New York State of Mind
Last week, I moved across the east coast to the Large Apple, the City that Never Naps — New York City. On Monday, I started my first day of my internship at Buzzfeed, and I’ve hung out with friends nearly every single day. And although I’ve been eating a bunch of incredible food, I’m so exhausted all of the time.
I guess it makes sense. After a month of chilling at home and doing little other than reading books and going to the gym, moving to the most active city in the world is quite the culture shock. Despite the overall strangeness that I’m experiencing, I’m really enjoying myself here. I understand what people mean when they describe the allure of the city. I find myself wanting to act like everyone else here, always moving, always doing something.
At times, I feel like I’m losing myself to the environment around me. There are a million amazing places to eat unhealthily that I can indulge in. The mindfulness I usually try to enact in my daily life seems to disappear as I fast walk to my destination. I pull out my phone dozens of times a day, checking my social media. My workplace provides a great variety of entertainment to focus on as well. Our bustling slack channel promises a great variety of dogs and cats, memes for work and work on memes. Every single person and their dog has an instagram account and everyone seems to constantly be updating them. In a way, it feels like this city and this job are a magnification of all of the things I struggle with.
As a result, I know that living here will both be a test as well as an opportunity to find routines that will keep me sane. More than anything else, I look forward to establishing a routine to curb the effects the city could have on meand allow me to stay true to who I am and who I want to be. Until then, I’ll probably stay exhausted, but I’m looking forward to the challenge.
Drops of the Week
where I *drop* recommendations of cool things this week
Article
"Why Did We Ever Leave Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood?” By Heather Havrilesky- a nice article about the strange yet important figure of Mr. Rogers.
Movie
A Man Called Ove - a beautiful Swedish language film that makes you feel a wide variety of emotions.
Playlist
relaxing- I may have shared this before, but this is to date the best playlist I’ve ever made. I would listen to it religiously for a period of time and it always kept me immensely calm.
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:~)
Love,
Nikhil