Brandon Donnelly
Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
Brandon Donnelly
Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
Today is my forty-first birthday.
I had aspirations of making it a slower day, but that didn’t really happen. I did, however, start my morning “on the Bench” for one of our development projects and that was pretty spectacular, especially with the weather we had. Today has to have been the nicest day of the year.
I very much enjoy my birthdays, but the cadence of them seems to only speed up. It feels like just last month that I turned forty. And so in many ways, birthdays are a reminder to me that it’s important to be decisive and not waste time. Life keeps moving forward whether we like it or not — usually quickly. So it’s best to optimize accordingly.
At the same time, this is probably one of my biggest faults. I’m bad at slowing down and living in the moment. I get restless. Neat B tells me that I am at my most relaxed when we are traveling in Paris and just sitting idly in a cafe somewhere. That sounds right. But I’d like to do more of this at home.
So that’s my birthday wish (goal) for this year.
A friend of mine sent me this X post today.
It covers two important life questions: (1) How do you define success? (2) Are your actions aligned with that definition? And included in the post is the author's "ideal end state", which is a list that includes things like "control 80% of my schedule", "be top 0.1% fit for my age group", and "thriving marriage with regular 1-on-1 time."
Some of his list has checkmarks, and some of it -- things like "small, beautifully designed home with an epic view" -- is still a work in progress.
After I got the message, I immediately responded with: "This is great. I'm going to do this for myself." I then sent it to my family.
Now, in some ways, I'm already doing this. I like lists and I have a lot of them. Some of them are "disciplines" that tell me to do things like write every day (that's what this blog is), lift weights, and continuously practice my French. And some of them deal with aspirational goals like, build a creative retreat in the mountains because you love snowboarding.
But I think there's a lot of room for me to be even more intentional, and aspirational, about what success means to me. And so that's what I plan to do. Maybe some of you will want to do the same after reading this post.
We moved into our new apartment today, so I don't have a lot to say other than that moving is a good way to remind yourself that you have too much stuff. I was in my last place accumulating for over a decade.
I try my best to live minimally and there is certainly something liberating about this mindset. But there is also a part of me that is a collector at heart. (A great number of our boxes are filled with things like books.)
It also turns out that Boxing Day, or some other time over the holidays, can be an excellent time to move. Streets are calm. Buildings are quiet. The email firehose is off. And nobody else wants to move at this time.
Most importantly, though, it affords you some time to get your life back together. And that's exactly what I'll be doing for the rest of this week.
Today is my forty-first birthday.
I had aspirations of making it a slower day, but that didn’t really happen. I did, however, start my morning “on the Bench” for one of our development projects and that was pretty spectacular, especially with the weather we had. Today has to have been the nicest day of the year.
I very much enjoy my birthdays, but the cadence of them seems to only speed up. It feels like just last month that I turned forty. And so in many ways, birthdays are a reminder to me that it’s important to be decisive and not waste time. Life keeps moving forward whether we like it or not — usually quickly. So it’s best to optimize accordingly.
At the same time, this is probably one of my biggest faults. I’m bad at slowing down and living in the moment. I get restless. Neat B tells me that I am at my most relaxed when we are traveling in Paris and just sitting idly in a cafe somewhere. That sounds right. But I’d like to do more of this at home.
So that’s my birthday wish (goal) for this year.
A friend of mine sent me this X post today.
It covers two important life questions: (1) How do you define success? (2) Are your actions aligned with that definition? And included in the post is the author's "ideal end state", which is a list that includes things like "control 80% of my schedule", "be top 0.1% fit for my age group", and "thriving marriage with regular 1-on-1 time."
Some of his list has checkmarks, and some of it -- things like "small, beautifully designed home with an epic view" -- is still a work in progress.
After I got the message, I immediately responded with: "This is great. I'm going to do this for myself." I then sent it to my family.
Now, in some ways, I'm already doing this. I like lists and I have a lot of them. Some of them are "disciplines" that tell me to do things like write every day (that's what this blog is), lift weights, and continuously practice my French. And some of them deal with aspirational goals like, build a creative retreat in the mountains because you love snowboarding.
But I think there's a lot of room for me to be even more intentional, and aspirational, about what success means to me. And so that's what I plan to do. Maybe some of you will want to do the same after reading this post.
We moved into our new apartment today, so I don't have a lot to say other than that moving is a good way to remind yourself that you have too much stuff. I was in my last place accumulating for over a decade.
I try my best to live minimally and there is certainly something liberating about this mindset. But there is also a part of me that is a collector at heart. (A great number of our boxes are filled with things like books.)
It also turns out that Boxing Day, or some other time over the holidays, can be an excellent time to move. Streets are calm. Buildings are quiet. The email firehose is off. And nobody else wants to move at this time.
Most importantly, though, it affords you some time to get your life back together. And that's exactly what I'll be doing for the rest of this week.
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