Well, we’re back and it’s now 2020.
Show of hands, how many of you reading this have already written the incorrect year on something?
I’ve done it twice already.
If you’re like me, you’re spending your holidays period, at least in part looking at what’s happened and what’s to come.
I’m not really a “goal” person, so I don’t set those kinds of targets for myself - I tend to focus on things that I want to do more consistently over the coming year to be happier, healthier and more fulfilled.
So this post is going to take a slightly different approach - I’m going to ramble a bit, philosophize a smidge, and share some of my basic thoughts about life.
Down the bottom, there’s a blurb about last week’s teaser post, but if you want to check out my story about a past New Year’s Eve (which is a pretty hot story, if I do say so myself), then you can just go here.
Looking Forward and Back Through Time
I always enjoy this time of year because it lets me do a bit of intellectual time traveling - I think back to the stuff that went on over the last twelve months, and then look outwards to contemplate what I want to do over this coming year.
A little bit about me if you don’t know this already - I don’t live a life of regret.
There are very few instances in my life where I have long-term regrets because I think that’s a toxic waste of energy.
If there’s something that I’m aware of that I’ve either done wrong or something where I’d like a “do over”, I spend the time to make it right, or I move past it.
No good comes from living life in the past thinking about what you could have done differently.
I had a small health issue earlier in 2019 and while it was never life-threatening or anything like that, it did make me realize, maybe for the first time, that I’m not ten feet tall and bulletproof.
It would be trite to say three days in the hospital for an infection makes you understand your own mortality, but it does offer some level of perspective.
When I came out of the hospital, I took another two weeks off work. That’s pretty rare for me because I don’t see work as a “chore” so much as “intellectually working out” - it’s like exercise for my brain.
Many people at work thought I was either very ill and hiding it.
The people who know me best knew that I was probably just recovering and thinking, so when I came back, there were three calendar invitations waiting for me: our firm’s internal psychologist, Georgia (our Office Admin Manager), and my boss, our CEO.
Georgia just wanted to make sure that I was ok and to make sure I wasn’t having some weird, mid-life crisis. She was just being a friend.
Our psychologist was checking to make sure that I wasn’t coming back too early and that my headspace was good before I started to make decisions again. Part of it was a genuine personal concern, but another part was making sure that our insurance was not at risk by someone in my position not being “fit for duty” and making decisions.
I respected her approach because as a partner, she’s protecting my interests.
The conversation with my boss was a bit different - he knew that my time off was a sign I was looking to make some changes in my life.
Very rarely in life do you get to say that you love another man, but I love him - he’s someone who I know would burn everything he’s ever made or owned to the ground to protect me, and he knows that I’d happily live on the street to do the same for him.
There was no beating around the bush - my work schedule was a problem, the travel was too much, and I needed to manage more and do less.
Ultimately, he and most of the partners in our firm, probably see me as the logical successor to him at some time over the next decade.
That’s always something that I just took for granted as probably my next logical step professionally, but coming out the back of that issue, I wasn’t so sure I wanted to put the work in. Maybe, I wanted to cut back, live off the fat of the land that I’d created for myself, and just enjoy life a bit more.
We agreed that my path to his chair would be different than his path to the same seat from our Founding Partner… and that was “ok”.
It’s something we’re going to explore this year a bit more in 2020, but either way, we cut back my travel, I promoted a couple of people to reduce my direct workload, and I made a mental decision to invest more time in personal interest hobbies (like this newsletter and Medium).
The professional element of my personality is a huge part of who I am as an individual, but I’ve struggled to put that balance right.
My wife, Mel, and I have a pretty exceptional relationship - we’re best friends.
We have a few common interests, we enjoy spending time together, and we have the amazing capability of being able to be in the same room together for extended periods of time and not talking, but still enjoying it.
We also don’t fight and argue very often at all.
On this vacation that we’re on right now as I write this, we’ve decided that this year, we’re going to make an effort to take more road trips together. I have MONTHS of annual leave accrued, so I’m going to start taking some of that and we’ll hop in the SUV and go somewhere for a few days.
My son, Boy-o McBoyo, is 16-years-old now and he’s transitioning from a boy to a man in his own right - that’s a weird thing to have happen in front of you. Mel is struggling a bit with it, but I’m enjoying the change.
I’ve decided that this year, he and I are going to explore some mutual interests together that doesn’t involve a sport. The idea is that we’ll spend some time together as friends, rather than just “Father and Son”.
Long-term, that’s how our relationship will evolve - I like him as a person beyond the fact that he’s my son, so finding a way to spend time together that we both enjoy will help make sure that we stay connected as he grows up more and needs us less.
So that’s family and work covered… What about personal development?
I think it’s important to see yourself always as a work in progress.
I’m never going to be the “finished article” of myself - there’s always going to be something that I’d like to improve or grow into.
One thing that people do, which I think is a toxic personality trait, is that they see themselves in a negative light and identify flaws in themselves. They then decide to “fix” that thing.
I look at areas where I want to grow and expand - it’s a much more positive way of seeing yourself and the world. The world is a better place and the people around me are better off if I’m working to be the best version of myself at all times.
In 2019, I rediscovered my joy of writing without having a purpose - writing business books or even erotic fiction novels is very structured writing and after a while, it ceases to be enjoyable.
I love writing and in 2018, it became something I resented and found to be a chore.
About three months ago, I ended up in something of a dispute with Amazon about my Kindle books under my erotic fiction pen name and one of Mel’s online businesses. It’s a minor legal dispute, there are lawyers involved, and to be fair to Amazon, they’re constructively working through it with my people, but I decided in late October to just pull all of the books.
I don’t need the money and I don’t know if I’ll ever republish them once we figure out this problem - pulling them down helped Mel out, Amazon was satisfied with that outcome, and now both sides are trying to find a way to remedy the situation.
But either way, I had started to hate writing them, so I stopped. I’d spent a bunch of time over the last two years planning out this massive connected universe, but then when it came time to start hitting the keys, I had no desire.
The downside of that is that I had to let my editor go in November. She and I had worked together closely for a couple of years, but over the last twelve months, I had her doing “busy work” while I searched for my mojo and worked on this issue with Amazon.
In the early part of November, she asked me if I really needed her anymore and so after a long conversation, we agreed that she could go look for other projects. Within two days, she had something she was very excited about, and so I paid her three months’ salary and wished her well.
It was bittersweet. I loved having her available immediately on text, but she was bored and had started to feel superfluous - that’s a very negative thing for someone.
Looking forward to 2020, I’m still going to keep doing this kind of writing because I’m enjoying it. I don’t think I’ll write quite as much as I did between August and November, but I’ll have a regular cadence because it’s fun.
I’m also looking at picking up a whole new hobby.
Ok, it’s not necessarily true that it’s “new” - it was something that I enjoyed while I was younger, but have regained an appreciation for in the last couple of months.
It’s not a “cheap” hobby, so I think what I’m going to do is use my “mad money” from Medium to fund it - that way I’ll have an impetus to keep doing both.
Beyond that… More of the same.
My life is pretty good, I had a fun and enjoyable 2019, so hopefully, 2020 will be more of the same.
Last Week’s Story Teaser - “Bringing In The New Year With A Bang”
As I mentioned in the last one of these emails and posts, I asked if you wanted to read a story about an adventurous New Year’s Eve that I had a few years back.
The response was an overwhelming, “Yes”, so I wrote and published the piece.
Without giving too much away because you need to read it, this experience was very different for me… That’s all I’m going to say.
To check it out, click the button below.
And with that, I’ll bring this one to a close…
This was a little different, maybe a bit more personal and introspective. If you liked this style of post, please feel free to smash the little heart button to like it or reply and let me know what you thought.
I hope 2020 is the best year of your life and is the start of even bigger things for you!
I just want to end by taking the time to say thanks for gracing me with the honor of dropping into your inbox periodically and for you taking the time to occasionally read my filth.
So much of the feedback that I’ve gotten from everyone over the last few months has been so overwhelmingly positive that it has truly been inspirational and I really need to thank you all for that - you’ve helped re-invigorate my love of writing.
Talk Again Soon,
DJ