For many years now (you may be aware) I have kept a journal. Each year I start a brand new one, and on New Years’ Eve of 2024, sitting by the crackling outdoor fire at a friends’ get-together, I reflected on the year that was:
If 2024 was edible, it would’ve been something small but packed with flavour.
There was no “one-thing” that defined/ made the entire year. It wasn’t a year of great, sweeping changes. But if 2024 was not something, it definitely wasn’t dull. It was very much a year of quality over quantity. Perhaps for this reason, while traditionally my first article every year has included one key ‘Aha!’ moment from each month of the previous year (as you can find here, here and here) looking back at 2024 I decided to laser focus in on my top 5 revelations instead. After all, Rob Gordon categorised everything from music to break-ups into top 5 lists in High Fidelity, and these were quite entertaining.
The revelations I’m about to share with you here had the biggest impact on me, and I’m certain that following these will help you not just to enjoy a better future, but to get the most juice from your current journey as well, however that may look for you…
#1. What would it mean to genuinely feel like “the luckiest man alive”? What is most important?
I have a relative who managed the regional department of a nationally recognised company for many years. He’s done very well for himself. More recently during a Christmas get-together, we stood out on the driveway of his place talking about work, about the sweet-spot of finding work that is financially rewarding but inspires us as well. For this reason, while he was offered a promotion, he turned it down. Instead, he went and worked as a member of the sales team for another retailer, and was quite happy in making the switch. He’s a people person and in his element there.
Early in the year I went to his 50th birthday celebrations. He’s a lover of camping and the outdoors, so the event took place in a big paddock. People brought their tents and caravans and camped out for the weekend, a bonfire blazed, people tried their hand at whip cracking. Then came the speeches. My relative’s turn came, and he thanked us all for coming. He gave special mention to his family and a few long-time friends of his there, and observed that looking around at everybody, he felt like the luckiest man alive. It was at this point that he nearly broke down.
He managed to keep it together, but driving home later – and in the days that followed – I kept thinking back to his speech, and to our conversation on the driveway just a month or so earlier. For all the benefits of wealth and career success and what that has brought him, evidently all along it’s the people close to him that have given him the most fulfilment and appreciation for life. I still have over a decade before I reach the same milestone birthday, but it got me wondering:
What would it mean to genuinely feel like the luckiest man alive?
We can expand this further – what (if we strip it all back) is it that really makes us feel so blessed, so full of appreciation and gratitude? I spent many years seeking what I defined as “success” – and in the process, I made many conscious sacrifices. It was all worth it, I told myself. But (to quote John Lennon): Life is what happens when you’re making other plans. Time is the resource we should consider most carefully. We don’t all get equal amounts and most of us don’t know exactly how much we have in total. Fortunately, at an estimate I’d say I have quite a bit still to come, enough to evaluate what would really make me feel like the luckiest man alive at the next milestone birthday.
So far, what I’ve come up with is: doing things that bring me actual fulfilment, good people and trying to make every day count for something.
Your list might well be different, but addressing it now means a better chance of reaching your next milestone and genuinely feeling that you really are the luckiest person alive.
#2. A journey upward could, in fact, take us in the other direction at times, away from our goals or aspirations before it leads us back and up. So keep walking.
In his book Three Simple Steps, author Trevor Blake mentions a phenomenon he calls the way of the winding staircase: by taking this staircase we ascend levels, however it’s not a direct journey. In fact, at times walking the staircase it can appear to take us in the opposite direction to where we want to be. If we couldn’t see the preceding steps laid out in front of us, the temptation might be to think “This isn’t working, I’m way off” and retreat back down the stairs, losing all progress as a result. If we’d just kept on walking, we would’ve reached those higher levels we intended to.
In gaming terms, the 10-minute side quest might not feel especially relevant to the main quest, but what you gain or learn in that side-quest could make all the difference to your success in the main quest. There have been more times than I can think of where skills I learned or little things I realised from old side-gigs came in handy for my main task, in ways I couldn’t have foreseen. This is something I’ve actually mentioned in podcasts before, but it was reading Blake’s analogy of the spiral staircase that struck me because it’s actually a great metaphor for the process.
Sometimes progress takes place horizontally as well as vertically…
#3. Small, incremental shifts can drive change we might not believe over time if we were to see it now. Little hinges swing big doors.
“Little hinges swing big doors”. So said W. Clement Stone. Or (as Paul Kelly sang in more recent times): From little things, big things grow.
I remember when I got my first gym membership in over half a decade. I’d look at these photos of myself from 5 years earlier and how I’d progressed with my weight/ strength back then and wonder “What if I’d kept on going with that?” It was the ‘what if’ that got to me, not seeing what I could’ve fully achieved if I’d stuck with it? This time, I’d stick with it. I’d train differently, based on what I’d learned since about effective weight training and in conjunction with the right supplements. So off I went. If you’ve started a fitness program having not done one for a while (or done one at all) you know the first few times you finish up with aching muscles and joints. All this tension and pressure on new areas of the body leaves its signature! But soon the tension goes away and then in the coming weeks you can ad more weight, do more reps, do it all without lingering pain afterwards.
So I knew I was growing stronger, but it wasn’t until I took a photo of myself (yes, I did a gym selfie) that December when it really sunk in. While the guy in the photo was obviously me, had I not already known this, I could’ve glanced at that photo and confused the guy with someone else. Compared with the person I was in group shots from the start of that same year, the guy in that gym selfie I could easily have confused with one of the gym bro’s I’d see training every other night. I was unrecognisable, but in a good way.
This was the result of just 6 months of training. What could I achieve in a year?
More recently I had dental aligners fitted, and via an app I’d take photos of my teeth with the aligners in and the photos would upload to the app and be shared with the practice for review. After 1 week of surgery, having uploaded the photo I received a message back telling me it was time to move on to the next retainer already. There was a scan review showing progress so far, and like magic I could see movement (however subtle) of some of my teeth, after a single week of wearing aligners. Right there was the visual proof of what change could take place in a single week of adjustment.
It doesn’t just apply to physical things like working out or dentistry, either – I’d like to say I’ve faithfully meditated for years since I first forayed into it, but I haven’t. What I know is that, when I have made a habit of doing it, people have passingly observed change in me, talked about how I seem “calmer” or more “in tune” (not to say I’m typically a restless person!). A change in attitude, in habits, in form – stick to these, and those small hinges can turn big doors that open up huge opportunity and revelation.
It just depends what doors you want to swing?
#4. Having big visions across a range of areas in life is grand, but we need to be mindful of all the smaller goals and achievements in-between, plus where we are now. Before we can run, we have to know and appreciate what it is to take baby steps.
As 90’s RNB group TLC sang: don’t go chasing waterfalls, listen to the rivers and the lakes that you’re used to.
This follows point #2 a little, but it’s more to do with focusing on the ground we’ve taken so far rather than the ground we currently stand on or the promised land (however that may look for us). There is a time for revelations and discovering new skills and processes, then putting these into practise and letting the results manifest. But there’s also a time to go with what is familiar, to rely on the habits or attitudes that have brought you this far. Doing this is key if you want to be recognised as someone with integrity. Before a door can open up, we want to know we can get both feet inside the doorway and stay there.
#5. Time away, on a semi-frequent basis is crucial for sustained long-term growth, revival and success. You can definitely afford to save/ spend money and time on it. High operational machinery needs servicing/ overhaul and so do we, especially.
High mileage machinery like trucks and locomotives need regular servicing and overhauls. So do heavy duty industrial vehicles such as forklifts and cranes. High capability processing equipment (like the device you’re reading this sentence on), also have ‘sleep’ or screen off periods and require updates. To think we are an exception – beings with much greater processing power than a computer, and the capability to work long hours like heavy duty machinery – is naive at best and dangerous at worst. Taking time away is essential for revival, to re-boot us. But it’s not just about rest-
Taking time away on a semi-frequent basis (once every few months, ideally) is also crucial for sustaining long-term growth on an internal level. During the time away you might not just spend days on the couch gaming or binge-watching the TV. To the contrary, you might engross yourself in a creative pursuit, take a road-trip or hike over many days. Hardly inactive!
How this is effective is that it draws us back from the regular life, the daily routines and tasks. With time away, we have time to think, to observe our habits, our routines, our nature itself – from a distance.
The spot I am sitting in looks like a room with walls, windows and lawn beyond those windows. But the same spot observed from space, would be indistinguishable. Instead you just see one land mass in varying shades of green and brown, obscured to some degree by wisps of cloud. You see a much bigger picture.
Time spent away is (metaphorically) our opportunity to go into space, give us space and look upon our lives from a detached, distant perspective. How does it look to us? What becomes apparent?
So the TL,DR of these 5 revelations:
- What is it that fills you with the most gratitude, and how can you find more of it?
- Not every journey of progress is a direct route. You could be ascending via the spiral staircase…
- Small shifts over time create a much greater compound difference.
- Appreciate the baby steps.
- Regular time away is essential for revival and real growth.
Like this article? Get every new piece the moment it drops- just enter your details AND get your complimentary copy of ‘The 3 Posts People Stop Everything To Read’:
0 Comments