on not disappointing myself
As my work-driven identity dissolved, I felt a burning ambition across all facets of life. Instead of a desire to achieve goals that society told me were valuable, I felt a hunger to discover what makes me feel fully alive. Instead of a commitment to “winning” other people’s games, I felt a commitment to design a life that I deeply enjoy inhabiting... See more
Sam Sager • Work, Ambition, and Identity
It turned out that it wasn’t about ‘knowing what to do’2, but something else, something intrinsically unnameable, fundamentally untrackable. I knew that I hadn’t made the shift happen, other than by showing up, day after day, and trying to open to the whole weird mess of feeling and desire, experience, instinct and memory.
How long does an idea take to birth?
the unending pressure to work with ‘crushing intensity’ in order to maintain the income and status that have come to seem like prerequisites for the lives they want to lead.2
Oliver Burkeman • Four Thousand Weeks
The problem is, as achievement-subjects, not only do we burn ourselves out, but the meaning and value of our lives is always deferred. Once we have our dream job, the perfect home, a perfectly optimised life – once we are productive enough, efficient enough, successful enough – only then will we arrive at meaning. But just like the fruit that elude... See more