Nothing is permanent
I came across this passage in Shane Parrish’s newsletter Brain Food:
Nothing is permanent. Some things are just renewed faster than they decay.
We want the naturally perfect relationship, but the ones that endure are renewed each morning.
Here's the paradox: fragility plus daily care outlasts strength plus neglect. The cast-iron pan seasoned daily outlives the new nonstick. The handwritten menu, which changes daily, outlasts the laminated one.
You can only optimize so much, but you can care forever. Efficiency has limits, devotion doesn't.
It struck me that only attention and effort can mitigate against the entropy that everything experiences. Relationships, systems, structures, just things…maintaining and strengthening anything can only happen with care.