Made for you

Hello friend—you’re receiving this email as a part of morning reading, a daily reflection on the parts of life worth living for that you signed up for sometime last year. I've got a laundry list of additions, designs updates, and website pieces I want to make, but ultimately, I just wanted to bring this back. Thank you for reading, and a very happy New Year. 

MADE FOR YOUJanuary 5th

Good morning, friend.Here’s a secret: most people get most things wrong, us included. The us part is the secret part. We’re usually pretty aware of it in others. It’s one of the real kicks-in-the-head from life when you start getting objective about it: we are probably, at a minimum, wrong about 20% of the stuff we think. Trouble is, we have no idea which 20% we’re wrong about. It’s not just the stuff out there, per se. The external things, like voting democrat or how to make the perfect chocolate chip cookie. There’s a lot of internal stuff too. The plans we make, the dreams we hold, the squirming bucket of ambition, trauma, pride, insecurity, and fear that tends to cover up our otherwise-unabashed desires. We’re wrong about those things, too. At least some of them. Which sucks, because life has no pause button. No time to sort it all out. Tomorrow is never less than 24 hours away, and you’re up next, forced to live your life with choices and believes you know have to be at least partially incorrect. There’s a line from the Christian Bible, in the Gospel of Mark, where some people are trying to come after Jesus and his disciples for gathering food on the Sabbath—violating one of those internal laws they felt so clearly was correct. Jesus gives them this simple answer: the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. It’s a good reminder behind every to-do list, every goal, even every belief and expression—this thing is here for you. You are not here for it. The next time you find yourself staying home from the gym, it is certainly possible it’s because you were undisciplined. But it’s also possible that you were actually wrong about going today in the first place—the gym was created to help you reach your goals. Not the other way around.Because all those to-do lists? The things you make for yourself? The aspirations, 5 year plans, flow charts and graphs?They’re made for you.Not you for them. Journal Prompt: is there a goal you need to let go of?