I recently encountered an article that described small, everyday choices as draining. What to eat for lunch, what to wear, etc. The flipside in this story was that, when people DIDN'T have many small decisions to make throughout the day, they were much more creative. Since I'm not citing the article, I guess I'm just asking myself (and you) what choices are draining which are not.
There's also a field of study that describes people as having a limited well of self-control. So if I'm self-controlled all day, it'll be harder to be so by nightfall. Maybe this is why diet plans often have "eat-whatever-you-want-days" as an outlet for our desire to, well, eat whatever we want.
These two things, together with this post from a few days, had me thinking about how to be a more creative person. If we keep working on sustainability, generosity, simplicity, our efforts likely shouldn't fall into the category of "self-control" or "daily choices", because both are ultimately draining. Rather, some choices should be automated and if we really don't like to eat x or do x exercise, we probably shouldn't.
After simplifying our lives for the past three years, we're left with the question: what shall we do now that we have a lot less pressure to earn money? That is, we still need to earn money, but most jobs-- jobs we even love!- will cover our needs. The usual excuses for doing draining stuff just for the money is (temporarily) being taken away, and I'm not sure where that leaves us. We'll finally get the next issue of Conferre magazine out, perhaps!
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We're on the road again, this time for a very short trip, and I have some reservations, as Noah's still pretty out of sync after our last trip. But I'm hoping he'll just be totally blown away by the gardens and the ocean, and by my amazing high school classmates (they really are amazing).
I went to Atlantic College (AC) for the last two years of high school. We were all together just two years, but they came at such an important time that the two years were as transformational as anything I've experienced since. As Eug, Noah and I travel to St Donat's castle in South Wales, I'll be thinking about the last ten years, and the ways in which it's differed from my expectations. As I visit the place that marked my leaving South Africa, I'll be thinking of our planned move back home, and all that's happened in the intervening years.
This year is a marker of change, reflection, and moving on, so I'm super grateful that I get to share it with you. Thanks.
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