Hi lovely friends,
2020 has introduced many new words in our collective vocabulary that were once novel, but now border on cliche and cringe-inducing.
“Unprecedented times”. New normals. Unusual years. Uncertain times. We’ve heard it all before and repeated these now cliche terms over and over.
December prompts a more reflective, still mood. Usually, it’s the time to think about the year that has passed and reflect on how we want to live in the year ahead. But 2020 has turned time into a peculiar force. We feel like time is passing slowly, while speeding up at the same time. We ask ourselves ‘where has the time gone’?
We feel like we’ve accomplished a lot by staying alive in a pandemic, yet berate ourselves for wanting to do more with the ‘extra’ time now on our hands.
As I grapple with this mess of contradicting feelings and strange omens afoot, I also remember that 2020 has been good to me in some ways. It has brought clarity in the midst of immense loss and stress, wonderful friendships and many other things both tangible and intangible to be thankful for. I hope you can find a pocket of time to reflect on your year (and I’m sharing some of my favourite resources below) to help you along.
🆕 What’s new:
I may have found my next binge-worthy fantasy series in The Poppy War: A brilliant exercise in world-building and character development, set against the backdrop of a world grounded in the bloody history of China’s wartime past. On Book 2 now and getting the feels.
To kickstart my writing journey in 2021, I’m participating in Dickie Bush’s #Ship30for30 challenge in January; a challenge to write and publish 1 atomic essay (250 words or less) per day. Not sure how I'll do it this time round, but I'm excited to finally publish some essays that I've been sitting on for ages. More updates to come!
💡 Awesome things I learned this week:
The truth about hard work: Reading this essay was a significant reframing of how I viewed “working hard”: A strong work ethic is universally celebrated in our capitalistic economy, but it isn’t the only perspective to approaching the notion of work. Which is something I’ve been thinking about lately. What is my relationship to my work and my life? Is my life my work or do we work to live? Big questions, not-so-simple answers.
“The concept of Hard Work can not exist without inner conflict. So the opposite of Hard Work is not Easy Work; the opposite of hard work is working in sync. “
A historical primer to reading R.F Kuang’s The Poppy War series. Drawing from history and East Asian culture, I found this essay setting the novel to it’s historical context and explaining its allusions extremely helpful in appreciating the novel. I’ve only read the first book so far, but I love the rich blend of historical and fantasy elements. Excited to read the other two novels in the series!
NPR’s heartfelt tribute to ambient music legend Harold Budd: One of my favourite ambient artists Harold Budd died earlier this month. And this piece reads more as a celebration of his legacy and life, rather than a grief-stricken eulogy. I’m always in awe of how a writer can translate what they hear in music and find the perfect words to describe the form and texture of music, while staying in tune with the emotional experience of listening to music. Absolutely beautiful writing.
My favourite paragraph and a delicate end to an excellent piece:
Although its aura is ethereal and unworldly, Budd's music is actually an exemplary form of humanly useful music. When the mundane urgencies of life, or the nonsense of our political culture, get you frazzled, which is pretty much every day these days, you can put on this music and imbibe its stillness and grace. His records are exactly the kind of music you'd play for calm and solace during a bereavement — or at a service sending someone to their final resting place. Harold Budd sounds like heaven on earth.
📘 Resources to share
Put together your own annual review: We do annual reviews and strategic planning for departments and direct reports, why not do it for yourself too?
Thinking and reflecting is hard work. You need to have the courage to show up honestly and maintain that self-awareness to say “I could have done better here”.
Yes, this is optional work. It’s not mandated by anyone except yourself. But I find that if I don’t take moments like these to stop and think on the year that’s passed, I find myself drifting in an unmapped ocean without direction. And that to me, is more scary than pausing to think.
Sharing some of my favourite resources to conduct your own annual review here:
An illustrated guide to healthy reflection: Use this as a primer before you dive into the other templates. I especially liked her emphasis on not summing up a year as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ and focusing on what you did, versus what happened.
James Clear’s simple 3-question format for his reviews; what went well, what didn’t go so well, what am i working towards?
Patricia Mou’s comprehensive, month-on-month review in Google Sheets.
💬 Quotes I’m thinking about
“Like any good work of art, a home is deeply personal—it’s a reflection of ourselves through how we decorate our spaces—yet it is also meant to be shared.” - Architectural Digest
Before you go
Finally, thank you everyone for following me on this journey and reading my random musings, thought fragments and longer, more-in-depth explorations. I started this biweekly digest to digest what I “note down” (hence the title); and am looking forward to growing this little newsletter in 2021.
Stay safe, and happy holidays.
See you in 2021!
Joshua
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Loved this! I need to sit down in the next week and do my own annual review, which is something I'm pretty bad at.