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They found that, when looking at thousands of people, those who had novel experiences, put themselves in new environments, tried new things – food, music, movies – were much happier and also had a deeper sense of personal alignment

There is this fantastic series of research by the researcher David Gonzalez and his team between 2016-2022 which essentially explored the importance of novelty for our memory, neurons and, crucially, for our personality.

Your brain was built for newness and to see the world and be challenged, taste berries, experience awe when seeing a waterfall, meet new people.

Saying it now, I think the core element of this is whimsy and a lack of seriousness, but still a need for trying and striving.

when we are the specimen, we are the subject under the microscope and that helps us recognise parts we may be missing, dare I say, avoiding.

We can coherently draw lines between our thoughts and experiences we can observe ourselves past and present, see patterns in behaviour

Journalling is very much like a mirror, I think that’s why it’s such a well-worn, tested therapy or self-help method, because it just lets you see yourself without the frills you put on for other people.

My final tip: write out a ‘person I want to be’ letter. So I did this the other day, because I was feeling, as you can probably tell, slightly unmoored.

I also wrote out how I imagined that looked like, tangibly.

There is this amazing TedTalk titled, very aptly, Your real vs. ideal self that I really think you should listen to that essentially discusses how this exercise helps you bridge the gap between who you are and the person you want to be.