Making a “Not To Do” List

I’m starting 2023 with what David Whyte calls a “not to do list” in his outstanding book, Consolations. Writing above on the word “Besieged,” Whyte describes the path from survival to flourishing in a world dead set on burying us beneath the crushing weight of constant noise and ceaseless activity. Abstinence, silence, patience, solitude - these become the tools of a sort of spiritual civil disobedience:

If the world will not go away, then the great discipline seems to be the ability to make an identity that can live in the midst of everything without feeling beset. Being besieged asks us to begin the day not with a to do list but a not to do list, a moment outside of the time-bound world in which it can be reordered and reprioritised. In this space of undoing and silence we create a foundation from which to reimagine our day and ourselves. Beginning the daily conversation from a point of view of freedom and being untethered allows us to re-see ourselves, to re-enter the world as if for the first time. We give ourselves and our accomplishments, our ambitions and our over-described hopes away, in order to see in what form they return to us.

In a time where doing creates meaning and activity makes identity, this can seem like a fool’s errand. But if the foundation of flourishing is love - its extension and reception - and if love is to be preserved in our lives, we have to find the road back to being as the source of belonging. Performance can’t be what secures our identities or shapes our imaginations. Love is most appropriately expressed in the lack of obligation. It’s always purest as a fountain running over, but we can’t grasp that or experience it in the frenzy of our ambitions.

I don’t want to find myself months from now in the middle of a year that hinges on me holding everything together, especially if I claim to follow a God who joyfully promises to take that responsibility from me (Colossians 1:17). So I’ll start 2023, as Whyte suggests, with a list of “don’ts.” Some of that will look like time away from things like social media and spending, but really underneath it all will be a stubborn insistence to ground my life in freedom and the generosity that it makes possible. More than what I want to do this year is who I want to be. And who I don’t want to be.

So my list says “Do not chase what is unimportant or unfulfilling.” “Do not miss the treasure of the present.” “Do not compare your story to anyone else’s.” “Do not avoid interruptions.” “Do not hesitate to express gratitude.” “Do not drown out the voice of God.” None of these things are particularly profound or even surprising, but that’s exactly why I need the reminder. These things are so easily and quickly forgotten or taken for granted. I need the time and space to “reorder and reprioritize,” as Whyte says, to have my perspective resurrected so I might “re-enter the world as if for the first time.” There’s no better time to do that than right now, at the start of a new year.

- Caleb Saenz