The Pocket Philosopher

The Pocket Philosopher

Share this post

The Pocket Philosopher
The Pocket Philosopher
🎄 Holidaze

🎄 Holidaze

The Paradox of December

Matt Malcom's avatar
Matt Malcom
Dec 20, 2021
∙ Paid
1

Share this post

The Pocket Philosopher
The Pocket Philosopher
🎄 Holidaze
Share

We don’t need to do anything at all. Just allow yourself to be seated; let the sitting take place. If you don’t strive to sit, relaxation will come. And you know something? When there is relaxation, healing begins to take place. There is no healing without relaxation. Relaxation means doing nothing, not trying.

—Thich Nhat Hanh

Fellow Philosophers,

If your life is anything like mine, things might be a bit crazy right now.

It’s the end of the year and the close of the 4th Quarter at work. Second Semester at school. It’s gifts and plays and rehearsals. It’s family and friends and celebrations. It’s meals in and meals out, time on the road and time around the table.

And then its moments of punctuated emptiness—Christmas afternoon, time off work, quiet nights and early mornings with no where to go, because for a day much of the world closes.

And sometimes, the unexpected quiet can be even harder than the breakneck pace of the end-of-year race.

I’ve been noticing lately in these moments of q…

Keep reading with a 7-day free trial

Subscribe to The Pocket Philosopher to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.

Already a paid subscriber? Sign in
© 2025 Matt Malcom
Privacy ∙ Terms ∙ Collection notice
Start writingGet the app
Substack is the home for great culture

Share