Get yourself some ‘thick’ desires

I did a fair bit of slowing down over the holidays, sitting, reading, reflecting. I'd been looking forward to doing just that, and it was great!

I remember this time last year, having queued up posts for a couple of weeks so that I could take time off, getting back into things felt really hard.

Not so much, this year. Higher quality rest, maybe? (I honestly don't know the reason – maybe I'm just better at daily emails now? 🤷🏻‍♂️)

Anyway, during my reading, one new (to me) writer I came across (who, co-incidentally also uses Ghost 👻 as their writing platform) put something out late last year all about the difference between thin desires, and thick desires. In her words:

“A thick desire is one that changes you in the process of pursuing it. A thin desire is one that doesn't.”

For instance, to build an actual community, with actual people, and all the messiness that comes with that (thick) vs. the completely effortless ‘community’ of social media (thin).

Or the difference between being a slave to ticking off items on your To Do list (thin) vs. being committed to a long term project, with many moving parts and uncertain outcome (thick).

She then goes on to outline how modern life seems designed specifically to sell you thin desires, but in the guise of thick ones; creaming off the easy, dopamine-rewarding aspects of more genuine, stolid thick desires and packaging it as the full thing.

Superficiality, dressed up as significance.

You can read the whole piece here (4 min read); it's really stuck with me and I definitely had it mind when I was choosing my three words for 2026 – so if you haven't done that exercise for yourself yet, then maybe have a read of this first, for inspiration.

Some of the ‘thick desires’ I indulge, that didn't make it onto my list yesterday, but that I am always mindful of devoting at least some of my attention to:

• making music mixes
• rustling up a new curry
• making plans to hang out with friends
• poring over maps and route-planning, just for kicks

Because none of these outwardly ‘pointless’ pastimes (‘thick’ desires) are going to have any meaningful impact on the world at large, but they are the stuff of life.

Ignore them at your peril!

💟

Giles

Mentioned above

What three words?

In which I propose the lightest of intention-setting exercises for you 📍

The Daily RemindersGiles P Croft

Thin Desires Are Eating Your Life

The defining experience of our age seems to be hunger. We’re hungry for more, but we have more than we need. We’re hungry for less, while more accumulates and multiplies. We’re hungry and we don’t have words to articulate why. We’re hungry, and we’re lacking and we’re wanting. We are

Westenberg.JA Westenberg