not just one

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. 

Not Just One ThingJanuary 20th

Good morning, friend.The best part about reading books by dead people is it’s shockingly difficult for them to change their opinion. It brings a level of certainty to the whole thing—unless some nosey bastard goes digging around in the journals of the deceased, what you read is what you (for the most part) get. But it’s that same fact that creates a trap in our thinking when it comes to reading history, the words of our dearly departed strangers. Because writing that can be read requires a system of ordering. When you write something, you write it with a point. A collecting principle. After all, who would go down to the trouble of sitting down and writing anything without good reason? We look to great biographers to find the through-lines of people’s lives, to wrap up all the contradictions of living into a singular, well-written document.Of course, it’s easy to trick ourselves into thinking that people work that way in the real world.But real-life people have no singular collecting principle. They’re multitudes. A mixture of intention and circumstance that create the many edges and facets of the people we love. There’s permission hidden inside of that truth, too. Permission to like elements of people you collectively dislike. Permission to dislike things about people you collectively love.Permission to do the same thing with yourself, too.Because after all, whether you love or hate yourself, you haven’t really clarified which self you love or hate. Journal Prompt: What are two opposite sides of yourself?