Hey! In case you missed last time, you’re receiving this because you’re a supporting force in my life; someone I’d like to stay in orbit with. Below, I share a bit about what life’s like these days.
Writing this is only 5% of the fun — I hope much more joy comes from the follow up walks and conversations I’ll share with some of you. Just click [here](mailto:[email protected]?subject=catching%20up%20from%20orbit&body=hey%2C%20saw%20your%20orbit%20from%20may%20and%20would%20love%20to%20catch%20up.%20I%27m%20%5BIN%2FNOT%20IN%5D%20NYC%20%5Badd%20dates%20if%20relevant%5D%20-%20when%20works%20for%20you%3F) and hit send if you want to catch up; I’ll take care of the rest.
I'm in a season of life where nothing is obviously trying to reshape me, and I don't fully trust who I am without a fire aimed in my face.
For as long as I can remember, there’s been a forge nearby: school, recruiting, new job, new city, a crisis of self — an obvious Story to take part in. A big hill to run up. It gave my self-respect an easy anchor. Effort was undeniable; difficulty was obvious; the rest tended to follow.
Things have cooled; life is… good. That cooling has made room for the uncomfortable realization of how much of my identity was wrapped up in being effective under pressure. A quiet voice keeps asking: if there’s no grind, crisis, or deadline, am I still who I think I am? Or have I quietly started coasting, and just haven’t admitted it?
The obvious move would be to give myself a new hill. Make work the mountain again, or pick some other clearly hard thing and get climbing; I know that playbook well. Even writing this, I can feel how instantly a Big Goal would quiet the anxious hum. But something in the cooling is telling me to stay here a bit longer. The unsettledness is interesting, if uncomfortable, and I don’t want to drown it out by cranking the heat back up just to feel steadier.
The nervous thought underneath: if I pick up something difficult and really lean in, I might find out I’ve lost a gear. As long as I don't fully commit, though, the old mythology rests undisturbed. "I can step into the forge whenever I want." Comforting! Untested.
Day to day, I feel the extra horsepower sloshing around. Much of it lands in the usual sludge. The rest of it lands well: cooking and hosting again, picking up and finishing more good books. I’m paying more attention to texture and beauty — clothes that feel good, a tidy apartment, the things that catch the 5pm moonlight on an early winter walk. The kind of aesthetic focus past versions of myself would've called a waste.
A few friends wrote me cards this year. Reading them back, I noticed what wasn't in them — any of the ways I measure myself on whether I'm earning my keep. Someone wrote about my keeping groups "grounded, cohesive, and intentional." Others mentioned goofiness, a safe and reliable ear, an interesting perspective, an earnest question.
One card said: I wish you all the happiness always, but for this year I especially wish for you to feel grounded, fulfilled, and loved — so you can take new risks and explore, knowing there's a love to come home to.
The line’s been doing loops in my head. This foundation I've built over the last few years — if I'm not going to use it to do anything weird, to be more of me, what was the point of pushing this hard?
I don't have an answer yet.
I threw myself a birthday dinner last month. I roped ten friends into "home-akase," where everyone made and served a dish to the group, course by course. I ran to three fish markets to secure the goods, set up the spreadsheet, the prep station, the on-deck station, the whole shebang.