Going back to school

Good morning gorgeous, and welcome to fall of 2019. The PSL is back, sweater weather came WAY too fast, and it's time to break out the horror films. I'm not here for clowns who are also spiders, take that LSD out of your hand, Mr. King, and chill, ok? Let's chat about going back to school.

We've been trained since we were children to see fall as a fresh start— so it's kinda weird, as adults, that September comes and not much really changes. In school, our growth was forced. We had to get up at 7 am and go to a place dedicated to our learning, we had to advance to the next grade, we were basically forced to evolve and grow our lives. As adults, we don't have to do that anymore. Really, we can keep puttering along— and year after year our Septembers can look the exact same. As people younger than us are remaking their lives over again, we rinse and repeat August.

To that I say, *yawn*. We can do better.

Your evolution isn't up to your parents and teachers anymore— it's in your hands. That's a bit scary, sure, but mostly it's energizing. You get to choose the subjects to study. You get to advance yourself to the next stage when you feel ready. If you weren't welcome at that lunch table, you can make your own damn lunch table and invite everyone to sit with you. There's no report card and no gold stars or participation ribbons. You are the only one you need to satisfy.

More importantly, if you don't like where your life is right now, you can commit to being somewhere totally different next September.

This sounds hard, but try this out with me. Take 10 minutes out of your morning to sit with a pen and a blank piece of paper and do the following:

1. Think about the life you want to be living next September. Not about money or titles or making your mother proud. Just about what would make you stunningly happy.

2. Now hold that image in your head and get granular— what does an average Wednesday in your ideal life look like? Sketch out the whole day for September 2nd, 2020. What do you eat when you get up? Where do you live? Who do you see? This isn't a spectacular day, remember, but an ideal day for your new normal life.

3. Decide on it. Then, write down 3 things you can do this month to move today just an inch closer to that ideal Wednesday. Mark it in your calendar to revisit your ideal day once a month until next September, and commit yourself to daily actions to keep you get closer to living that day.

Here's what a career growing startups have taught me about life—all growth compounds. What you do today directly impacts what your life is going to look like in a year, and things that seem small now can amount to huge changes.

Let's use this September as a fresh start, and plan our gorgeous futures over a half sweet PSL, shall we?