I’m traveling.
This morning I went out for a walk: the first workout of the day. 75 Hard is on Day 25 today. Ran about half of it because I’m feeling good. Didn’t feel the urge to run all of it, because I didn’t set that as my goal.
I ended (deliberately) at a little coffee joint by some high rise office buildings, ordered a coffee and some nibbles, and sat at a sidewalk table.
Around me are the office workers. The young ones, maybe just a year or two out of school. The middle age ones, looking like the younger ones but 20 years older. All the same, men and women both. All striding to the office from the parking garage. Earnest faces, all.
That’s not my life.
I wonder if they know? I certainly didn’t, when I was just a year or three out of school. It took a few mighty wallops from life’s cluestick to get me on The Path.
I ran and walked by a several high rises with the names of mega-juggernaut law firms in them. I suspect I know what it’s like inside the belly of the beast.
That’s not my life. Thank God.
I feel partially free. That’s what I realized, sitting there.
What would it take to feel totally free?
And what does that even mean, to feel free? Perhaps I am free right now but my self-perception is that of a trapped man.
I have taken on responsibility, voluntarily. It is gnawing at me now. Right now as I type with my thumbs. I know that taking on a voluntary burden makes me a better man. Yet I chaff beneath the load.
A responsibility-free life is undesirable, at least if I want to be happy. Children. Marriage. Work commitments. All of these have made me a better man to the direct degree to which I discharged my voluntarily-assumed commitments.
Anyway. It’s an interesting question. I am “that” close to freedom.
That’s the epiphany of the day.
Maybe it’s the character of the commitments taken on. Maybe that’s where freedom is found.
Or maybe, just maybe 🤔 the Kingdom of God is within. Sheesh. Why do I keep forgetting?
Dream/idea.
Sublease the office (or at least downsize it) because everyone is working remotely. One month’s office rent makes my garage a nice workspace. Two months’ office rent makes it very nice. Three makes it opulent.
Resolutely refocus. Do less better. Again. It’s a continual process. And it works every time.
Put the same thought and effort I have for other things (fitness, business, whatever) into people and relationships.
Time for some deep thinking and writing.
For what it’s worth: “The Road Less Stupid” by Keith Cunningham is good for writing and thinking. Yes, you know how to brainstorm. But it’s worth spending $20 to get a few (more than a few) tactical tips.