Stay hungry, be grateful

A few days ago, I celebrated my birthday.
It's a perfect time to look back at the last 12 months.

What I learned,
What I achieved,
What I experienced,
What I'm grateful for,
What I did for myself,
What I did for my loved ones.

Retrospective isn't an obvious thing in a world where we should "stay hungry and stay foolish".
While Jobs's worlds resonate with me very much, they can also be a trap.

We should never stop learning.
We should always try new things.
We should maintain a strong motivation to compete and avoid complacency.

One of my Gallup's main themes is "Achiever".
Achieving the next level of everything and pushing the limits is my life's fuel.

Learning new skills,
training harder,
going the extra mile.

But this is also my curse.
The more you are focused on achieving,
the less you enjoy here and now.

Always hungry,
forgetting what's behind,
always looking forward.

We need to move on, and we forget how far we've come already.
It's never enough.

---

To break this endless loop, I started writing my daily summary. I use a geeky notes app (Obsidian) that generates my daily journal from the markdown template. 🤓

And I write it for 10 minutes each day.
(here's my template 👇)

~~~

## Three Good Things from Today
1.
2.
3.

## Today I Learned

## Work Highlights

## Random Notes  

~~~

Then I read notes and write a monthly summary based on them.
And then magic happens. I am always amazed by how many great things have happened within the last 30 days. And how many of them I've already forgotten.

---

During my birthday, I checked notes from the last few months.
And I know I did a great job already.
I still have my goals, plans, and aspirations.
I am still planning to go the extra mile.

But I'm not hungry anymore.
I am enough, and I am happy with my life.