🦶 TREE 195: Finally on Friday, how to figure out the next step

All week I’ve been writing about The Next Step, which is fine if you know what the next step is. If you don’t, this has probably been an annoying week. To make up for any annoyance, here are two super-practical ways to figure out your next step.

1. Talk

You might not know what to do next because your thinking is in a tangle. Taking is a good way to detangle, especially if you can talk to someone who is good at listening and reflecting. (What you don’t want in this situation is a fixer/advice-giver.) Before long, the tangle will become a line you can follow and you will know what to do.

If you haven’t got one of those people handy, just talk. There’s something about getting your thoughts outside your head that helps create clarity. Writing until you know what’s next is another method that works for some people.

As soon as you have clarity, take action.

2. Chop

Sometimes you know the thing you need to do but it’s so big and impossible that you don’t know where to start. Start by chopping it into pieces, then do the piece that comes first. The first piece may still seem overwhelming. Chop it again. Keep chopping until you get a first piece that’s small enough to do today. Then do it.

Next week is Christine’s and my 25th wedding anniversary. We have an international marriage. During our marriage we have both emigrated to other countries. We have been poor enough that we’ve split a Mars bar three ways for a treat. We lost a baby at full term. We have two birth kids. We adopted a teenager. Later we adopted a toddler. We started and shut down a business. We helped start a church. We grew out of our faith. We’re still best friends with each other. We’re more attracted to each other than ever. What I’m saying is, we’ve learned a couple things about building a thriving long-term relationship. We’re going to write about it next week.

Something for the weekend

A 14 year-old boy broke into John Lenin’s hotel room and got this interview. John is great. The animation is the perfect accompaniment.

Happiness
Jeff

‘Talking over me and you’

The Memory of TREE playlist – every song from every email – 13.5 hours of great music (according to me, mostly):