Tag Archives: Ben Franklin

year of virtues, month five: resolution

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Hi everyone! Since we are already midway into May {how did this happen??} I wanted to write a brief post about my focus for this month from Ben Franklin’s List of Virtues. During the month of April, focusing on industry was very helpful in moving forward on some important projects that had sort of stalled-out midway through.

  • I completed and submitted a short story that challenged me {in a good way} and that I think is one of the best pieces I have written since graduate school. It ended up being a much longer piece than I had originally envisioned, and it felt SO rewarding to complete it!
  • I also made a whole bunch of headway on the publication of Dancing With The Pen II, and organized a book launch pizza party for the Bay Area contributors.
  • And Allyn and I made lots of progress in the wedding planning arena. Proof: our “wedding corner” is slowly taking over our apartment!

Wedding corner

I really want to continue this momentum, so for May’s focus I decided to go with number four on Ben Franklin’s list: resolution.

RESOLUTION: Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.

To me, this is a virtue that requires two steps:

  1. First, figuring out the most important things you wish do to {perform what you ought}
  2. And secondly, resolve to perform these tasks without fail {make it a habit}

May seems like the perfect month to look back at those resolutions we made in the shiny potential of January 1st and re-evaluate them. Which resolutions are working for you? Which ones are not? Are there any resolutions that you made with the best of intentions and have since let drop to the wayside? Maybe this is a good time to re-commit to those activities or goals.

At the same time, you might have made some resolutions that were more based on your “fantasy self” than your real self. Gretchen Rubin talks about this on her podcast “A Little Happier.” We all have ideal versions of ourselves, but these self-images can be based more on fantasy than on reality. For example, maybe you like the IDEA of being someone who does CrossFit, but in reality a long solitary run or a low-key exercise class like Zumba is much more up your alley. If your resolution was to join a CrossFit gym and go three times a week, and you have yet to make much progress or have stalled out, perhaps it is because you like the idea of being “someone who does CrossFit” much more than you enjoy the actual activity of CrossFit. In that case, it may be time to tweak your resolution to fit your ACTUAL self and the activities you actually enjoy or find the most meaningful.

For my resolutions this month, I am resolving to continue my healthy habits of drinking a green smoothie every morning, going to yoga at least once a week, and working on my creative passion projects for at least half an hour first thing every morning. I am also resolving to continue last month’s momentum by completing my work on Dancing With The Pen II and officially release the book into the world! I can’t wait to share it with you guys when it is available on Amazon.com. Stay tuned! 🙂

Questions of the day:

  • What does resolution look like to you?

year of virtues, month four: industry

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Happy Monday, everyone! How was your weekend? I am back home from a whirlwind AWP conference in Los Angeles, where I got to attend so many helpful and thought-provoking workshops, snagged a whole bunch of new books I can’t wait to read, and connected with some dear friends I had not seen in quite a while. By the end of the conference, I felt filled-to-the-brim with a strange combination of brain-dead exhaustion and recharged motivation in my writing life.

My brother, coincidentally, had to work a conference in Berkeley the same weekend, and got a couple days off work following the conference. So my parents drove up from So Cal with me and we spent three lovely days together in the Bay Area as a family. Allyn called it my “staycation” and that is exactly what it felt like — a little relaxing mini vacation right at home! It was wonderful to all be together, and we lucked out with absolutely gorgeous weather. I joked with my family that San Francisco was showing off for them, because immediately after they left, the weather turned gray and rainy! It matched my mood — I miss them! It is always hard saying goodbye.

view from coit hike

 

fam in sf 2016

Today, since we are already a week and a half into April, I wanted to write a brief post about my focus for this month from Ben Franklin’s List of Virtues. It was a bit difficult for me to choose what I wanted to focus on this month, because I am feeling a bit scattered and pulled in many different directions. Summer and our wedding are just visible on the horizon, but not close enough to touch yet. And yet at the same time, I feel like the new year just began an eye-blink ago and I have so many projects I want to make more headway on before the busy summer begins.

I decided to go with number six on Ben Franklin’s list: industry.

INDUSTRY: Lose no time; be always employ’d in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.

To me, this is a virtue that must be dealt with carefully. It reminds me of Gretchen Rubin’s Secret of Adulthood that many things in life are good servants, but bad masters. To let industry rule your life would mean you become a productivity robot, and nobody wants that. I have written on this blog before about my quest to make time for what really matters to me and to value myself and my day not just on the number of things I check off my to-do list. I think we need to be careful with industry that it does not become a barometer of worth; that we do not multitask our lives to the detriment of deep thinking and intentional listening; that we do not speed through our days on auto-pilot, constantly rushing from here to there, constantly checking our email and social networks and newsfeeds. {After all, when Ben Franklin wrote these virtues, there were no such things as smartphones or Google!}

This month, I am focusing on industry with the perspective of being employed in what is most useful to me — what I most want to make headway on in the forthcoming weeks. I have a couple big projects that I really want to move forward with and that I have not been giving the attention they deserve of late. Also, I want to make little-by-little progress on our wedding planning while we still have plenty of time until the big day. As I learned during my year of living simply, taking care of tasks far in advance takes SO much stress away!

My brother shared this graph with me that I thought was very interesting: Steven Covey’s Time Management Matrix. Here is a great article explaining it in depth. Basically, “urgent” tasks mean tasks that you need to get done for someone else; “important” tasks are those that are important to YOU for achieving your larger goals.

This month — and beyond! — I want to focus more on important tasks, rather than defaulting into giving most of my time to the urgent column. And, interesting to note, in the important column Covey lists “relationship building” and “recreation” — two items definitely not on the to-do list of a productivity robot. Yes, perhaps it is possible to be industrious AND have a balanced life!

Questions of the day:

  • What does industriousness look like to you?
  • What quadrant on Stephen Covey’s matrix do you spend most of your time in?

year of virtues, month three: silence

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Hello, friends, and Happy Friday! Hope you had a wonderful St. Patrick’s Day yesterday! I donned a lime-green shirt, made some deep green spinach-banana muffins {recipe coming soon; promise you can’t taste the spinach one bit!}, joined my grandparents for a homemade dinner of corned beef and cabbage, and then met up with my dear Dana for our third St. Patty’s celebration in a row! It’s become a new tradition for us and I love it. Her house is always all decorated for the holiday, we put on four-leaf-clover headbands, she makes delicious Irish coffees, and we chat away! Time with her always flies by and before I knew it, I was glancing at my clock and it was 9:45, and time for me to head home! Do you have any little traditions with friends that totally brightens up your year?

Photo from our St. Patty's date last year!

Our first St. Patty’s date!

 

st pattys with dana

Last year!

 

me and dana st patricks yr 3

This year {with our leprechaun friend}

This month, my focus on Ben Franklin’s List of Virtues is on silence. He writes: “Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.” I am choosing to interpret “trifling conversation” to mean gossip, complaining, shallow arguments, etc. I do not consider myself much of a gossip, and strive to be an optimistic and empowering presence for myself and others, but I have noticed that sometimes it can be easy to try to connect with other people through mindless complaining, venting, or gossiping. I think conversation has an extremely valuable place in our lives, but truly nurturing and fulfilling conversation comes with deep reflection, listening, and thinking. We have all experienced the difference between speaking to express something true and important, versus jabbering away mindlessly just to hear ourselves talk. This month, I am making a conscious effort to be mindful of the way conversation ebbs and flows in my day-to-day life… and to choose silence more often.

Another way I am choosing silence is to focus on quieting down the chattering voices inside my head. My yoga teachers call this the “monkey mind.” I am spending just five minutes a day in quiet meditation/reflection/contemplation, simply trying to focus on my breathing and clear my mind of all the clutter. I have already noticed that this has made me feel more at ease as I go about my day, and helps me stay more present and worry less about what might happen in the future. Even good things we are looking forward to in the future can still be a source of stress or worry, as I am learning while planning my wedding! Sometimes the best thing to do is breathe and let go.

I am also experimenting with driving around in silence, rather than listening to music or podcasts during my commute. You all know how much I love podcasts, but I wanted to see what it would be like to purposefully add more quiet time to my day. And, you guys — a magical thing has happened! I look forward to my commute time more than ever now. It has become my time to daydream, to drift, and has become a super powerful time for connecting to the characters in the new novel I am working on. In the quiet, I can hear their voices speaking to each other, giving me dialogue and ideas for new scenes and development. It almost feels like I am able to hear the story straight from their mouths, and now all I have to do is write it down. This might sound crazy to some people, but as a writer this is one of the most magical experiences — when your characters come to life, and become companions you think about and converse with throughout your day. I believe this silent time has been absolutely crucial for this magic to happen.

The final way I have embraced silence is by listening to my heart about what I would like to share publicly, and what I would like to keep to myself. I have been a little silent on this blog of late, because I have been doing some deep reflecting about this subject — what I want this space to look like, what I am craving to lean into more, what I want to connect with you about… and what I want to keep private. I have a post all written and ready to go about how my sweetheart proposed to me, but over the past few weeks something in my heart has kept me from pulling the trigger and clicking that PUBLISH button. I can’t quite describe it, but I think there is something about the memory of that experience that feels too precious for me to share publicly, at least right now. It is something I want to keep between my sweetheart and me. And that is okay. I am hoping you all will understand.

I would, however, like to share this song with all of you, a song that has very special meaning to Allyn and me, that is perfectly fitting on this topic of silence. I think Ben Franklin would approve! 🙂

Here’s hoping you are having a fabulous Friday and that your weekend is filled with all the good things your heart is yearning for… and maybe just a little bit of quiet time all to yourself.

xoxo,
Dallas

Questions of the day:

  • How do you find quiet moments in your busy life?
  • What are your favorite ways to reflect and slow down?

news! + year of virtues, month two

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Hi friends! Wow, 2016 has been off to quite a whirlwind start in my neck of the woods.

In January, I…

… moved to a new apartment with my sweetie that, looking back at January’s focus from Ben Franklin’s List of Virtues, is pretty much successfully put into order. {We put together our bookshelf this past Sunday and our new couch was delivered yesterday!} It is looking much more homey and moved-in around here. I hope to share photos with you soon giving a tour of our new place, but in the meantime here are a couple snapshots of our kitchen!

new kitchen

new kitchen 2

Author Gretchen Rubin {who hosts my favorite podcast, Happier, with her sister Elizabeth Craft} says that “outer order contributes to inner calm.” After spending January focused on getting my surroundings into order, I have to say that I do feel much calmer in all aspects of my life. I have noticed that I am better about being on time to various appointments. I have no trouble getting up early and, most often, my dominant feeling upon waking up is excitement to jump into my day. I no longer waste time looking for things. I no longer feel “scattered” because my things are scattered all around. There is a distinct pleasure, I have learned, in putting an object back in its place. Marie Kondo writes about this feeling beautifully in her book The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. As human beings we cannot control everything — we like to think we are in control, but life likes to remind us that indeed we are not — but we can at least control our surroundings. Perhaps that is why outer order contributes to inner calm: it helps us feel in control of at least some things. I know that when I begin the day with a clean kitchen and a clutter-free living room, I feel much more equipped to tackle my writing projects.

Also in January, I…

… cut 8+ inches off my hair. And I absolutely love my new hairstyle. I feel so much lighter and freer!

My dad wrote a column weaving together my haircut with some other beautiful stories. You can read it here. {Warning: have tissues handy!}

Hair after

The biggest & best thing that happened in January?

… my sweetheart popped the question, and I said YES! Easiest question I’ve ever been asked. I am so thrilled to spend my life with this amazing man who makes me laugh, makes me think, and makes me feel so loved every day.

Al and I engaged

I’ll share our full proposal story with you guys later this week! 🙂

In February {what remains of February… how is it already the 10th??} I am going to focus on Franklin’s virtue of MODERATION. In the early stages of planning a wedding, this seems like an especially appropriate virtue to keep in mind. We want our wedding to be special and fun, but we also want to keep things in perspective: it is one day out of our lives. As a wedding blog I read put it: think of your wedding reception as a six-hour-long party. My sweetie and I have decided that we don’t want to break the bank for a party that will be over in the blink of an eye. Instead, we want to focus on what a wedding truly means: committing to spending your life joined with another person. That is where the real joy and excitement lies!

And, yes, planning a great big party to celebrate is fun… in moderation!

Questions for the morning:

  • What in your life do you wish to “get in order”?
  • Do you agree that “outer order contributes to inner calm”?
  • Any tips for planning a wedding? I’d love to hear them!!

a year of virtues: living like Ben Franklin

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Back in college, I read The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, and I was struck by many things: namely, how organized this great man was — and how that was likely a necessity due to the many, many amazing things he was involved with, just one of which was the founding of our country!

Something else that has stayed with me all these years is Franklin’s list of virtues that he believed created a fulfilling life:

Benjamin Franklin’s Thirteen Virtues

1. TEMPERANCE: Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation.

2. SILENCE: Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.

3. ORDER: Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.

4. RESOLUTION: Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.

5. FRUGALITY: Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e., waste nothing.

6. INDUSTRY: Lose no time; be always employ’d in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.

7. SINCERITY: Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.

8. JUSTICE: Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.

9. MODERATION: Avoid extreams (sic); forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.

10. CLEANLINESS: Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, cloaths (sic), or habitation.

11.TRANQUILLITY: Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.

12. CHASTITY: Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dulness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another’s peace or reputation.

13. HUMILITY: Imitate Jesus and Socrates.

I thought a fun project to chronicle this year on the blog is living by Benjamin Franklin’s virtues, focusing on one per month. {Except for chastity… I think Franklin makes a great point, but I don’t quite feel like chronicling that topic on this blog!} 😉 Unlike previous years where I posted a new challenge each week, I’ll just be doing a recap post of these challenges each month. This is to keep things simple, and also because I want to stay on top of blogging as best I can, and posting a new challenge each week was sadly not feasible by the end of last year. I have been excited to pick up a lot of different freelance projects and teaching projects that excite me — but they also make my plate a little more full than it was before! Thanks for being patient, and for continuing to read, as I work to find my “blogging groove” in this exciting new chapter of my life.

Speaking of new chapters… this month, I am moving into a new apartment with my sweetheart!

me and Allyn France

We will be living in a relatively small, quiet town in the Bay Area in our very own one-bedroom place. I am very excited!

For the month of January, my focus will be ORDER. Piggybacking on last year’s simplicity challenge, I would love to start 2016 off with an organized, orderly home and work life, with each thing in its place and only the things that bring my life joy. I will let you know how it goes!

xoxo,
Dallas