This Past Year
This past year, I’ve discovered what love is. I’ve been trying to describe it and to capture it for a long time, but I think I’ve begun to understand it. I’ve used a lot of different words to describe it, and I’ve been to a lot of places looking for it. I’ve caught glimpses of it in a documentary, a mountain, a meal, a song, an article.
This past year, I divorced all external obligations and decided to explore my own path. After years, I was unable to truly own and be proud of my work and my experience. I was subjecting myself to the pulls and tugs of my environment, unable to operate independently, defined by my own desires and wants. In review season, my performance was divorced from the performance of my work. My compensation was defined by people who were not in a position to qualify my work. My work was defined by an independent corporate strategy of which I played no part.
This past year, I began attaching heavy emotions and thoughts to certain articles and documentaries I came across. Netflix’s Chef’s Table documents the story and struggle of famous chefs around the world. Each episode a chef, each episode a lifelong commitment to capturing an idea. This morning, on the subway ride to my dependable work-from-New York coffeeshop, I read Om Malik’s interview with Bunello Cucinelli, which prompted this post. Brunello’s focus on balance and operating at the highest of levels achieving not only product and brand and luxury success, but also financial success read to me as a blueprint for how I want to form my relationship to my work.
This past year, I was free to float. I was no more bound to San Francisco than I was to New York. Or London, Paris, Amsterdam, Los Angeles, Norway, or Jordan. I was not beholden to a time to clock in and a time to clock out. My work stood on its own, tied to my compensation. If at 2 PM I found myself unproductive, I left home and cooked a meal, listening to some good mellow music, enjoying the day’s sun. My deadlines are tight, and my progress is swift, but I’m working less than I ever have.
This past year, I’ve had a lot of conversations around a particular topic: My attempt and pursuit of beauty and experience; A romantic, rather than a rational approach to life. Much of my struggle professionally has been in my role’s definition as a technical engineer. My attempts at realigning my career failed, so I decided to take ownership over my career trajectory. I choose to continue working on what I’m working on because it makes me happy to do so. I wake up in the morning and ride my bike because it makes me happy to do so. I travel across the world to have a 2 hour lunch in Beirut because it makes me happy to do so. The privilege of my position is not lost on me. The unique combination of youth, time and money is a special gift I have which I will never again have, and squandering it feels like a bigger crime than indulging.
This past year I’ve acknowledged my instinct. It has strong ideas about right and wrong. What fits and what needs to be rejected. It knows, when I meet someone, whether or not I will open my heart and accept that person. It knows when I hold an object, whether that object holds special value to me or not. When I design an experience, whether that experience is good or bad. It knows when I plan my day, whether I will enjoy it or dread it. I’ve begun eliminating negative triggers from my life, and focusing my mental, physical, and interpersonal energies on positive, additive experiences.
This past year, when I read Om’s interview, watch Chef’s Table, talk and spend time with certain people, contemplate my work, I have a clearer idea of what I want and what I think. When my heartbeat speeds up and a warm fire kindles inside, warming me up from my heart out, when my hands feel clammy and my brain tingles, I know I found what I’m looking for. I know I found something that speaks to me. I know I found love.
