I’ve tried blogging almost a decade ago but it never seemed to work out for me. We set up manilatomorocco.com to chronicle our honeymoon registry in 2008. Then we started tinytweaks.com since my husband and I wanted to share how little changes in lifestyle can contribute to lifelong improvements. Both are no longer available online. I said then that maybe blogging was not for me since I can’t seem to stick to it.

I started http://www.wandermench.com as my personal blog to initially share my London Marathon fundraising project two years ago. Early posts were mostly about running, travel or a combination of both. Then I stopped again since life got in the way and I lost my rhythm creating content. I also just focused on training and building a business and started to feel that I don’t have to share everything on the blog (or on social media).

Last year I got extra curious about building habits. So I wanted to experiment with my blogging routine and give it one more shot. I also wanted to apply techniques on habits that I’ve been reading about and share these as well while I was going through the journey. So reaching 100 posts is a real milestone for me. Most important insight during this experiment is that habits stick if you don’t make it hard for yourself to adhere to doing it everyday. Simplifying and taking the path of least resistance are necessary to imprint habits. Moving on to the next hundred posts! 

People strive for balance. Work-life, passion-purpose, self-others, etc. It is not easy though to be in a state of equilibrium, it takes a lot of willpower and thought to execute and carry out. Juggling several things at the same time is serious business. Something eventually has to give in the quest to reach this elusive state. 

I’d like to instead work towards a state of flow, where one aspect of my life eases into another. Flow is typically defined as being in the zone as you perform at optimal levels. When in flow, time seems to stop as you intently focus on what is right in front of you. It is being fully present and giving one’s full self to the task on hand. And then you transition seamlessly into another aspect of your life, also giving it the same energy and vigor. Individuals who are at the top of their game, from sports to business,  perform well because they are able to harness their natural flow and have mastered turning on and off their intensity buttons. 

Flow is also about embracing the movement between seemingly contradicting states.  From lightness to groundedness, from whimsy to steady, from social to introspective, from reckless to responsible, from caring too much to not giving a shit. So I’d like to flow more and have this focus and fluidity mark the way I live each day. 

It’s quite ironic that you need to create space to fill up your being. Space can come in different forms. It could be through solitude as you deliberately take off to experience silence in its entirety. It may be through paring down to the essentials, ridding yourself of excesses that you’ve allowed to be your norm. It could be by doing nothing, allowing yourself some slack and time off without any agenda. Today at yoga it was about creating space so you can go deeper into the pose and give more of yourself to practice. 

In our world where busyness is a badge of honor that we wear proudly, idle time is frowned upon and considered as wasting time. It is interesting though that the best performing individuals, those who are at the peak of their game, show otherwise. They factor in time for recovery and are able to switch on their competitive streak at will. Recovery allows the body to perform at a higher level because of renewed energy. More importantly though, it allows for the mind to imprint the movement into the unconscious so that the conscious mind can focus on making further improvements. 

The habit of creating space is necessary for lifelong learning. We take in what we need at the moment but should be ready to let this go when it does not suit our purpose and context anymore. This cycle of purging and filling up our mental and emotional tool kit is a constant practice that takes us closer everyday to who we ought and aspire to be in this world. 

I was browsing through Kinfolk’s Home issue and I chanced upon a line that resonated with me: “I give myself the right to explore things I find interesting.” This caught my attention because it is something that I want to be guided by as well. It ties back to choosing to live with increased curiosity. And curiosity is not just about seeking new experiences but being inquisitive about how we are as we go through even the most ordinary and mundane parts of our every day living. It is an introspection of sorts that calls for us to be fully present and engaged in moments that we choose to spend our time on.

Now what do I find interesting lately? Methods of living and being has been on my mind. I’m also interested in presence, process and practice. I’m curious to know what I may fill my mental and emotional toolkit with and which ones I can get rid of. I ponder on who and what I should spend my time on. I wonder how I can pare down my excesses further. I still am into habits and performance. 

These are most likely the things I will be writing and reading about. It feels good to be guided on what to consume. There’s nothing wrong with being aimless sometimes but there is something about being deliberate in what we do and take in. A good balance of both is healthy. I like thriving in contradictions anyway, part of the whole learning exercise. 

The start of the year sets off with thinking about what we want to achieve for the new year. Resolutions abound, bucket lists are revisited, goals are made. We feel energized knowing that we have set these for ourselves and that we can look forward to a year of making these happen. 

But then life gets in the way, old habits resurface. All these things get shelved and before you know it, it’s the middle of the year then the end of the year. Why didn’t we accomplish any of the things we said we would do? Perhaps it is because we were just fixated with the goals but did not plan on how to make it happen. We set ourselves up for failure if we just focus on the goals without planning for the practice. And it is the everyday showing up that is the best mark for progress and an early indicator of success. 

Process entails having systems in place with an end in mind. It is mapping out how you get to a point where the action becomes second nature. Essentially it is about building habits that stick. So even if the goal may not be fully achieved because it was just audacious, there is marked progress and you have acquired significant gains. Plus you have good habits that may last you for years to come. 

I had an interesting conversation with an old friend and I listened intently as he talked about how he wants to take a year off to just explore what he really wants to do with his career. He is brimming with ideas, filled with energy that he just wants to direct towards discovering that which he will pour his heart into for the next years. We talked about how this year is about taking things slow and trying out different things so he may move full steam ahead once he has sorted out his personal compass. 

The dialogue brought to mind a passage I read in The Daily Stoic:

“Let all your efforts be directed to something, let it keep that end in view. It’s not activity that disturbs people, but false conceptions of things that drive them mad.” —SENECA, ON TRANQUILITY OF MIND

In our quest for meaning, it is important that we are led by a purpose that is much bigger than us. Purpose drives passion and passion drives action. It is the lens through which we see the world and dictates what we say yes or no to. It is what gives us courage to fail, knowing that we are going through this to come closer each day to our life goal. But as I mentioned in a previous post, if we are not sure where our passion lies, let us be curious for now and explore what sticks and resonates with us. The key is to be keen as we discover, to be sensitive to the things that energize us. A life without passion nor curiosity is just a daily hustle. 

I saw a lot of people’s feeds stating that they will say “no” more this year. Maybe just like me they felt that they spread themselves too thinly in the past, just saying yes to things because it sounded kinda fun. Or maybe saying yes because it seemed cool and would look great on social media. We have really been too obsessed with social approval that we do things not for their own sake anymore. 

This year is about focus and going full steam ahead. I can only achieve this if I free up time to just do what I set out to do. The good thing is that it is clear where I want to take myself in the major aspects of my life. This clarity affords me the attention needed to move forward. I just have to save myself from my tendencies and distractions. I have a lot of these curiosities and it’s not entirely a bad thing until I end up not accomplishing anything that takes me closer to where I want to go. 

More than saying no as a theme for 2017, I’d like to spin it positively. Borrowing shamelessly from Derek Sivers, this will be a year of “hell yeah! “, saying yes only to those things that clearly make my heart soar. So I say yes to playing bigger, loving wholeheartedly everyday and moving towards the peak of my game. 

I spent the break just consuming all sorts of content. I was tempted to write but I knew that I had to fill up my well with ideas, insights and experiences so I may churn out better content. It was also a time to think about the themes and topics that I would like to devote my time reading and writing. And I will continue to write for no one else but myself and therefore I will write about things that make my heart sing. These are stuff that will help illuminate the question “How can I continue to live a meaningful life?”

So below are just some of the topics I will be sharing in the blog this year. 

• Focus and Clarity
• Coping with Uncertainty 
• Being Comfortable with Experimentation 
• Being Choosy
• Productivity and Presence
• Curiosity 
• Purpose and Passion 
• Redefining Success
• Vulnerablilty 
• Courage to Fail
• Showing Up 
• Putting Yourself Out There 
• Start Up Life
• Mastery and Excellence
• Practice 
• Self Care
• Mastering Your State
• Beautiful Language 

I am excited to add to this list as the months roll by. Happy New Year! 

I can’t remember when was the last time I really wanted a specific thing for Christmas. People ask me what I’d like to receive as a gift and I usually have a hard time responding since nothing really comes to mind. I just end up asking for something ordinary, simple or useful like a white shirt. But if I were forced to come up with a list, I would ask for the following:

Time –  I realized that my two most important languages of love are time and touch. But time is at the top of my list. Give me your undivided time and attention. Choose to waste it with me. Let us while away the hours talking about everything and anything. Find time for me. If you can’t, make time. Show me that there is nothing else you’d rather do at this particular instance than be with me. Let us linger over copious amounts of whatever we choose to drink and just let the world around us go by.  This is the same thing I give to those closest to my heart. 

Presence – tied in closely to time is being present. I value you being truly there. I like it when you set your phone aside and consequently set all those that are worrying or occupying your mind aside as well. Or you can just openly talk about those things. Choose to be with me fully. Focus on enjoying every bit of our conversation. Listen, even if you don’t say anything after I’ve spent hours just ranting. Show me that there’s no place you’d rather be than where you are now, alongside me. 

Moments – let us experience things together. Let us do fun, crazy stuff that we will both remember when we are old and brittle. Or help me remember these things when I’ve had a little too much fun. Whisk me off to try something new. Make me say yes to do things I’m scared the shit of. Have my back when I finally agree to do so. Create memories with me.

Wonder- take me to places that take my breath away. Even if these are not in far away lands. Surprise me and sweep me off my feet. The littlest things can do this to me. I’m not exactly interested in the grand and expensive gestures. The seemingly mundane things that you do because you know it’ll make me giddily giggle works just fine. Freely talk to me about topics that will make my mind wonder too. 

Solitude – if you know me well, you will understand that I love going off for long periods on my own. Silence and solitude are essential to my being. It is the fuel that I need so I can give more to the people and things that matter. It is the self care that works wonders for me. I long for it and I seek it. I always go back to it when I’m at my saddest and also when I’m at my happiest. 

This is my all-occasion gift list and I don’t think it’ll change much in the years to come. Have a blessed Christmas! 

Everyday, I am greeted by a lady security guard at the gym with a hearty “Have an excellent morning, ma’am!”. It never fails to brighten my day, even if I woke up with a bad hang over or a crazy night. It is not the usual greeting and it rises above the mandatory welcome. What intrigued me though was what her definition is of an excellent morning. It would be interesting to know and one of these days I will ask her.

Excellence is what we ultimately strive for, in all that we do. But each one has his her own definition of this similar to how success is different for every individual. Thus it is important to take a step back and carve what this means for us. Otherwise we just go through the motion day in and day out, and nothing really matters much. Otherwise we let others define this for us. 

So even if we are not sure whether what we are doing is that which we will pour our hearts into, let us strive for mastery. The act of doing so brings us closer to what it is we ought to be. Have an excellent morning!