Who Will Cry When You Die - Chapter 17 and 18

Chapter 17 - Think About Your Ideal Neighbourhood

Take time to think about your ideal neighbours and think how they relate to yourself. Envision who you want to be. Think about the qualities that make your ideal neighbours so admirable and how you might foster such qualities in your own life. Use those traits to identify who you want to be.

I found thinking of my ideal neighbour challenging. Moreso because I focused on who I didn’t want rather than who I did want. It wasn’t until I moved into my current house and had wonderful neighbours that I was like, yes I want more of that. I wanted to be friendly. I wanted to host events and invite them. I wanted to have random conversations with them when we ran into each other. But the problem I found was that I waited for them to make the first move. In order to push myself I decided to invite my neighbours over to bond with some board games. They accepted my invitation and we had a wonderful time with full intentions to meet up again. But then COVID hit and they moved. Despite an unfortunate end, this experience allowed me to imagine and create the reality that I want to embody. And it gave me more confidence to do similar activities that scare me.

Chapter 18 - Get Up Early

Get up with the sun or at 5am. Quality of sleep matters more than the quantity of sleep. Don’t rehearse the activities of your day while you are in bed trying to sleep. Don’t eat after 8pm. If you have to eat, let it be soup. Don’t watch the news before bed. Don’t read in bed.

I love implementing this principle because I felt more accomplished, and had the majority of the day to myself. Time felt like it was unlimited. But it was hard to keep up. Eventually, I had to give myself 3 days off where I woke up whenever I wanted, so that everyday didn’t feel like an obstacle. But I am proud of myself for doing it every day for 9 months.