⏳ Erebus Growing | 0025 - Changing your life is simple

Welcome to Erebus Growing, a weekly email where I share little snippets of life to help you change and grow into your highest life.

This week, on my drive to my 9-5 on Monday morning, I saw a father crossing the road with his son on the way to the park.

It reminded me that I want to have kids (specifically, I want to adopt) and in order to do that right now, I need money.

Being responsible for another human being can be expensive.

But getting that reminder of the fact that I want to raise kids, well, it struck me.

That’s why I took on the extra burden of a part-time job for a while. I need the money to pay off a couple of personal loans and some credit cards and bring some stability.

The good news is I was privileged to pick up a part-time where I can start building a bridge to my eventual full-time of The Living Room (my relaxed bookstore with tons of plants, upcycled furniture, and some sort of simple coffee shop situation).

If I have to take on an extra burden to earn money quickly and easily by trading away more of my time, I’m going to make it worth my investment in more than one way. I work at a home improvement store in the lawn and garden section, so it’s a nice way to learn more about something I’ve developed a growing interest in.

👨🏻‍💻 Meditation

This past week, I’ve been thinking a lot about my ideal life.

I’ve been really considering what I want it to look like, why I want it to look that way, and why I’m doing the things I’m doing now.

And I keep coming back to a central theme:

It’s not easy to change your life.

But there are, in my mind, three things you need to know:

1. What do you want?

2. Why do you want it?

3. Why are you doing what you are now?

Unsurprisingly, exactly the things I’ve been thinking about this past week.

It all leads back to my theme: in order to become your future self, act as your future self.

One way to change your life, perhaps even the only way, is to align your actions and decisions today with your future self.

When I started to change my life, I thought twenty steps ahead. I said “I can’t spend 2 hours in the gym” and so I didn’t even spend 20 minutes. I said “I can’t go without eating meat” and so I didn’t even try to cut it out of my diet.

I fell into the trap of comparing my day 1 to someone else’s day 400.

In reality, the way it works, and when things shifted for me, is by changing today.

I can choose not to eat meat today.

I can choose to get on my rowing machine today.

I can’t control tomorrow Jeff, but I can control today Jeff.

And that’s the important part.

Changing your life is just making the right decision over and over again.

It’s saying “I just need to work out today.”

As you go through your day, you have to consider your actions in light of your ideal life and do what your ideal self would do.

What would future Jeff do?

What would future [INSERT YOUR NAME HERE] do?

And then you do it.

And you build your muscle such that in the near future, you’re just that person.

Changing your life is simpler than you think, but it requires that you see the future while changing the present. And a whole lot of trust that deep down, things are changing.

📚 Inspiration and Resources
Every week we all consume content and I share my favorites here.

Read.
This article from the Harvard Business Review came across my inbox a few weeks ago. Titled Stop Fighting Fires, it goes into the world of dealing with problems in organizations (particularly tech orgs) but has application to any business place. I’ve always heard about how many “fires” my supervisors spend time putting out. Or how everything is always “urgent” and “critical” that everything else has to be dropped to respond. Strangely enough, I’ve never truly had that (barring actual emergency situations). Why? Because I build systems for myself to attack the root cause or continuously collect information that I can easily export. It’s an interesting read, no question. Give it a read here.

📓 Journaling Prompt
Journaling is one of the most important things to do when exploring our own lives. A new prompt for you to use this week is below.

What is one small action that you could start doing every day that your ideal self does?

Until next time, I wish you enough and send you off with love and a sense of urgency in your life.