Why short-sightedness can help you choose calmly
#139 - tests, new lecturers and new dishes
Hi there,
At last, I’m back, a whole 3 weeks later. Happy New Year! 🎉 (teetering on the edge of that becoming too late to say but nevertheless 😁)
I hope you’ve had a positive start to the year with purpose and progress, however large. I’ve enjoyed the start of a new term along with starting the new year, with a relit spark to get those little wins which will add up. The week looks very different at the end than at the start, when Imperial greeted me back with 4 exams across 2 days - hard work.
Highlight of the week: beyond the obvious of finishing my exams, my first ‘Friday Night Dinner’ of the term with Jibreel, a Maths flatmate. A reluctant cook, he rolled his sleeves up with me to produce a (Hello Fresh) masterpiece - Chicken and Halloumi Shawarma. The 1h+ it took us to make it was totally worth it 😋
The ‘Friday Night Dinner’ idea was one born out of reflecting on the first term and realising a want/need to strengthen connections I’ve made in Term 1, leveraging my increasing cooking skills at the same time.
At the same time, I want to focus more on connecting individually with people, prioritising this over the many career events (ranging in quality) I went to in Term 1. This led me to a call this week with a cool guy who runs a finance podcast, whose team I’ve applied to join. 👍
Excitingly, he revealed that he’d be up for interviewing me and asked if I wanted to continue my application. I paused - this is a new year, do I want to commit fully to something new this early in the year? After all, it’s better to do a few things properly than let others down by juggling too many plates and leaving unhappy guests at the restaurant. 1
As is slowly becoming a habit, I said I’d have a think about it and get back to him. It’s much better to pause and say yes resoundingly than feel obliged to give an immediate response and doubt yourself. Yes shouldn’t be the default response - if it is, you aren’t respecting your own time.
People think focus means saying yes to the thing you've got to focus on. But that's not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. Steve Jobs
I’ll save the suspense to Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible 8 (can’t wait) - I ended up saying yes. The justification in my mind? Remember that I’m not signing my life away.
When you start a new venture, turn to the next chapter or make a career move, it is useful but subtle to remember that it won’t be permanent. As most things do, it will come to an end - which will work out for the reasons that arise then - and you will move on to the next challenge.
Perhaps it was the mood of having a broad view of time, typical at the start of the year, that got my mind tricking me: “Oh, that’s 4-5 hours a week forever”. Rather, I’m not tying myself to a chain which won’t break until the end of my university journey - even the co-founder on my call mentioned another co-founder who left to do his own thing! I’m getting involved in a cool project with cool people, for as long as I can balance it - sounds like a pretty good deal to me.
Overall, this reminds me of what I’ve trained myself (when I’m aware enough and not bogged down) to tell myself - this too shall pass. Life is a road where at the end of a bad corner, there is a good stretch of road ahead. Life finds a way of going in cycles, up and down - not quite as smooth as our beloved sine and cosine curves, but certainly fluctuates.
A couple of my favourite posts which touch on the idea that things will change:
This concept of having too long a time horizon reminds me of a point in Term 1. It’s the week after my birthday and a bumper first week of being 19. Starting with an early train to London and a penultimate orchestra rehearsal coupled with our Winter Ball, finishing with 2 concerts in 2 days, all amidst a mountain of maths and spring week applications - it was one of the busiest weeks of my life.
I recall a conversation the week before with a flatmate where I was feeling the pinch - “There’s 4 weeks to go and there just feels like so much, I’m not confident on how it’s going to be”.
The end being in sight meant I started thinking about the term with how much time was left rather than previous weeks of “Ah, it’s week [ ] of the term”. Unfortunately, zooming out to an entire month makes the schedule seem daunting, a monster too large to tackle, too scary to face and too much to break down.
Thinking back on it now, what allowed me to get through it all in one piece was not thinking of it as the last 4 weeks. Thinking one week at a time allowed me to make peace with what was to come. I knew that it was all safely on my calendar, and that I will continue to keep an eye on it. For now though, the main thing was to breathe, stay in the present and approach the next thing in front of me.
After all, progress is not one massive jump up the stairs, but moving one foot at a time, up the next one and then the next one and the next and…
To conclude here, when you feel overwhelmed or that the task at hand is so massive it’s paralysing (good luck Mum with your dissertation! 😭🙏), remember that a) it will eventually end and you will live to see it, and b) you should think about the very next step you can take to make (actual) progress. Definitely take the time to bravely survey the terrain and timeline of the entire war, remembering that even this will change over time - investing too much time in potentially soon-to-be invalid work is unwise. Then, put aside the warplan, look to the next battle at hand and bring your best self to it, with clarity, calmness and confidence.
Two stories weaved together, as is becoming my skill. Not sure if they illustrate the same issue but they definitely share the issue with thinking too long-term. Thanks for reading, now for some recommendations!
Podcast of the week🎙️
Deep Dive with Ali Abdaal - How Dopamine Shapes Your Habits and Productivity - TJ Power
One of the most value-packed episodes I’ve listened to. Who knew brain chemicals impacted each and every part of our life? Definitely worth a listen/watch, and then a relisten to make a note of everything.
What I’m grateful for this week 🙏
The invigilating graduate teaching assistant who got me some tissues for my nose (how cold has the weather been this week!?), couldn’t have gotten through it without it (whether they were for my nose or my eyes is an exercise to the reader 😂)
Quote of the week 💬
I walk slowly, but I never walk backward. - Abraham Lincoln
Week 1 of 11 down, 10 exciting weeks ahead! Here’s to a successful week ahead…one day at a time.
Adi
Hmm, wonder if stretching that analogy worked…