Compass No.23
The marriage we have with ourselves, embracing our mortality, and remembering to focus on what could go right
Thought provoking quote
David Whyte's book, The Three Marriages: Reimagining Work, Self, and Relationship, explores the complex interactions we navigate between the relationship we have with our partner (the first marriage), the relationship we have to work (the second marriage), and the relationship we have to ourselves (the third marriage). He contends that the relationship we have with ourselves can be amongst the trickiest to navigate:
"In the midst of a seemingly endless life, however, we can spend so much time attempting to put bread on the table or holding a relationship together that we often neglect the necessary internal skills which help us pursue, come to know, and then sustain a marriage with the person we find on the inside. Neglecting the internal marriage, we can easily make ourselves a hostage to the externals of work and the demands of relationship. We find ourselves unable to move in these marriages because we have no inner foundation from which to step out with a firm persuasion. It is as if, absent a loving relationship with this inner representation of our self, we fling ourselves in all directions in our outer lives, looking for love in all the wrong places.”
Podcast insights that stayed with me
In a recent podcast interview with Oliver Burkeman entitled, “How to Be Sanely Productive,” Ten Percent Happier host Dan Harris speaks with Burkeman about the liberation that arrives when we embrace the fact that we are finite. They discuss how the acceptance of finitude allows us to confront the illusory fantasy, “Once everything is done, then I’ll be happy.”
These are the topics of Burkeman’s latest book, Meditations for Mortals.
“It’s Worse Than You Think” is the title of the first chapter in his new book. In the chapter, he argues that there is nothing more liberating than realizing the human condition is worse than we think. For example, he contends that if we go through life thinking that meeting all obligations is difficult, then life becomes a huge struggle. Burkeman attests that when we realize that it’s impossible to meet every obligation, we are freed to focus on what’s important.
Decision hunting: This is Burkeman’s idea that it’s helpful to think about decisions as things to go looking for, rather than things that just arrive. For example, if you are stuck on a creative project, he argues that the answer is to find some decision you could make now and go make it. He contends that the willingness to say “I will choose” often produces better work and experiences than trying to make the exact right decision.
Daily-ish: Many of us are looking for rules or protocols that make everything run smoothly once and for all. Burkeman’s view is that the search for these all encompassing systems can quickly cause us to serve the rules and have them become the thing we have to follow, rather than the thing that serves us. His antidote to this mindset is to embrace the idea of “daily-ish,’ which is to be committed and disciplined about the things we’ve decided to prioritize, while making room to allow life to happen. In this way of thinking, habits and routines became a tool to bring us more fully into life, instead of rules that see any deviation as disaster.
"C'est fait par du monde:" This is a french phrase Burkeman references that roughly translates to “regular people did that,” which he uses to champion the idea that anything out in the world that seems extraordinary was made by flawed and finite humans no less subject to limitation than we are. While we might not all become the Shakespeare of our desired goal or profession, he attests that there is no reason to assume it shouldn’t be us to do something meaningful.
Question inspired by a recent interview
Last week I spoke with Isabel Nesteus Bannon, a former collegiate golfer turned entrepreneur. We spoke about her experience launching a candy brand inspired by her Swedish upbringing and chatted about what it’s been like to balance a growing business with her full-time day job. When I asked her about what helps her reset after a setback or tough day, she said this:
“If I’m constantly thinking about the negatives, then that is what I'm going to see, and that's probably what's going to happen. Everyday, even if it is a hard day, and I’m feeling like ‘This is not going anywhere,’ I remind myself that I do have the power to change my mindset, focus on the positives, and think about what I can do to make those things happen.”
If you’ve been overly focused on what could go wrong in an area of work or life, I invite you to take a step back and ask: What if things went right?