Renew Yourself By Trying New Things
It seems to be more and more accepted that time is built up moment by moment and accumulates experiences that shake and push us through random currents. The German professor and scientist, George Lichtenberg, said that nothing ages us faster than incessantly thinking that we are getting older. To counteract this, you need to renew yourself.
When you think it’s too late to do something, you legitimize the word “never” and kill the winds of opportunity and change. Do not evaluate the options based on how much time you have left of the day, week or the rest of your life. Rate them based on the here and now.
“Take care of the minutes, then the hours will take care of themselves.”
-Lord Chesterfield-
Always unresolved about things
You can always regret that the hours have passed, that you have wasted your free time and given up your hobbies. It can be the cause of some degree of anxiety. That may be why you dwell on thoughts like “I should not have let it go,” “What did it cost me?” or “when am I going to seize the moment?” On the other hand , unattainable goals can disappoint you when you find that they are out of your reach.
When you set some goals, they tend to revolve around integrating new activities into your life, which is not a bad idea. But you can also try to take a look at the things you are already doing and renew yourself.
Work on improving it. Expand your view on it and think more about it. Maybe if you follow this seemingly modest path, you can be enriched more than if you sought out goals beyond your short-term options. No matter how attractive they may seem at first.
“When we say that the past is always better, we condemn the future without knowing it.”
-Francisco de Quevedo-
Renew yourself with an everyday activity
You can get a lot more out of reinterpreting parts of your day if you change the lens you see through.
Growth is often not as far away as we think. Just by changing perspective, you can come to see many things in your daily life, relationships, behaviors, goals that can actually lead to new discoveries.
You can build an infinite number of skills if you change your approach. I will give you a personal experience as an example. At Christmas time, when I had a lot of extra time, I decided to renew myself. I focused on one activity that I had done completely automatically before: cooking. With a change in my perspective around an activity I had done without giving it a thought, I realized that I could add much more to my life than a filling and varied diet.
Cooking can be motivating for some people. For others, it may be a nightmare. We limit it to a tool to socialize with, to nourish and activate our taste buds. But beyond all this, there are other possibilities that we have not even explored. I was lucky enough to practice on some of them and improve them.
Beyond the obvious
Behind every activity there are some hidden qualities that we can use to make the most of every moment. In my case, I discovered a few of them through cooking.
Creativity:
An important part of cooking is change. To dare to imagine new dishes, cook them and try them out. It’s true that sometimes it’s better to stick to specific recipes – especially in the art of baking – but it’s part of the process. The creative process is not complete until you can find someone who has tried it before. For example, you can be inventive when it comes to the presentation and decoration of the dish.
“Every week I have a disaster in my kitchen. The fire alarm is triggered repeatedly. But that does not stop me from being adventurous. ”
–Paul O’Grady–
Discipline:
This is the other side of the issue. Precision and time are important elements for all tasks. If the results are to be good, they both need to be checked. Learning to measure and follow instructions is a form of discipline that will form a good foundation for your creativity.
Patience:
This involves both having patience with yourself and the task at hand. If it is to succeed, it is important to respect the time it takes to both learn and complete the task. If you hurry up and want to finish quickly, it can negatively affect the final result. And when it comes to cooking, as with many other leisure activities, it is better if you do it in a different rhythm than the one you normally use to cope with your daily obligations.
“I do not have time to stress.”
–John Wesley–
Memory:
You can design your task as a challenge. When you try to remember recipes, measurement conditions and ingredients, you train both your short- and long-term memory.
Planning:
This is an important part of everyday life. Knowing where, how and what to do will help you focus on the task instead of constantly returning to your mental agenda. Having a structured but also flexible schedule frees up mental resources. You can use them to improve the experience of the activity you are doing.
Frustration tolerance:
To fail, practice and make mistakes again. To think that you do not know or can do nothing is a demon lurking around every corner, every circumstance. If you fail in this discipline, you have to start over and may fail again. It all depends on whether you adjust your expectations, analyze your mistakes and work on getting better little by little.
I will not quit without pointing out one last goal to renew yourself: interrupt the likely anxiety rhythm that is present in your daily routines. Be aware of something that pulls you in and that keeps you from thinking about anything else. Whether you choose to renew yourself through cooking, moving around the furniture or manually binding all the old books on your bookshelf… It does not matter. Find an activity that can help you break out of your routine – it will be crucial to your well-being.
Look around, slow down, renew yourself, make mistakes, learn and relax.
