A life changing revelation

Hi ! This week, I’m thinking (and writing) about priorities, Vietnamese billionaires, people who vacation at sex resorts, nostalgia… and more, all below. You can find last week’s newsletter here, and if this was forwarded to you, you can sign up here.

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The choice of priorities

I had a revelation this week. 🔥It might be life changing🔥.

Out of all the millions and millions of things in life you could be doing, or could one day do, your choice of wanting to do them is pretty binary: you either would want to them, or you wouldn't. So for me, I would enjoy visiting Las Vegas, learning how to ballroom dance and re-reading Lord of the Rings. I wouldn't want to go shark cage diving, learn how to speak Mandarin or run a marathon. Not worrying about the things we don't want to do is easy. But do you realise how many things could go on the "would want to" list? Literally millions.

So, now is a good time as any to accept that you literally cannot do all the things you want to do. It's not bad organisation, laziness, or too little time and it's definitely not your fault. There is just no scenario in which you could ever have enough time to do all the things you want to do. So we need to change our approach.

It boils down to priorities. We get to prioritise what we want to be doing or working on, and then we get to actually do that. For everything else, it's time to say "that would be nice, but it's not a priority". Honestly, try it. And not just for the big things, but for everyday stuff too. The moment you start thinking of your day as made up of priorities that you choose, it all starts to feel simpler and easier, and more controllable. Is going to Las Vegas, or learning the Waltz or reading a Tolkien book a priority for me right now? No, no and no. So I won't give them another thought. Do I really have to drive Zac to chess and boxing and karate? Yes, yes and yes: these are conscious priorities, and I am privileged and grateful that I get to do them.

(🛑 And if your knee jerk response to the above is "I have too many priorities!", I would challenge you on that too. Everything you do is a choice, and if you are abdicating control of your day to an outside invisible force, then you are just fooling yourself. Time for a harsh reality check).

(This thinking is inspired by Four Thousand Weeks. See below for details)

FROM THE BLOG

I haven’t written anything new on the blog this week (because, instead, I was putting the final touches to a work project that is almost 100 pages long 🤯 ), but here are some oldies: A perfect date with myself (where I go and sit in a restaurant alone on a Saturday night), an impulse purchase from my hospital bed and the day we put diesel into our petrol car while on holiday.

SMALL TALK FOR DINNER PARTIES

Have you heard?

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👉️ A Vietnamese woman billionaire has been sentenced to death for stealing $44b. That’s quite a lot of money - no wonder she’s a billionaire 🤣 🤣. She started out as a market stall vendor, then dabbled in property and somehow ended up owning a bank. She set up thousands of “shell” companies, and made it look like they owned the bank but actually she secretly controlled 90% of it. She then used that power to give herself / her companies $44b in loans. It took 200 lawyers, 2,700 witnesses and 6 tonnes of evidence to convict her. So she had 11+yrs years of being inappropriately filthy rich, and soon she will be horribly dead. Not worth it, riiiight?

~

👉️ OJ Simpson has died. I remember clear as day sitting in my college cafeteria (I was in Boston, MA) with hundreds of other students, our eyes glued to the tv screens, waiting for the verdict to be read, and the outburst of emotion sweeping through the food space (swaying both ways) when we heard “not guilty”. We were definitely all late to class that day. I really want to believe he didn’t do it, I really know he did, and I am somewhat relieved that he at least spent 9 years in jail for another crime. That man was a criminal idiot. Read his Wikipedia entry to see how he had no respect for the law, even post murder trial.

GOOD READS

• 💌 “The case for an emotional affair” A long read, so get yourself a cup of coffee first. It’s about a college sweetheart, a hidden box of letters, a broken marriage and a lifetime of “what if” and “what the hell?” questions (Oprah.com).

• 🍆 “I went to a sex resort. Yes I’ll tell you about it”. I am not even going to sugarcoat it. This article is wild. There are people out there who live lives I cannot imagine living. “An entire week of full frontal nudity, pretty-much-nightly group sex, wild parties, and a bunch of new friends”. Good for them, I guess 🤣 (Mashable.com)

• ❤️‍🩹 “A practical guide to dating after divorce”. A surprisingly sane, balanced article by a divorce coach who lays out the new rules of the land. She is a fan of dating apps (big stretch there, I think) but it’s a good article to read if applicable, or to send to a friend who needs it. (Goop.com)

• ⏱️ The three-or-four hours rule for getting creative work done. You’ve heard of the four work week. This isn’t as ambitious (it gives you a full day to get your four hours in), but boy is it a powerful concept. I’ve always said that none of us work for more than 4 productive hours a day anyway, and this framework just gives you permission to make it official. By Oliver Burkman, author of Four Thousand Weeks (see below)

BOOKMARK THIS

• Youtube: I highly recommend you spend 10 minutes a day watching animal-rescue YouTube channels. These are usually 3-5 minute videos of humans doing good by animals. Makes me feel like there is hope for us all, still. The videos always have a happy ending and really do elevate the soul. I cannot begin to tell you how many tears I have shed over them. Some examples:

  • Seal rescues. There is a team of volunteers from Ocean Conservation Namibia that rescues seals from the garbage that humans leave behind. Beautiful work.

  • Dog rescues. The Dodo channel documents the rescue of abandoned and defeated dogs who have almost given up on life. Every video starts off as brutal, but warms my heart (and makes me cry) in no time. Best thing about these is seeing the personality transformation of the dogs once they get some unconditional love. A lesson in there for all of us.

  • Not really a rescue as such, bit this woman grooms dogs. It’s remarkably relaxing to watch her do it, and listen to her chatter. Also…be prepared to fall in love with pretty much all the dogs.

• Instagram: @mogzee_m has reels with an identical shot every day: she stands in the kitchen, plays some music and shows you what she’s wearing that day. Not a word is spoken. If that sounds boring, it’s because you haven’t seen it yet! This woman has a vava-voom that makes me want to buy a whole new wardrobe (and also to copy her IG account for myself).

READING NOOK

If you are overwhelmed with life, feel like you have not lived up to your potential, or scared that life is leaving you behind, then Four Thousand Weeks is for you.

It's an antidote to all the productivity books you will ever read. Its message is deceptively simple: stop trying to do everything, because you'll never manage anyway. Rather, be intentional with your time. Don't plan your life with precision, things will never work out the way you planned, yet somehow they always do work out. Leave a lot to chance (think of how many great things in your life happened by pure chance. Why close yourself off from more of that?).

Think of your life as a series of moments (you're living one right now). Focus on the moments, and the rest will work itself out.

PS. No time to read? The author has a lot to say on that too. It's not that you don't have time to read, it's that you don't want to sit for an hour without distraction because you are too used to instant dopamine-fixes from your phone etc. Get your priorities straight, problem solved!

PSS. Thanks for your recommendations for fiction must-reads. I’ve added The Great Alone, The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow and Tomorrow to my list. Let me know if you have any more. 📖 

MUSIC

🇮🇹 I have been feeling very nostalgic lately, maybe as an antidote to what seems a rather crazy world that we live in today. So I have been reminiscing about the regular weekly dinners my family would go to, when I was still in high school. We would meet up with my parents' Italian friends, sit at a big table that was laden with food, shoot the breeze and laugh as only those who have forgotten all their problems can. The restaurant of choice was always the same: a nondescript Italian gem, tucked away below street level in the middle of town, called Stafeno's. Stefano - of course - was always there, together with the other regulars; Eddie, Nuncio, Candy et al.

We might not have owned the restaurant, but by 10pm and a couple of bottles of wine, it certainly felt as if we did. The music would get turned up a notch (or two) and it was always Francesco Napoli, singing with an infectious love of life that will instantly put anyone in a good mood. And so it's probably not surprising that I went searching for his music now, 25 years later. I'm happy to report that it is as uplifting and merry as ever, and definitely should be played at full volume while driving down the streets, even if it mortifies and embarrasses your kids. Or maybe, especially if it does.

~If you liked this…~

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