Tag: #wellbeing

A Sunday morning of tidying up the office

Empty Sunday mornings are pretty good days to do some tidying.

I’ve accumulated so many bits of paper in the last few years that it has started to overflow. My office space has become generally noisy, to the point where the clutter has become a mainstay on desk spaces.
A tidy-up has been very much overdue. And whilst I would like to pretend that I have such saintly energy that I just simply decided to tidy, the truth was that I pushed myself into it. Last night, I spent about an hour looking for my old passport. Turns out, I needed to find an old visa number stamped on it.

I left half the papers on the floor. I had made it so messy that I forced my own hand in needing to tidy it up this morning.

You *cannot* be anything you want to be

It was a lie. But in your heart, you probably knew that already.
Even now, it doesn’t stop us telling that to our kids. After all, our generation may be doomed, but the next one will have real freedom, right?

For a long time, this was one of my underlying beliefs. Anyone, if they tried hard enough, could achieve anything. The power of the mind was so powerful that we can make it happen, no matter what the odds.

Getting back into the back-to-work vibe

The summer holidays are over. Brussels is slowly coming back to life after its sleepy summer. We’re coming back into the traditional return to work.

I actually am enjoying a sense of energy in the air. It’s nice to have things happening again in this town. I’ve spent quite a lot of time here in the summer. I enjoyed the peace and quiet, but it’s also felt a little empty. Now, there’s a bunch of events around town over the next weeks for me to look forward to.

It seems like a rest has done people some good. many people will feel the heightened political tensions, but this is particularly the case in the political hubs such as Brussels. Disconnection is what keeps us from getting too caught up in work and forgetting to live.

On being more forthright with your opinions

When it comes to sharing our own opinions, many of us get in a pickle.
On the one hand, we feel our internal psyche telling us something that needs to be said. Sometimes this might not be particular popular or welcome.
On the other hand, we are wary of becoming like those people who say things to the point of obnoxiousness. I think we all know people who perhaps are a little too confident.
So how do we get to the sweet spot of sharing an opinion clearly, especially when it goes against the grain?

A polite reminder to see how far you’ve come

Whenever I see a post telling us to remember what we’ve achieved, I tend to scoff a little.

It feels a bit cheesy. It is like an invitation for self-congratulation, which feels even more bizarre when it often comes in response to facing a current hardship. Why look back, when the thing that we’re meant to be facing is staring right in front of us?

Yet as is often the case with common wisdoms, there is usually truth behind them. That’s probably why they stand the test of time.

Sometimes looking back is actually very important. When we don’t go back to seeing what we achieve, it’s hard for us to have a sense of momentum or pride upon what we’ve overcome. Without these things, our task becomes even harder.