As we are well aware, a new year is upon us. It’s the time of year when I tell people I don’t make resolutions, “I’m not the resolution type”; while taking a personal inventory of how authentically I’ve lived in regard to my values and make hollow promises to myself on how my behaviour will change. Not a resolution, see. I eat reasonably well, except for when a box of fritters is put in front of me, and I get to the gym consistently enough I don’t shame myself for days I don’t make it or I show up and just phone it in. Yet I have noticed a continuing behaviour or set of behaviours I’ve been struggling with which I touched on in my last post, and it’s time to let go of those things which no longer serve me.
I have unintentionally swallowed the pill, blue or red I’m not sure, and been convinced by a society I’m not a part of nor want to be that I’ve got to hustle, side jobs, full-time jobs, investments, get some property, and some more, and more MORE! I was a perfect candidate for falling into this mindset. Getting clean from drugs and alcohol left me with an immense financial debt to clean up outside of the personal debts to myself, my family and my friends. Those first few years were fucking hard. Barley making rent, stealing groceries, unsure how long I’d be able to keep a roof over my head, I put my head down and ground it out. I ate crow and moved back in with my folks in my mid-thirties. I had a couple of serious injuries that left me unemployed and for a time, unemployable and I never shut the hustle mindset off. Even while injured I was taking courses, reading, and devouring podcasts on how to optimize my output and “be a better person” when I got back on my feet, quite literally. At this time as a recovering, unemployed mid-thirties drug addict living with my parents I still managed to meet the women who would become and remains (!!!) my girlfriend. So it wasn’t all bad.
All that hustle and self-development served me well at a time when it was needed, but I haven’t been able to witness until now that I deserve a rest. I can change my M.O. The hustle does in fact stop.
That said, diving within oneself and continuing to do “The Work” probably doesn’t stop. I can’t imagine that once the lid is off that one you can put the genie back in the bottle. That’s a game we get to play for the rest of our lives if we’re lucky.
It turns out I don’t have to run my own business, I can be perfectly happy with one house and don’t need to be a landlord to multiple people or own any NFT’s at all. I gain a lot of pleasure in breaking and rebuilding motorcycles in my shed. Reading on the couch with my Boo. I’m endlessly dreaming of the perfect cast and watching a rising trout swallow the fly I tied myself. Hacking away at short stories that will most likely never see the light of day and the catharsis of letting my mind run like an endless underground steam through my subconscious. These are the things that make me ME. And these things are going to be my resolution.
Living an authentic and examined life.
I find it interesting that I say I’ve been swayed by society's pressures when in fact the people I interact with in society don’t hold “society's demands” in high regard. Not one person I know expects anything from me except to continue to nurture our relationships. To be there for them as they have always been for me. To lie to each other about the fish we’ve caught, and agree to go on last-minute motorcycle rides.
Let’s tell each other our true aspirations for this coming year and hold one another accountable for our authenticity.
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