Thirty six

I turned 36 years old last week. Things have been going… really well? And at the risk of jinxing it all, I wanted to share a snapshot of this moment in time mainly for future me to look back on someday.

Family

My kids are great, man. They’re the hardest thing about my life right now but also the best thing about my life.

Having three kids has made me feel “complete” in a way I didn’t expect. There’s really a world of difference between having two kids and having three kids. I’m not sure if it’s because Bri and I both grew up in a family of three kids and have always had that number on our mind. But we both chatted recently that we finally feel “complete.”

Knowing this is your last kid also makes it easier to savor memories. “This is probably the last month before he’s going to be crawling everywhere; savor this!”

I’ve found this is even the case with our the three year-old who’s really gone full-bore into the tantrum phase lately.

Our oldest is starting kindergarten in a few weeks. In a sense, it feels like we’re wrapping up one era and starting another. I’m very excited for him, and for us.

I just love this quote from Bob Odenkirk on a recent episode of Mike Birbiglia’s podcast. When asked about who he was most jealous of:

Anybody who’s still got little kids at home growing up. There’s no question I knew what I was doing when I had kids growing up. I was being a dad. That was my job, and I didn’t have to ask myself ‘What am I doing here? What do I do and how can I be a part of this world? How can I be meaningful today?’ I didn’t have to ask that question, because the answer is … pick up everything between here and the door and make sure they get to school and have a laugh with them. Life was… I understood my purpose.

I hadn’t realized just how well-defined my purpose has become. All of the annoying self-doubt and constant questioning of whether I was doing the right thing has gone out the window, because it’s so plainly obvious that my job right now is to be a good dad for my kids and a good husband to my wife.

Hobbies

With one kid, I was still able to have a bunch of time to myself and on the weekends, tinker on the computer, and take up hobbies. That got much harder with two kids, and it’s effectively impossible with three. In many ways, I’ve managed to stay sane by reducing my expectations of personal time and projects to zero.

Something I still struggle with is scheduling time to have fun. I don’t think I’m alone in this—parents with young kids can feel the grind day in and day out. But you have to remember that you’re modeling the behavior for your kids whether you like it or not. And I want my kids to know how to prioritize happiness and not see a stressed out, anxious, irritable dad who hasn’t had a night out in months.

I’m enjoying date nights and what little alone time I have with Bri. We have dates scheduled out as far as the end of the year. I learned you have to books dates well in advance to get time to schedule sitters. It’s also a pleasant surprise to pull up the calendar for the week and see you have a date night scheduled that week.

Friends

As far as contributing to happiness, “friendships” is neck-and-neck with “family” these days.

In my twenties, I was really bummed to see my huge bouquet of college friendships dwindle year over year as people drifted away both proximity-wise and emotionally. People got together less often, and most of all: you just realize you don’t have that much in common.

And getting married adds a whole new element to trying to establish new friendships—double dates mean two additional people that have to feel a good vibe in order to make something work.

The challenge stems from “friendship sources.” In college, friendships were 100% based on proximity and shared activities. In my twenties, they were based on either longtime childhood friends who we kept up with—and happened to live near—or work-related friends.

Then, Bri and I both got remote-ish jobs, so even that group started to dwindle.

But a few new promising “friendship sources” have emerged in my life:

• Kids: Once you start having kids, and they get old enough to have play dates together, you start meeting new parents. Sometimes, like in our case, a couple of those parents will be super cool and actually have a lot in common with you! So you start hanging out regularly, even without the kids.

• Church: I’ve started regularly attending a local church, and volunteering as a Sunday school “shepherd” (“teacher” is too strong of a word). Without diving too much into the topic of faith or religion: this is proving very promising for meeting new people who are in the same stage of life as me. It’s definitely a slow burn, but we’re finally starting to get “church friends” who we look forward to sitting next to every week and catching up with. I feel like this is a long-game worth playing because the community is so large and there’s a lot to be gained by just showing up!

• Gym: I’ve been going to the same CrossFit gym for almost ten years now—ever since I started working remotely. Friendships have been quite difficult to establish because of the circumstances of seeing people at 5am and then trying to talk over loud music and sweaty breathing. But I’m settling into a groove now: I feel more accepted as a member of the gym culture, and I’ve made at least one really close friend through the gym. I enjoy bumping gym people in the community, especially those who also have young kids.

• Neighbors: We’ve had three new sets of neighbors move in recently, all with young kids around our age. It’s been fun getting to know them (we bring cookies and a note with our phone numbers when they move in!) and seeing our kids play together.

One of my favorite things to happen recently is meeting “crossover” friends who exist in multiple friendship sources! It’s easier to establish friendships with people who have young kids AND go to your church, or who you see at the gym AND have young kids.

Plus: I still have a podcast with my buddy Austin! Seth Meyers was recently on Armchair Expert and joked that the close male friendship epidemic could be solved if dudes just started doing podcasts together. Turns out there’s something to be said about scheduling a recurring meeting with your friends and talking about random things for an hour!

Career

I’ve been back at Shopify for a little over a year now. I switched teams and have been working on a challenging project. I’ve also faced big non-technical challenges for the first time which threw me for a loop and led to me really struggling for a couple months.

But recently, I’ve found peace in trusting in other people more. Delegating ownership and responsibility to owning things and taking less of that on myself.

Instead of being “100%-always-on Josh Larson hard-worker boy,” I’m focusing on taking the qualities others have found so valuable in me and instilling those into my colleagues, teaching them how and why I make the decisions I do. Either explicitly, through osmosis, or through Jedi-mind-trick.

I guess maybe I was supposed to be doing this the whole time? Maybe this is what a healthy relationship with work looks like?

Part of me worries that not putting such intense pressure on myself looks like I’m giving up or letting myself go, career-wise. What, am I going to just coast now?

A couple things I’ve heard recently have given me comfort, though:

• Actor Paul Rudd was on Amy Poehler’s podcast, and he was asked whether he still gets nervous that he’s going to screw up on movie sets. His answer: “I think I might be getting worse [at my job].” Paul Rudd, almost universally-beloved, is humble enough to admit that even he doesn’t nail his work 100% of the time. There’s something so freeing for me to reckon with the fact that “the more you know, the less you know” and to stop trying to be aggressively more perfect every day at work.

• On a similar note: “Always take the position that you are to some degree wrong, and your goal is to be less wrong over time” is a quote by Elon Musk, who ironically is the polar opposite of Paul Rudd when it comes to critical acclaim and likability. That struck a chord with me recently: I am wrong, and I simply hope to be less wrong at the end of the day.

Maybe this is the result of selling my side business six months ago and not having a new thing to grind on in my head all hours of the day. I’m sure I’ll return to a more high-octane “surge” state professionally at some point, but this feels like a nice moment of peace.

Health

I’m healthy.

My wife and kids are healthy.

Our parents and siblings are all still alive and healthy.

Health is one of the hardest things to not take for granted in the present. It’s like when you catch a nasty cold and think, “Wow, I would give anything to feel like I did a couple days ago when I didn’t have this cold!”

I’m practicing gratitude about this phase of life when I’m in my thirties and my body still works.

I’m grateful for having a gym that I go to regularly. I’m glad I can reliably go to a place at specific time any day of the way and do the same workout with the same people at the same time.

Sure, I could use a few pounds if I said “no” to birthday cake or fresh-baked cherry pie. I’ve written previously about having a personal nutrition coach and losing weight that way. I stopped doing that shortly after our third kid was born (life is tough).

But I’m finding more and more that life is about balance. Sleeping in when my body is tired instead of dragging myself out of bed at 4am to go to the gym, only to be absolutely wrecked by 6pm when my kids want to play with me after dinner. Going for a pleasant walk or jog instead of an intense HIIT workout if the weather is really nice.

It’s also about positive self-talk. Being gracious with myself when I ate more than I should and knowing I’ll have a better nutrition day tomorrow. Telling myself that I look good in that outfit.

Health, like time, is precious currency.

What’s next

When we went out to dinner to celebrate my turning 36, Bri asked me, “What goals do you want to achieve before you turn 40?”

Dang, 40. That’s coming up quickly.

And for the first time in a long time, I realized… I don’t really have anything major about my life that I’d like to change right now. Sure, I wouldn’t mind a promotion at work or travel or fun times with new friends.

But if you would have asked me this ten years ago when I was nearing 30, I would have given you a laundry list:

• Have kids

• Make lots of friends

• Build a startup, quit my day job, and sell it for millions of dollars

It struck me that I’ve done those things (except for the millions of dollars part). And I’m happy with this phase of life.

I’m also reminding myself that I’m not always going to feel this optimistic. Times are going to be tough again. Health is going to fail me and those that I love. Bad things are going to happen to people I care about, and I’ll have to deal with that.

But for now, life is an exercise in gratitude.