Thank you for so clearly articulating why “staying on the bus” is so important, and offering a way to think about getting on the right bus (or buses--up to three).
I am particularly interested in figuring out how to connect with others in an authentic way at the moment because I’ve been applying a laser-like focus to learning traditional realist art skills for the past two years. I shed nearly all other activities from my life as I commit to developing these skills. My husband thankfully cooks and calls me when it’s time to eat. (It’s good to have a team approach to life.)
Only now am I starting to recognize that I do indeed see more and better than I did before. And with my new objective vision I am able to be more critical of my abilities to execute on my internal (subjective) vision for what I produce. An emerging ability to critique my own work has me thinking that I might be nearing the time to start adding my own work, not just exercises in a curriculum to my life.
Never would I have developed this skill without intense focus and hours and hours of practice. (It’s the subtle color I think you now see because of your focus on the colorless life of a writer.)
Your article and Larson’s offer me a chance to think more about what to do now. Keep digging in for two more years to learn more and develop artistic skills I can’t yet imagine? Select a “bit” to play with the skills I have--painting images of barns, say--that might connect me to the world in new and interesting ways? A blend of the two? Or start developing an entirely new skill--become a personal trainer?
Just writing down these thoughts highlights for me a need to choose and shows how ridiculous my fleeting thought of getting on the bus that led to becoming a personal trainer is for me.
It’s at once wonderful and frustrating that humans are so complex--and, how much we want to connect with others in ways that allow us to share who we are. Yet, only in digging deep on one thing to the exclusion of others do we discover more about ourselves than we might otherwise learn from playing more bits.
Your piece makes me think that if I can only get on three buses, I’ll need one to nurture my family relationships, another to continually develop artistic skills, and a third, perhaps, to connect me with others that exploits the skills I most want to develop for myself.
Thanks for giving me a framework to think these things through, Henrik.
Almost everyone I’ve met would be well-served thinking more about what to focus on
Thank you for so clearly articulating why “staying on the bus” is so important, and offering a way to think about getting on the right bus (or buses--up to three).
I happened to read your piece just after finishing Jeremy D. Larson’s NYT article “Want to Try a New You in the New Year? Try Committing to the Bit” (https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/03/magazine/commit-to-the-bit.html?unlocked_article_code=1.K00.ei6e.u66RVjj-Wnuy&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare), so I was primed to think about “what” would be my “bits”. Your article then offered an algorithm! (Yes! I love a good plan.)
I am particularly interested in figuring out how to connect with others in an authentic way at the moment because I’ve been applying a laser-like focus to learning traditional realist art skills for the past two years. I shed nearly all other activities from my life as I commit to developing these skills. My husband thankfully cooks and calls me when it’s time to eat. (It’s good to have a team approach to life.)
Only now am I starting to recognize that I do indeed see more and better than I did before. And with my new objective vision I am able to be more critical of my abilities to execute on my internal (subjective) vision for what I produce. An emerging ability to critique my own work has me thinking that I might be nearing the time to start adding my own work, not just exercises in a curriculum to my life.
Never would I have developed this skill without intense focus and hours and hours of practice. (It’s the subtle color I think you now see because of your focus on the colorless life of a writer.)
Your article and Larson’s offer me a chance to think more about what to do now. Keep digging in for two more years to learn more and develop artistic skills I can’t yet imagine? Select a “bit” to play with the skills I have--painting images of barns, say--that might connect me to the world in new and interesting ways? A blend of the two? Or start developing an entirely new skill--become a personal trainer?
Just writing down these thoughts highlights for me a need to choose and shows how ridiculous my fleeting thought of getting on the bus that led to becoming a personal trainer is for me.
It’s at once wonderful and frustrating that humans are so complex--and, how much we want to connect with others in ways that allow us to share who we are. Yet, only in digging deep on one thing to the exclusion of others do we discover more about ourselves than we might otherwise learn from playing more bits.
Your piece makes me think that if I can only get on three buses, I’ll need one to nurture my family relationships, another to continually develop artistic skills, and a third, perhaps, to connect me with others that exploits the skills I most want to develop for myself.
Thanks for giving me a framework to think these things through, Henrik.