Week 10: Putting it all together

Time to read: 1.25 minutes

This duck says, "keep reading!"

This summer started with a simple idea: you create your days, weeks, and years. Not the news, not the people who behave badly — you.

We talked about living well is not optional homework, it's the whole assignment. We talked about being well-used and spending your life on worthy pursuits. We talked about how regret rarely comes from what we did, but from what we quietly never did. We talked about being the change you wish to see, one interaction at a time.

Here's what ties all of it together: None of this was ever about the world getting easier or kinder or more sane. It was about you deciding who you're going to be in this world, no matter what.

You choose your response, effort, kindness, integrity, and entire being, consistently, over time, in small and big ways.

Creating your life was never going to be a choice you make once. Your life is an accumulation of small choices, made every day. To be honest, even when it's hard. To be grateful when you want to be rude. To take a break when the words you are about to say are not helpful. To clean up your messes when you inevitably make them (because you are human).

Multiply those choices by a life. That's what "creating your life" looks like from the inside.

So as summer winds down, here's your homework: Keep going. Keep choosing. Keep being well-used. Keep showing up as the person you've decided to be — one day, one choice, one person at a time.

That's the whole purpose of this life.

Live well!

Week 3: Was Your Day Worth It?

Time to read: 59 seconds

One thing I do with my wild and precious life is buy and sell beautiful things, mostly jewelry.

Last week I promised to talk about being"well-used." Here's what I mean.

A well-used life isn't one where nothing goes to waste, where every hour is optimized and every talent monetized. That's maximizing, not meaning. And honestly, this form of well-used is exhausting. (Believe me, I know.)

Being well-used means your days are in service of something that matters. Your effort, attention, and particular mix of skills and quirks are spent on things worth spending them on. Who measures that worth? YOU!

Some days that looks like showing up fully for someone who needs you. Other days it's the quiet satisfaction of work done carefully. In my world it's a coaching session where someone has an ah-ha, a team functions more effectively, connecting a beautiful 1950s necklace to its new person, or a conversation with my young adult children where they actually hear me. :-) Well-used is rarely dramatic. It is showing up, again, for the thing you've already decided matters.

When you drop into bed tonight, ask yourself: what did I spend myself on today? Was it worth it?

More on how to actually answer that question next week.