Happy New Year from the Last Homely House! Contrary to how Christmas went for us, New Years has been lovely. It’s a non-holiday for us, in the sense that we have no family rituals and mostly just treat it as another day. But that is an important lesson about expectations - have no expectations, and anything pretty good seems, well, pretty good!
It was unseasonably warm here - about 45 degrees this morning - so I decided to go out for a paddle on my stand-up paddle board.
I have a seat I can clip on it and convert it to quasi-kayak, but I hadn’t been out in stand-up mode for a while, so I decided that was what I wanted to do. It’s probably not the brightest choice, and I think maybe a little arrogance was involved, because I have fallen in many times while doing stand-up - it only takes hitting the fin on some hidden branch or sandbar and you are ass-over-tea-kettle in the water before you know it, and although the air temp was forgiving, the water had ice floating in it, and the combination of being wet (even in a wet suit) and cooler temperatures is not great. But I was lucky and had a nice hour on the water. And I made this video specifically thinking of you:
I also tried my hand today at making beef bourguignon courtesy of this recipe from Ina Garten.
It’s a fairly forgiving recipe (as are most stews), but it does require several steps. We had my father and his wife over for dinner and everyone enjoyed it. It’s great that it actually calls for you to soak your bread in the stew - I feel like an oafish Tony Soprano when I do that most of the time.
So it’s New Years and time to think of things we did last year and will do this year. One thing I am thinking of doing is splitting this newsletter into two separate emails - a links letter and a weekly essay. While you all continue to open the letter at a very high rate, I see few clicks on the links, which tells me you are probably burning out because of my blather. So maybe less more often? We’ll see. Either way, there won’t be a links section today, other than what I integrate into what used to be the introductory section. So let me give you a few thoughts of reflection.
First, I set up a Google Sheet at the beginning of last year with a set of daily goals with weekly total targets. This was based on my reading of James Clear’s Atomic Habits. Great book - I still recommend it. Clear made it clear (ha ha - see what I did there?) that a focus on outcome will get in the way of actually achieving your goals. I later read BJ Fogg’s Tiny Habits which I recommend even more than Atomic Habits (though they are both great), and Fogg basically said the same thing. Or more likely, Clear said the same thing as Fogg, because Fogg has been around longer. But regardless, instead of focusing on your goal, you have to focus on process. Want to write a novel? Set up a process of writing every day. Fogg is great because he will tell you just set up a habit of sitting down at your desk for 5 minutes and opening your word processor. Don’t have a word count. Just get yourself into the chair. Starting is the hardest part. And you know what, I found this to be genuinely true.
My google sheet started with some unrealistic goals and I had to pare them back. But many of them stuck. For example, I set a goal of reading 10 pages from two books each day. Both books had to be developmental - something that would help me be better at my job as a researcher or teacher, or better as a human being. One book had to be challenging - I read Nozick’s The Examined Life, for example - and one could be “popular” - I read things like Authentic Leadership (don’t bother) and Brooks’ From Strength to Strength (definitely worth your time). Eventually I softened on the two books thing and maybe got a bit less strict about reading something challenging - but as a result of this discipline, I read 42 books that were developmental this year. I was stunned by how this modest commitment to read 20 pages per day rapidly turned into me chugging through book after book. I haven’t read 42 books in a year since… well, I don’t know when. I read all the time, but in recent years I felt like I had been spending too much time on the internet, which is what spurred this goal. I have to add, not only did I read 42 developmental books, but I read 13 novels, and listened to 12 audio books, for a total of 67 books this year. It was completely unexpected to hit that many titles, but once I put ass-to-chair and started reading, it was easy to go beyond the 20 pages. I read fewer magazines and watched fewer Netflix videos, and I do not regret that sacrifice.
Not everything worked out from the sheet - just because it was there didn’t mean I actually did it. But I kept myself accountable by keeping track of the failures as well as the successes. The reading success has me really excited to double down on this approach for 2023. If you’re interested in seeing my sheet, you can view it here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1YLDgU6R8eGB5TdcGPhkUEoYvPXALyLGF5aAaEvgMcNw/edit?usp=sharing I’m not totally proud of it - I regularly missed targets for things that were important to me. But I share it so that you can think about whether it is something you might want to try. The book success was all about process rather than goals. Other things, like my research goals, had to be revised down to require less time in order to be able to say I had succeeded for the day. Fogg talks about trying to build a habit of flossing your teeth. He says, just commit to flossing one tooth. The beauty of that is, you can stop at one tooth, but once you are going, who is really going to stop at one?
For 2023, try establishing a new weekly habit - preferably a daily one. But make it super easy for you to declare success. Want to work out more? Set a goal of doing one push up each day. If you do 10 or 20 or 50, great, but if you do one, call it a success and give yourself a gold star on your spreadsheet. Serious - get the Fogg book - now is the time to read it!
For 2023, my wife and I are both going to be doing a Photo 365, which means we are going to take a photo every day. Here’s day 1:
We went out for a sunrise walk this morning. I think that’s a great way to start a new year - walking up the hill into the sunshine, a bit of fog because the future is always uncertain.
OK - so links will come in a separate email later this week. In the meantime, as you begin this new year, I wish you and your families and friends good!
Thanks for reading and see you next week! If you come across any interesting stories, won't you send them my way? I'd love to hear what you think of these suggestions, and I'd love to get suggestions from you. Feel free to drop me a line at mark.bonica@unh.edu , or you can tweet to me at @mbonica .
If you’re looking for a searchable archive, you can see my draft folder here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1jwGLdjsb1WKtgH_2C-_3VvrYCtqLplFO?usp=sharing
Finally, if you find these links interesting, won’t you tell a friend? They can subscribe here: https://markbonica.substack.com/welcome
See you next week!
Mark
“The meaning of life is to find your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away.” – Pablo Picaso