Try This Trick to Transform Your New Year

Life has two distinct modes — avoidance/resistance and engagement/creation. That’s about it.

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“There is nothing more comfortable than not thinking.” —Simone Weil

I LOVE THE DAY AFTER CHRISTMAS. There’s a palpable sense of relief in the air, as collectively, we’re set free from the inescapable tidal wave that pushes us (even those who don’t celebrate) into the holiday.

Of course, it’s a temporary pause—a bardo or between-realms condition—because the New Year awaits the other end of the equation.

Still, the stillness on December 26 is wonderful. It reminds me of waking up in the morning after a silent snowfall that fell through the night. You look out your window onto a transformed world.

This morning, amidst the lull, I wondered: Are New Year’s resolutions still a thing?

They might be for folks younger than, say, 50. But after you turn 50, a refreshing version of ‘why bother’ takes root in your brain pan.

That’s not to say you turn into a toadstool, but after passing that chronological midpoint, the sense that you’re locked in a vector of diminishing returns is both unnerving and freeing.

And yet, regardless of our age, we all have shit that we still need to do. And perhaps a dream or two that we want to take another shot at. But definitely, the ‘do or die’ volume is turned way down.

Here comes the most double-edged part of this post, and it comes as advice or, better said, a friendly, easily disposed-of suggestion:

In the new year, stop imbibing from the endless stream of advice that meets us at every bend in our lives.

It’s like the hippy-inspired ‘life coach’ fad of twenty years ago—once released into the internet—mutated into a draconian shout-fest, turning everyone into logorrheic experts on, well, everything.

We don’t register the unsavory parts of this phenomenon because it’s shrouded by the supposedly good intentions of the purveyors.

But when an entire culture of specialists and influencers (ugh) dominates our attention bandwidth, you know that fear and doubt have become the base note that’s disorienting people worldwide.

Unfortunately, this widespread anxiety brings out the hucksters who have discovered that it’s easier to try and sell confidence as a way to avoid (and counteract) their private moments of doubt and scattershot focus.

Yesterday, I read a Washington Post article talking about how even ‘fun’ and how to experience it is being relegated to the experts.

“Fun has become work, an afterthought, a performance. Fun is now planned, performed, learned. There are books on fun. Coaches for fun. Which means fun is done.”

The remedy. Again, a suggestion: As soon as you encounter someone man- or womansplaining everything to you, take that as a sign to disconnect and find a good book to read — preferably a novel and not another non-fiction ‘how-to’ thing.

Better yet, study the dynamics of what’s going down between you and the self-appointed gurus. What is it in your nature that awakens this sort of exchange? That’s worth inspecting with more scrutiny.

For many people, listening to advice mongers is like watching reels on Instagram or videos on YouTube—it’s a way to kill time. But more telling is that it’s also a way to avoid engaging with whatever we need to engage with to do whatever it is we want to accomplish

People ask me how I write my Sun horoscopes each month. They often comment about how uncannily applicable the forecasts feel. The secret is that I write to the part of the person involved with (or struggling to engage with) their creative process.

I rarely write about specifics because, well, these are fucking Sun sign horoscopes. But when I address the puzzles that arise around creativity—that’s always relevant.

Life has two distinct modes—avoidance/resistance and engagement/creation. That’s about it.

Anyway—blah blah.

This year take an aim to unplug from know-it-alls, experts, blowhards, pundits, ‘influencers’ (ugh), and their ilk. Just leave all of that jabbering behind.

Return to the sovereignty of your life and its innate unknowingness—a human condition that graces us all—be you Elon Musk or the guy making your cappuccino at Starbucks.

Feel and think your way forward at your own pace, with your intuition as your own personal Jesus.

As I tell my clients, unless an idea, a solution, or an approach arises from their inquiry, it’s not gonna stick around, take root, and bloom.

Consider Henry Miller's observation as a complementary/counterpoint to the Simone Weil bromide above: “If we wait until we’re ready, we’ll be waiting for the rest of our lives.”

So, reengage with your life while thinking for yourself.

And then don’t think too much about what other people have to say about whatever you’re thinking about.

Take incremental steps and start doing it, making it, writing it, studying it, composing it, cooking or composting it—whatever.

(Whatever ‘it’ is—well, that’s something between you and your heart’s desire.)

Let the advice-mongers talk among themselves.

Oh, and have fun!

Happy New Year, everyone

Love,

PS: One day is left to take advantage of my 20% off annual paid subscriptions to WOODRUFF. Grab it now!

Opening photograph by Eric Kogan on Boredpanda —with special thanks to Nate Lippens.

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