A Certain Uncertainty
I cracked the spine of my 2008 Moleskin pocket calendar for the first time this morning. We’ve all crossed over from one year to the next. The Time Square ball has dropped, the numerous countdowns of bests and worsts are recorded, the noise makers are silent and the granted revelry kisses from the stroke of midnight are memory. Welcome to day one, morning one, 2008.
My pocket day calendar will accompany me throughout the year just as my previous calendars followed me through 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004... I use my calendars to record more than just appointments. I jot down thoughts for later writing, I note new words, capture quotes or interesting conversations I happen to overhear, register my hours of sleep, exercise, due dates, books read, birthday’s and shopping lists. My pocket calendars become the annotated capsule of my year.
In years past I bought my pocket calendar a month or two before each New Year. I did the same this year. Different from previous years, however, I didn’t open my 2008 version until this morning, day one, 2008. In previous years I opened them as a bought them and diligently got all my important dates for the upcoming year marked and included. This takes time and I’ve always set aside a morning to update all the important and critical information well before the big ball dropped marking the cross over from the old year to the new.
For the last decade I’ve crossed over this annual New Year bridge with irons in the fire. I’ve often hopped this yearly fence with elaborate to-do lists, deadlines and commitments. As a result I haven’t given the actual crossing much more thought than...”lets party” or “I’m staying in tonight because I’m on deadline” as noted in my new pocket calendar. All those events and deadlines following me from one year to the next has made them mesh and fold into one another with a certain certainty.
This year, like few others in my history, is distinctly different. This year, it seems, I’m carrying less of this certainty of events, deadlines and commitments over the threshold of one year and into the next. Rent, insurance...and that’s it. This was made clear to me this morning in the basement room of my brothers home in Sun Valley, Idaho when I opened my 2007 calendar for the last time and my 2008 calendar for the first time. I transfered one or two pass-codes and viola! I was finished.
As I look out at the day, weeks, and months of the year ahead nothing is set. Nothing is set and everything is possible.
Starting my year with this certain uncertainty is a little unnerving. But that is only because it has been so long since I’ve allowed myself to live authentically in this space. As such this certain uncertainty is also overwhelmingly satisfying. I find that unlike other years I’m not bound to think or act within a constrained set of parameters. Instead of spoiling over what needs to be done and how to get most effectively from point A in 2007 to point B in 2008 my thoughts are opening to possibilities not possible within tyranny of hard schedules that bound my thinking for such a long time.
At one level I’ve carried less from one year to the next. At another I’m wheeling in much much more. I find this level of uncertainty allows me to think back and coalesce whole swaths of my life experience in very tangible ways. It is a whole life I’m taking into 2008 not simply the top ten list from 2007 or the list carry-overs from 2007 I’ve got scheduled for the months ahead.
I sat at the Ketchum Grill bar last night on New Year’s Eve with my sister-in-law, Ann. She asked me what I was looking forward to in 2008. I thought about travel, work, commitments represented as items on a spread sheet, expectations tied to a pay check or a status report, production calendars, and to-do lists. With a sort of odd surprising delight I told her, nothing. I’m not looking forward to anything in 2008. This Certain Uncertainty felt wildly liberating. I donned a festive party hat and gave a “toot” on a New Years party horn!
And why not. The certainty of a list of events pre-registered in my calendar hasn’t gotten where I want to go and hasn’t provided any of the certainty that truly enriches my life. Certainty of events hasn’t ever pointed to or defined how a year in the life of Eric Mason actually panned out. Certainty of a crowded calendar chronicled the deadlines but there was less and less life held within those accomplishment each year. Certainty never told me what my year would look like or how fruitful a year I’d have. The years stacked up. The certainty of events along with the increasingly insurmountable and complex set of to-do lists became the navigational compass, the point, the end.
This year I’m starting differently. I’m carrying nothing into 08; no appointments, no to-do lists, no spreadsheets, no job, no fear, no regrets over what wasn’t accomplished in my 2007 book. The job will come as it is intended. The appointments will come as they always do. I’m going to avoid making a to-do list as long as possible. I want to let the uncertainty of each day unfold guided not by the deadline but the thoughtful process. The rest will fall into place. Of that I am certain.
My pocket day calendar will accompany me throughout the year just as my previous calendars followed me through 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004... I use my calendars to record more than just appointments. I jot down thoughts for later writing, I note new words, capture quotes or interesting conversations I happen to overhear, register my hours of sleep, exercise, due dates, books read, birthday’s and shopping lists. My pocket calendars become the annotated capsule of my year.
In years past I bought my pocket calendar a month or two before each New Year. I did the same this year. Different from previous years, however, I didn’t open my 2008 version until this morning, day one, 2008. In previous years I opened them as a bought them and diligently got all my important dates for the upcoming year marked and included. This takes time and I’ve always set aside a morning to update all the important and critical information well before the big ball dropped marking the cross over from the old year to the new.
For the last decade I’ve crossed over this annual New Year bridge with irons in the fire. I’ve often hopped this yearly fence with elaborate to-do lists, deadlines and commitments. As a result I haven’t given the actual crossing much more thought than...”lets party” or “I’m staying in tonight because I’m on deadline” as noted in my new pocket calendar. All those events and deadlines following me from one year to the next has made them mesh and fold into one another with a certain certainty.
This year, like few others in my history, is distinctly different. This year, it seems, I’m carrying less of this certainty of events, deadlines and commitments over the threshold of one year and into the next. Rent, insurance...and that’s it. This was made clear to me this morning in the basement room of my brothers home in Sun Valley, Idaho when I opened my 2007 calendar for the last time and my 2008 calendar for the first time. I transfered one or two pass-codes and viola! I was finished.
As I look out at the day, weeks, and months of the year ahead nothing is set. Nothing is set and everything is possible.
Starting my year with this certain uncertainty is a little unnerving. But that is only because it has been so long since I’ve allowed myself to live authentically in this space. As such this certain uncertainty is also overwhelmingly satisfying. I find that unlike other years I’m not bound to think or act within a constrained set of parameters. Instead of spoiling over what needs to be done and how to get most effectively from point A in 2007 to point B in 2008 my thoughts are opening to possibilities not possible within tyranny of hard schedules that bound my thinking for such a long time.
At one level I’ve carried less from one year to the next. At another I’m wheeling in much much more. I find this level of uncertainty allows me to think back and coalesce whole swaths of my life experience in very tangible ways. It is a whole life I’m taking into 2008 not simply the top ten list from 2007 or the list carry-overs from 2007 I’ve got scheduled for the months ahead.
I sat at the Ketchum Grill bar last night on New Year’s Eve with my sister-in-law, Ann. She asked me what I was looking forward to in 2008. I thought about travel, work, commitments represented as items on a spread sheet, expectations tied to a pay check or a status report, production calendars, and to-do lists. With a sort of odd surprising delight I told her, nothing. I’m not looking forward to anything in 2008. This Certain Uncertainty felt wildly liberating. I donned a festive party hat and gave a “toot” on a New Years party horn!
And why not. The certainty of a list of events pre-registered in my calendar hasn’t gotten where I want to go and hasn’t provided any of the certainty that truly enriches my life. Certainty of events hasn’t ever pointed to or defined how a year in the life of Eric Mason actually panned out. Certainty of a crowded calendar chronicled the deadlines but there was less and less life held within those accomplishment each year. Certainty never told me what my year would look like or how fruitful a year I’d have. The years stacked up. The certainty of events along with the increasingly insurmountable and complex set of to-do lists became the navigational compass, the point, the end.
This year I’m starting differently. I’m carrying nothing into 08; no appointments, no to-do lists, no spreadsheets, no job, no fear, no regrets over what wasn’t accomplished in my 2007 book. The job will come as it is intended. The appointments will come as they always do. I’m going to avoid making a to-do list as long as possible. I want to let the uncertainty of each day unfold guided not by the deadline but the thoughtful process. The rest will fall into place. Of that I am certain.
posted by wigdawg at
8:16 PM
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