Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish new year) 5774 starts this evening at sundown. The title of this post, “shana tovah u’metukah” is a traditional Rosh Hashanah greeting that wishes someone a good and sweet New Year. It is traditional to eat apples dipped in honey on Rosh Hashanah to symbolize starting off the new year on a sweet note.
Rosh Hashanah is also a time of reflection that lasts 10 days, culminating in Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement), that is the holiest day in the Jewish Calendar. These next 10 days are about reflecting on what you have done or could have done in the past year.
About 3 years ago, I started participating in 10Q, a list of questions to facilitate this process of reflection. I wrote a little about 10Q in a recent post called Looking Backwards. Over the next 10days, I will be sharing some excerpts of my answers to this year’s questions.
The first question of the year is:
Describe a significant experience that has happened in the past year. How did it affect you? Are you grateful? Relieved? Resentful? Inspired?
This has been a year with its share of ups and downs. I lost a close friend, which is a first I am not eager to repeat. My father’s cognitive capacity has also deteriorated, which is sad, but he’s in a good place emotionally, so that is comforting.
These two experiences greatly impacted how I see the world around me. I have long said that I value experiences over objects. But with my father, I have also seen how memories of experiences can alter or even disappear. That makes me much less interested in the kind of experiences that I feel will be good for me and focusing more on the ones that I enjoy as they are happening.
I see this coming into play mostly within the realm of professional development. There are some things I feel like I should learn just because they may have some practical value at some point, I have basically given myself permission to give those a pass. Instead, I am focusing on building those skills that give me joy. I happen to be incredibly fortunate that the skills I need to advance Tech Whisperer are also the ones that the most joy. And I don’t think that is an accident.
*If you are a regular reader of my blog, you already know some of what is going on in my life, and I apologize for the duplication. If you are not a regular reader and my answers intrigue you, I recommend going back and reading some of my previous posts.