Happy New Year, friends!  

So many of you responded to my invitation to contribute to art supplies for my trip to Liberia, visiting The Hope Project’s school. Over $1000! I fly out on January 22, and I’ll be checking two big bags of art supplies and inviting teachers to pick out more things they need. I am so touched by your generosity and how it enhances my experience of this trip. If you would still like to give, you can give directly to The Hope Project here. If you specify “art supplies” with your donation, you’ll be added to a special distribution list just to share responses from the students in receiving and using these art supplies.  

This trip, my ask, and your giving prompt me to return to one of life’s great conundrums: How do we choose what to care about? 

I recently listened to this very excellent discussion. Dr. Rick Hanson has long been an important teacher in my life. These insights are a mix of thoughts from he and son Forrest and my own learnings over the years around these questions. 

  • We need caring and not caring. One of T.S. Eliot’s famous lines is “Teach us to care and not to care.” Rick says that these opposite energies—caring and not caring—are both disciplines, and they form the riverbanks through which our lives flow. We must care about something, otherwise this life isn’t worth living. But we certainly cannot care about EVERYTHING. What I see now are the extremes. Either we are swayed by every entreaty on social media and diffuse our energy, or we get overwhelmed and cease to care about anything. 
  • Desire follows effort. If we wait to act until we can devote our time to a passion, we are missing out. And, in fact, may never find THE thing we’re seeking. If we give some effort to what crosses our path, however, the desire follows. We care about what we work on (sometimes called “The Ikea effect”—we care more about the furniture we put together!). 
  • We must save our fierce attention for things that could really use it. Mari Andrew says that, when scrolling, “In less than a minute, I have just experienced 25 unprocessed emotions—I’m jealous, judgmental, upset, excited…studies show that we will focus on social media as though it is something we are hunting.” Thus, the encouragement—save your fierce attention for something that could really use it! This means strategically deciding not to care about a lot of things. 
  • Get quiet. In order to know what we care and don’t care about; we have to check in with ourselves. If we are too busy to notice our interior world, all we hear is static. 
  • Everyone’s recipe is different. Some people are fireflies, burning bright for a while then pulling back (this is definitely me). Others persist, slowly and surely, making incremental progress over a lifetime. Some people have a huge capacity for external stimulus; other people have very little. It’s so important that we not compare ourselves to one another, but instead, follow the tug of our own hearts.  
  • “If you’re going to care about one thing, care about your innermost being” (Rick Hanson). Yes, yes, yes! If everything else seems too overwhelming, if you can’t decide what charity to support, what book to read, which exercise regimen to begin, fine. For the moment, direct that energy toward the journey of the soul. That will lead you to the next thing. It always does. 

May you have people, endeavors, and dreams to care a lot about. And may you decide NOT to care about many other things. As always, I’d love to hear about it.