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Re:Thinking with Adam GrantWhy I live each day like it's my first with Suleika Jaouad | ReThinking with Adam Grant
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At a glance
WHAT IT’S REALLY ABOUT
Live each day like it's your first, not last advice
- Suleika argues that “live each day like it’s your last” creates exhausting pressure and instead recommends “live each day like it’s your first” to foster curiosity, awe, and both present- and future-orientation.
- executive_summary
- Living with recurring leukemia reshaped Suleika’s relationship to ambition, shifting her from resume-driven striving toward “eulogy virtues” like kindness, bravery, and showing up for loved ones.
- Journaling is framed as a private, low-stakes practice for thinking and sense-making that can take many forms (morning pages, lists, paintings, voice memos) and often reveals insights you didn’t know you had.
- Specific practices—like writing “10 images from the last 24 hours” and tracking contributions—help “fact-check” fear-based narratives, sharpen attention, and reinforce what genuinely nourishes you.
IDEAS WORTH REMEMBERING
5 ideasSwap urgency for curiosity by living “like it’s your first.”
Suleika found “like it’s your last” turns life into a high-pressure performance, while “like it’s your first” invites wonder, play, and attention to small moments without abandoning hope and future planning.
Ambition needs a course-correct toward “being,” not only “doing.”
Her illness highlighted that you can’t postpone living until after milestones; orienting toward eulogy virtues helps rebalance meaning away from constant optimization and resume-building.
Journaling works because it’s private, imperfect, and honest.
By removing the pressure to produce “good writing,” the journal becomes a direct channel to intuition and subconscious processing—often clarifying thoughts you can’t access by thinking alone.
Use micro-noticing prompts to counter fear and widen your story.
Writing “10 images from the last 24 hours” helps fact-check the mind’s tendency to over-index on worry, and it trains you to notice (and then seek) nourishing details you’d otherwise miss.
Adapt your practice to constraints; creativity can be a survival skill.
When complications impaired her vision, Suleika pivoted from writing to watercolor “fever dream” paintings, turning dread into intrigue and uncovering an unexpected passion by staying flexible.
WORDS WORTH SAVING
5 quotesI'll take it a step further. Not only would nothing meaningful be accomplished, but I really believe in some ways it's the worst advice.
— Suleika Jaouad
When I'm living every day as if it's my last, it's so much pressure. I'm trying to make every dinner as meaningful as possible. I'm trying to s- you know, squeeze the juice out of every moment, and that is just a spiritually exhausting way, uh, to move through your life.
— Suleika Jaouad
And so instead, I'm trying to live every day as if it's my first, to wake up with the sense of curiosity and playfulness and wonder that a little kid might.
— Suleika Jaouad
There isn't infinite time to finally get to a place where you can enjoy your life now. You don't, like, check off boxes and then finally settle in.
— Suleika Jaouad
What I love about the journal is it's a private space. Um, this is not public writing. It's writing you do for yourself.
— Suleika Jaouad
SPEAKERS
Suleika Jaouad
guestWriter and journalist known for her work on illness, journaling, and authorship of “The Book of Alchemy” and “The Isolation Journals.”
Adam Grant
hostOrganizational psychologist and podcast host of ReThinking with Adam Grant.
High quality AI-generated summary created from speaker-labeled transcript.
