How to avoid this, ‘never-satisfied striving for things that won’t ultimately matter’

“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.” ~ Albert C [Coach Tony]( Coach Tony [@tonystubblebine]( “In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.” ~ Albert Camus I will probably mention New Year’s Resolutions more than once this week and my first thought is toward the implications of how much life has changed. Often a Resolution is about doing something that you’ve long wanted to do but hadn’t been able to achieve. For 2022 — how many big changes are going to be in reaction to a new landscape and would you even call those changes Resolutions? Examples for living an anti-mimetic life. I really [enjoyed this essay]( fom [Luke Burgis]( with examples of how to live an anti-mimetic life. It’s a term I’ve never heard before and so it articulated something that I’d previously only been able to refer to as “opting out.” The word ‘mimetic’ was coined by the French social theorist René Girard. It is related to the word ‘mimic’ — the human propensity to mimic what the people around them are doing. But Girard’s finding went deeper: it’s not only what they do, but what they want that we also mimic. We adopt their desires as our own, unconsciously — and then convince ourselves that our desires are entirely our own. He called this mimetic desire. and Being anti-mimetic means have the personal freedom to counteract negative forms of mimetic desire — like the kind that leads to polarized politics, unhealthy obsessions, envy, hustle-porn, and never-satisfied striving for things that won’t ultimately matter to impress people who don’t love us. _ The Compression of Morbidity That’s another great term that I only just learned. From [James F. Fries, Who Studied the Good Life and How to Live It, Dies at 83]( Put differently, exercise and a healthy diet don’t help you live longer, but they can help you postpone the onset of debilitating disease until close to the end of your life, a phenomenon that Dr. Fries called “compression of morbidity.” Good New Year’s Resolution: Say Yet. Throwing this out there as a powerful but unusual Resolution for positive self-talk. Try to say the word “yet” about yourself once every day. If you don’t manage to say it out loud then make sure to write it in a journal. This word can help you build self-talk around your growth mindset. So instead of saying, “I’m not good at math” you say “I’m not good at math, yet.” In my experience mindset comes down to your self-talk habits. So here’s a concrete way to reroute an entire class of negative self-talk. Plus I wanted to link to Janelle Monae singing [an entire song about this on Sesame Street](. __ I link to a lot of Medium articles and that’s partly because I run three publications there. These publications are different ways to level up: Better Humans, Better Marketing, Better Programming. Medium pays publishers and authors based on a subscription program… so if you are ever considering signing up for Medium [please use my membership link]( so that I get credit. Don’t miss out on the other issues by Coach Tony [Become a member for $5 per month]( Did you enjoy this issue? [Yes]( [No]( [Coach Tony]( Coach Tony [@tonystubblebine]( Tips, inspirations, and knowledge on productivity, happiness, health, and making an impact on our world. Official email of the Better Humans publication on Medium. (@bttrhumans) You can manage your subscription [here](. In order to unsubscribe, click [here](. If you were forwarded this newsletter and you like it, you can subscribe [here](. Created with [Revue by Twitter](.