Zooming out on your life
#43 - I'm on a book spree!
¡Hola! ¿Cómo estás?1
Another week in the Y11 summer flows by, as results day closes in. I’ve been hooked onto the sports apps, following the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games action and other cricket matches.
We also performed rituals for my late (2020) paternal granddad and also stayed over at my maternal grandparents. Hence, it was a chance again to learn more about my thatha whilst also realise the devastating impact of ill health during people’s old age, with both my mum’s parents suffering from leg pain.
It made me think about: a) the need to maintain good shape and health in the first half (to set up a promising second half) and b) making the most of our abilities, mobility-wise, when we are young.*
Highlight of the week: honestly, the feeling of having to do nothing. Last month, I often felt a void during the day of tasks to do. The exams had sculpted my mind into searching for chapters to review, questions to complete, papers to try. Hence, the ability to put my feet up and chuckle through 3-4 James Corden monologues on YouTube, guilt-free, was golden 😁🙌
*This is one of many points made in Bill Perkins’ book, Die With Zero. Here’s one of my favourite YouTuber, Ali Abdaal’s summary
I live in Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham, home to the 7th biggest part in Europe, Sutton Park.
Packed with empty land, bulbous trees, and endless paths to tread on, it’s a proper picture in the sun and as park walks always do, your mood is uplifted.
Yet, because it’s so close to home, so accessible, it’s normal, non-special. It doesn’t seem that much of a big deal, despite being “the 2nd biggest non-capital-city park in Europe”.
It’s not just us: after a day out to a heritage site, we paid a visit to a family friend. When asking about when they last went there, they gave us an empty shrug - it wasn’t that special.
It got me thinking about how similarly, thanks to our negativity bias, when we sit down to think about how life is going, our mind dives straight into the problems. In conversations, we often open with what’s going wrong - “Life’s crazy these days”, “I’m too stressed at work”, and “There seems to be no time for anything”.
However, to see the real quality of life, it is worth zooming out - taking a bird’s eye view of your life and looking for the good.
We should make the choice to wear our optimistic glasses and identify what’s going right: we have a job, we’ve got 24/7 electricity, we’ve got healthy food.
But Adi, these are fundamentals, basics, most of us have these things. It’s a pretty low bar you’re setting…
American actor Ron Cephas Jones reportedly wakes up every day and says,
Thank God I’m alive for another day!
Gratitude doesn’t need to have any limits. Because, there are real fellow human beings who don’t get the privileges you take for granted: around 150,000 die every day.
But, it’s so easy, even normal2, to miss these things when we’re so obsessed with our own lives, stuck in our own heads.
Just as a photo is blurry and an incorrect depiction of the real object, how you view your life by default is too narrow and close-up. Take the time to take a step back and gaze in awe at how awesome your life really is 🌅🤗
Book of the week 📖
“The thing with fiction books is, if it’s a captivating plot, it turns into a proper page-turner, especially if you’ve got loads of time”
My happy thought to Dad as I sped through 200+ pages in 24 hours of the fantastic tale, Susannah’s Garden by Debbie Macomber. An immersion into a world with intersectionality of problems and relationships that evolve through the book, ending of course on level ground. Can’t wait to pick up some fiction again
Podcast of the week🎙️
BBC World Service’s The Food Chain - What’s up with airline food?
It’s holiday season and although I’ve had only tasty recent memory of food many 1000 feet in the air, some don’t. It’s a delicious rundown of how it’s developed and how it can be made better.
Article of the week📰
You too can be Tory leader! Just follow John Crace’s 16-part plan
I thoroughly enjoy reading Crace’s satirical patronising takes on politics, always putting a smile on my face. As the battle for UK PM simmers, here’s a funny recipe…for disaster.
Quote of the week💬
“You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him.” - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Let me know what’s going just fine in your life3, and share that along with this post to a friend, inviting them to also realise how excellent their life is.
What has gone has gone. What’s to come will come and will be fine. All is well - stay in the present.
Adi
Hello! How are you? Just putting some of the Spanish I’ve been picking up on Duolingo so far this summer into practice 🤓 📱
A cricket podcast I once listened to put it beautifully: “If you didn’t notice the umpire was there, he’s done his job properly” (same thing with a wicketkeeper). We only talk about them when they’ve made mistakes, but don’t appreciate their normal, reliable (important) service.
‘Do as I say and do as I do’ I’m grateful for having a reliable, fast connection to the Internet 📶, parents who genuinely care about me 👨👩👧👦 and a beautiful bed 🛏️