This Is What I'd Keep
This year marks 10 years of BestSelf, which is honestly a little wild to type.
Ten years is long enough to build things, outgrow things, lose things, buy things back, and realize half the stuff you thought mattered was mostly ego.
When I was younger, I mostly wanted to be more productive. I thought progress looked like more goals, more systems, more products, more proof that I was becoming the person I said I wanted to be.
The tricky part is that productivity can turn into a hamster wheel. You figure out how to become more productive, and then you just use that capacity to work more. As a workaholic, I can tell you this is still hard for me.
Now I think the point of productivity is to spend time more intentionally somewhere else. And if you're setting a goal, make sure it's actually your goal, not someone else's goal for you. Otherwise you can hit the thing and realize it was empty the whole time.
Not everything should be optimized. Some things should take a while. Long dinners. Long conversations. The whole point is deciding where we want to spend our time, not chasing productivity for productivity's sake.
A decade later, I think progress looks a lot more like keeping the right things. Not everything. The right things.
The older I get, the less interested I am in reinventing myself every time life gets messy. I want fewer things I trust more.
Because life has a way of editing you. You go through enough seasons, good ones, brutal ones, weird in-between ones, and eventually you start to notice what actually earns a permanent place.
The most meaningful things in my life now are not the flashy ones. They're the ones I return to.
A journal that helps me get honest. A question that gets me back into a real conversation. A reminder that my attention is my life, and I should probably stop handing it away like free samples at Costco.
The Curation Question
I think we all do this eventually. We collect tools, habits, ideas, routines, identities. Some help. Some were just for a version of us that doesn't live here anymore.
And if we're paying attention, adulthood becomes partly about curation:
- What do I still believe?
- What still works?
- What still feels like me?
So today I was thinking about what I'd keep if I had to pack up the last decade into one box.
Not literally, though yes, we did actually make one.
That question is what I love about our Anniversary Box. It isn't just a bundle of old favorites. It's a little time capsule of the ideas that lasted. The tools people came back to. The products that still help in the real, unphotogenic middle of life.
Not because they're trendy. Because they proved useful. And I think that question is worth asking in your own life too.
If you had to keep just a few things from the version of you you're building right now, what would make the box?
Which habits? Which relationships? Which tools? Which beliefs? What still deserves shelf space?
Because clutter isn't just physical. It's mental too. And sometimes growth looks less like adding another tactic and more like finally admitting what is already working.
So instead of asking, what else do I need? ask, what is already worth keeping?
Make a quick "keep" list today:
- One habit worth protecting
- One relationship worth investing in
- One tool that genuinely helps you live better
- One belief you want to carry into your next season
If you're overwhelmed, start here: what in your life has actually earned its place?
