#88: living life on your own terms
👋 Welcome to the 88th issue of Out of Curiosity, a weekly newsletter promoting ideas to help get 1% better everyday.
My name is Reza, and every week, I go through nearly 100 pieces of content (from books and podcasts to newsletters and tweets), and bring you the best in this newsletter.
In this issue:
🚧 How to set boundaries
👥 The 8 friends you need to be happy in life
💡 And how's that working for you?
🚧 How to set boundaries
Like an internal compass, boundaries can all start with a “gut feeling” that tells you when you have the time or energy to devote to something versus when you need to say “no.” Good boundaries free you to live life on your terms.
Once someone is aware of your boundaries, most people will respect them and apologize if they accidentally cross the line. Without clear communication, the lines become blurred.
Amidst our fast-moving world, self-care can feel selfish or even frivolous. But the science of self-care is clear: taking alone time for yourself is linked to more confidence, greater creativity, more emotional intelligence, and more emotional stability in challenging situations. It can even help prevent burnout.
Solitude allows you to reflect on your life and your values. The time you set aside for self-care can help bring more clarity into your relationships with other people, ultimately helping you define your boundaries.
→ Science of People | 6-min read
👥 The 8 friends you need to be happy in life
The vast majority of the time, no single friend offers you everything you need from your relationships. A survey on 1000+ people aimed to answer what types of “vital friends” were someone who, if they vanished, your life satisfaction would noticeably decrease.
The eight types of friends are: The Builder, The Champion, The Collaborator, The Companion, The Connector, The Energizer, The Mind Opener, and The Navigator.1/ The Builder: Someone who motivates you and encourages you to take it to the next level. That supportive friend who believes in your potential and won’t let you rest on your laurels.
2/ The Champion: Somebody who roots for you and describes you to others in a way that makes you blush.
3/ The Collaborator: Who is that friend that the moment you see each other you roll up your sleeves and get to work on the next big caper?
4/ The Companion: Simply put: a best friend. They won’t just help you move; they’ll help you move bodies. The person who will still be there when everyone else has very wisely run for cover.
5/ The Connector: No matter what the issue, they know somebody who can help. They make friends more often than most people make excuses. Even if they were locked in solitary confinement with no one to talk to, they’d end up best pals with the prison guard.
6/ The Energizer: That fun friend. The person you’re always laughing around. The one who always knows the great place to go or the awesome thing to do.
7/ The Mind Opener: They send you interesting articles. They get you to question your assumptions. Talking to them makes your brain do things straight out of the dream sequences from “Inception.”
8/ The Navigator: Sometimes they’re a mentor, sometimes they’re a sounding board, but they’re always your GPS system for when you don’t know which exit to take on the highway of life.
→ Barking Up The Wrong Tree | 13-min read
💡 And how’s the working for you?
In fact I was as prone as ever to missing deadlines. And I never felt like I was pulling my weight, either, because once any given obligation was done with, another was always lying in wait. (“Beyond the mountains, more mountains” – Haitian proverb.) The obligation-focused mindset wasn’t working out for me even on its own terms, and grasping this made it easier to start to change.
We don’t engage in self-defeating habits simply because it hasn’t occurred to us to act otherwise, or because we haven’t yet read a book revealing “the surprising science” of doing things differently.
No: it’s because we experience those habits as essential bulwarks against some kind of terrifying outcome. Deep down, we fear some truly awful thing would occur if we let ourselves fall short of perfectionistic standards, or worked less, or cared less about meeting obligations, or whatever it might be. The genius of AHTWOFY? is in the way it acknowledges that all that stuff is real – but then prompts you to wonder whether your current strategies are really helping you avoid the awful thing to any significant degree anyway.
→ The Imperfectionist | 4-min read
✨ One last thing…
👋 Until next week,
🗂
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