In the beginning...

Today is the first day of the rest of your life, what will you do with it?

I’m sure you’ve heard that before. I have. But do you know that feeling when you really start to understand an idea you’ve been hearing for years? Well I’m just now starting to internalize what that statement means. And I think it means: stay in the moment, and love what you’re doing now.

I used to be in love with the idea of the future. I am ambitious, motivated, and hard-working. That tends to lead to a lifestyle oriented towards goals and how to achieve them. That, in a nutshell, is how I spent my time at Kenyon College, a rural school in Ohio.

Goal: I want to run varsity for Kenyon’s cross country team.
Plan: Run 90 miles a week all summer, hate life.

Goal: I want to go to med school.
Plan: Start getting good grades, study hard for the MCATs, and pad resume with research internships.

Goal: I want to have a girlfriend.
Plan: Choose a girl I like, relentlessly pursue them, and convert religions.

etc.

During my senior year of college I wrote an honors thesis on the survival mechanisms of bacteria that cause food poisoning. I didn’t write the thesis because I loved research, I liked doing experiments but not really thinking about the science behind it, or because I loved biology, I’m interested in how the body works but I don’t love studying. Instead, I wrote a thesis because I was ambitious and wanted to do something recognized as hard.

One day, I had a funny conversation with a friend that was also working on a thesis. Her thesis was about the growth scaling of caterpillars. We were talking about how invested we had become in our projects. She was having trouble growing her caterpillars, so she was troubleshooting with her adviser and she said, “Maybe the kids aren’t eating enough!” She loved her project so much she unconsciously mistook her caterpillars for kids! I always just thought people doing research were doing it to pad their resumes, like I was. But this conversation really made me realize, “Wow! These are the people who should be doing research!” Which made me realize, “Wait, maybe I shouldn’t be doing research!” And of course, this made me rethink how I was spending my days.

I recently graduated from Kenyon College and moved out to Portland, Oregon. Even more recently, I decided I want to use this move as a catalyst to change how I live my life and really how I spend my hours and minutes.

John Lennon once said, “Life is what happens to you when you’re making other plans.”

My friend Mooks and I had an epic email chain one summer that was over 10,000 words. In this chain, we would ramble on about something, and then some other more interesting idea would come up. In this situation we would say, “Sidenote:” and then go off on another tangent. This writing style is a great metaphor for how I want to try to direct my life. By forgetting about my long-term goals, I can check out some of the more tempting sidenotes that come up everyday, and maybe do a better job of focusing on the moment. We’ll see!

from ken

What are you doing with the first day of the rest of your life? I'd love to hear about it!