— Living is often in the noticing. And in the remembering.
I’ve recently started a new system with my small Moleskine notebook. It’s super simple. But it’s been powerful.
Each day gets a page, and I simply make a list as the day goes on, recording short notes of the things I spend my time doing (leaving out the common stuff like cat chores, putting out birdseed, meals unless somehow special, etc.)
I mostly include things like:
- The main creative projects I work on and the things I write.
- Time spent with our private AWAKE groups.
- The music I really spend time listening to.
- The books I read and the Audible books I listen to throughout the day.
- Anything I watch (since I watch so little), and anything I spend time studying (e.g., an hour with Seneca, or a book of Magnum photography, or a classic chess game).
- Walks I go on around the lake, and mini-adventures or picnics with my wife.
- Or simply a half hour spent sitting with my cats on the porch watching the birds, chipmunks, and squirrels.
The idea is to retain, in a very simple list, what it is I actually spend my days doing so that I can then look back each night and at the end of each week and see what it was I gave my time (and therefore my life) to across that span.
As a byproduct, the list then becomes as well a remarkable expression of what it is I have to feel thankful for — in a sense charting not only the composition of my days but equally all my many sources of gratitude.
Without such a list, all too often, my days blur together. Worse: weeks blur. Months blur. YEARS blur.
And I suppose I’ve come to realize just how much I’m losing by simply not paying close enough attention.
Because there’s also this: By setting about each day knowing I am to record what I occupy myself with, in a way my notebook gives me a standing order each morning — PAY ATTENTION.
And, while paying attention — MAKE IT COUNT.
~ Sebastian
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