. For me, being open to new people and new physical routines is important right now, while being open to new experiences through travel is not. By the end of the year I will have learned what worked and what didn’t work from the commitments I made, and I can adjust accordingly for the future.
💫 Digital serendipity
Some recent standout reads:
I recently visited family in India and though Mishti’s journey was vastly different from mine, I loved the vivid descriptions of her interactions and setting.
“India is a place I’ve always wanted to know in a way that feels more visceral, fleshy, and real. I look and—if I’m lucky—sound the part. But the more I know, the more I don’t. Going to Lonar was about a feeling: the awareness of the space between me and something other, a growing curiosity about that other, and the tingling desire to bridge the gap.”
I always think about this quote from Paul Graham’s essay “Cities and Ambition”: “New York tells you, above all: you should make more money”. Walk through any trendy neighborhood and this message is heard loud and clear. Patricia explores what might be if cities instead promoted authenticity.
If purpose is the fountainhead from which all else springs, imagine a city whispering: “you should be more authentic”.
To commitment in 2024,
Vadini