Road to Forty
Dec 17, 2024
It’s 4:37am, Dec 17th, as I’m pondering why I haven’t yet fallen asleep. Yesterday was my 39th birthday. Only one more year until the big four.
This last revolution around the local star has been great and heart wrenching at the same time, so I decided to jot down some thoughts for my future self, while lying in bed, Nantia and 🐈⬛ Tarta blissfully sleeping beside me.
So the following will be a small recollection, a thought dump, of the past few years, an evaluation of the current state of self and some promises for the future. A more intimate, personal new years resolution, but centered around one’s birthday. If you are reading this, you can keep me accountable.
Recollection of past self
Moving houses is a pain in the ass. Moving cities even more so. Moving to a different country is a whole other ordeal. Since relocating abroad in 2020, I keep wondering if this was the right decision for us. And everytime, I end up with the same conclusion: Yes.
Leaving family and friends behind is the hardest part of the decision, and doesn’t go away with time. If anything, you miss them more and more.
But also, you get out of your cozy, safe comfort zone and have your world thrown upside down, forcing one to reevaluate their priorities, their passions in life and how they want to live the remainder of their 40.000 weeks. That’s what happened to me.
An evaluation of present self
Learned firsthand why pregnancies can be heartbreaking. Ellie came and went in a blink of an eye, but she marked us forever.
I am now doing something I am both great at (people tell me) and truly love. Making video games is more rewarding than any other job I even had.
Have finally found a sport that is both challenging and fun 🏹.
I’m reading a lot, but mostly fiction. All of the business & self-improvement books in my shelf can wait. Too many people try to give advice by repeating the same things over and over for 200 pages, uh.
I feel more zen than ever. I know what I don’t want, who should be in my life and why I do certain things, cringy and whatnot. They’re all me.
One thing I would like to shed off but haven’t managed yet is how glued I can be to this stupid metal slab we call smartphone, and all the social media. I haven’t been on Facebook for years now, Twitter has become a cesspool with all the recent developments, Instagram is manufactured to drain your time… Perhaps on the Road to Forty I shall finally find the will to break off.
We have lots of new friends around us that we love, but I dearly miss my people now that we live on a distant land. Hope you all are happy and content. If not, do something. Change. Reach out.
Apart from some minor knee and back pain, I’m fairly healthy. Mentally as well. On top of regular gym, biking 10k everyday for your work commute helps. It also gives you a good tooshie 🍑. Thanks Amsterdam.
I am now way older than my late father when they had me. I often wonder what he would think of the things I’ve done, places I’ve been, decisions I took. We went to visit the town he studied in Italy a couple of summers ago, walked he streets he walked. Would he remember his favorite spots if I were to ask?
The future promises
Dedicating too much of ones thoughts on stuff you believe are important to people but are not your passion is very wasteful. I did that a lot from 2017 to 2022. Corporate jargon, team structure methodologies, managerial meetings. Uh *2. Thus I promise myself that that time will be dedicated to making or digesting art instead, everyday if possible.
There is a big bucket list of things I dream of doing while still on this spinning space rock. Traveling, making stuff out of thin air (yay design). Some of them require big swings. Thus, future me, take the chance and try, do not let me down. Though, to be honest, I hope that list never runs dry, for I live to dream the next step.
Call your family more. You’ll regret not doing it when they’re not around.
Don’t let her down.
Keeping it to 4 will hopefully increase the likelihood of each of them happening. Thought the bucket list is quite gargantuan 🥴
Talk to you in a year, Theo in your 40s.