2023 was a big, tumultuous year.
It felt like we kept trying, but never had all of the right ingredients to make it happen. Like we opened our fridge to make dinner but only had one carrot and a sriracha-stained jar of mayo.
Recipes changed, rules for what was possible got rewritten, and finish lines moved. There was blanketed instability and a lot of pretending things were “normal”. We toggled between hopeful and hopeless, liberated and confined, and everything in between. We tried to regain our footing but mostly just grew immune to crazy.
Above all, we were confronted with one overwhelming truth: things probably aren’t going to go back to the way they were. And for better or worse, we’re going to have to make this wild west work.
Needless to say, 2023 was not a simple year.
For me, there was a lot of throwing paint at the wall and maximalist over-stuffing. I was overcompensating for dissatisfaction and uncertainty by doing the most. I was in a race to exploit any and every resource, spinning plates on every hand and overgrown toenail.
My response to the world ablaze was to try and plant as many seeds as possible from my crumpled hanky. I wanted them to take before they charred (or no longer held any value).
And this wasn’t all bad.
A hectic flurry generates a lot of movement. In many ways, 2023 felt like three years crammed into one. Each month came with its own multi-chapter novella of ups and downs, wins and losses, boob sweats and camel toes.
But ultimately, last year’s pace taught me that when we're on the run, it’s difficult to be present. In order to create real, lasting memories you have to slow down. Otherwise you’re not truly absorbing—you’re skimming.
Note: This rudimentary epiphany arrived after high-intensity cardio. Sadly, the rumours of spin class euphoria to unlock simple, but buried truths are well, true. We are a mere month of unlimited Rocket Cycle classes away from our own enlightenments.
In other words, the faster we go and the more stress we pile on, the harder it is to shed our to-do’s and clenched ass cheeks. When we’re programmed to “rapid clown juggle” we have zero space left to relax, step back and absorb. We leave no room to creatively design and critically implement our big picture stuff.
And right now as a new way of being emerges, the stage is set to begin our anything-goes, great works. But to do so, we need to be able think clearly and react swiftly.
So, this year, I plan to toss away some junk (and good stuff too), in order to streamline and focus more.
I want to work towards a few things well, instead of a dozen things half-heartedly. I also want to slow down purposefully in order to dig in deeper. As they say, “less is more”. Or “quality over quantity”. Or “one car with heated seats over 6 broken-down Pontiac Sunfires”.
With that in mind, here is a list of my 2024 In-and-Out list:
Note: I can’t (and won’t) say “in and out” without thinking of the leading lady of Le Vieux St-Laurent, Annie. She’s a large, french, Monroe-pierced server that asks after you order the club sandwich, “chew want mayo in and out?”.
The answer is of course, “yes, mayo in and out” and “bless you for asking”.
So, “ere it is”.
In
Aggressively long lunches
Costco sheepskin slippers
Deleting the people on Facebook who 100% have Munchausen that we keep around for our own sick, voyeuristic pleasure (and screenshots)
Candles
Fewer, high-quality ingredients
Jokes
Leaving the phone at home
Sweating
Being cute in a cafe
Only good wine
Resilience
Self-investment
Treating our favourite people
Building stuff we get to keep
Out
Talking about how busy we are
Buying 4 pairs of “horse girl” Wrangler jeans because they were 80% off
All-inclusive vacations
Fast reply rates to group texts (sorry to the members of “Breakfast Clerb”, “State Street”, and “McLovers”)
Going out for dinner 3x a week
Being bored
Seed oils
Two-hour Zoom meetings
Stress headaches before 10am
Thick, really nice hair ;)
Feeling stuck
Being hungover
Binging
Buying
In 2024, our experiment continues.
We are on the frontier of change, and with it comes growing pains and discomfort, but also uncapped opportunity. We’re arriving at places we’ve never seen before and it’s best we have our faculties about us.
We’re going to get to do some cool shit—we just need to make space.