I’m writing this blog in 23 minutes, but I try to believe I have all the time in the world.
The other day, I was watching a TV show with my mom. Three renowned, German chefs travel across the US and Canada in a mobile home. At one point, the oldest of the guys reminds them that he’s almost 60. “I’ll be lucky if I see another 25 summers.” Ali, who’s ten years younger, gets visibly emotional on camera. “We really don’t have that much time!”
It’s true. There are only so many hours in this life, and if we don’t grab a good chunk of them and dedicate them to the things we truly care about, they’ll be gone before we now it. Hence, this blog. Every morning.
That said, over the years, I have discovered urgency only helps on one time frame: the 24 hours you are on right now. Beyond that, short-sighted thinking and mid-term pressure have done nothing for me. I discovered I mainly wanted to write books in 2021. All of the detours I took since then to make money, they feel like distractions. And many of them didn’t work out regardless.
You’d think writing books is an extreme example of goals which take a long time, but is it? Writing great songs. Being an exemplary parent. Building a local community. None of that happens in a year or two.
I don’t know what it was about Hermann Hesse’s Steppenwolf, but that book showed me the eternity mindset: Put in a little work every day, but pretend you have endless lifetimes to accomplish what counts. Will it yield better books, sounder choices, a happier life? I’m too young to know—but I guess I have all the time in the world to find out.