Things that won't take care of themselves. Your career. Your physical and mental health. Your relationships. Your community and connections. Your learning and growth. Unless we build a system, unless we put ourselves on the hook, unless we start finding incremental actions that help us grow, we would find ourselves at a distressing level for any of
Fear is a symptom... It's a symptom that we are doing something that can change things, that can make things better. It's a symptom that we are creating tension, we are initiating something that people might not have been expecting us to, that we are upending the order of the
Letting emotions drive... We don't, for the most part, create our emotions with intent. They happen to us as a consequence of our actions and our interactions with the world around us. If we let our emotions drive our actions, it becomes a feedback loop that can take our agency away.
Thinking and feeling... Thinking and feeling don't take us too far. Both are fleeting in nature. Writing on the other hand is more tangible, more resilient, more transparent. And even powerful is action, especially repeated action. Instead of Descartes' "I think therefore I am", as creatives we can
One day at a time. Resistance beats us one day at a time. It tells us that we can start working out tomorrow, we can start writing our book tomorrow, we can start eating healthier tomorrow, we can start doing whatever we want to do... tomorrow. The catch is that it will tell us the
Without getting wet. You can't swim without getting wet. You can't do boxing without getting punched. You can't lead without making mistakes. These are part of the conditions that allow us to create the change we seek to make. We can't make do without them.
Processing the emotions. It feels like a smart thing to move forward from a distressing situation or engagement and try to act as if nothing really happened. Sometimes, it's even called being "professional". But when we do that, when we leave our emotions unprocessed, they compound and make things
Do the work. Yes, you can make plans, big and small. Yes, you can have discussions and deliberations. But, nothing matters until you sit down and do the work. There’s a secret that real writers know that wannabe writers don’t, and the secret is this: It’s not the writing part
Simple solutions. Would eating something healthy make you feel better? Or maybe, you just need some more sleep. We sometimes tend to give into existential dilemma when the answer may be much more simple.
People who give us energy... ...and warmth and connection and belonging are a gift. A simple "Hi!" with a warm smile can make someone's day. We can be the gift. We can choose to be.
From change to status quo. There is a period of emotional turbulence that accompanies change. From the time of initiation to action and finally to getting used to it. Once we get used to the change, it becomes the new status quo. Until the next change arrives.
Finite is doable. It's easier and tempting to daydream, to think of a hundred things you want to do, and a hundred things you want to achieve. It even feels great thinking about how you'd feel once you achieve them. But, the more vague and large we make the
The generosity of contribution. The calculating self is concerned only with itself. It wants the certainty of outcome, the guarantee of results. It engages with the process only because of the results the process promises. But the process doesn't make any promises. In contrast, the central self only wants to contribute. It
What do you do? The industrial economy makes it easy. You can say, "I am a designer at Google" or "I am an investment banker" and the problem is solved, and the tension is relieved. Rather, there was no tension to begin with. But, when you do work that matters,
Moderate solutions. Emotions can make it tempting to jump to extreme solutions when faced with a problem. And they can create a sense of false urgency too. But, if we learn to separate the emotions from the actions, we can find that there may be other, more moderate, ways in which the
A few bad blogs. Write a few bad blogs. Let yourself do that. Let your fingers move on the keyboard. You don't need to publish them. You can even delete them. But, the more you are okay with writing bad ones, the more you will write and the more good ones you
On your side. We all have the voice of resistance inside our heads pushing against us, leading to self-sabotage, making us beat ourselves up over things that don't even matter. That voice may or may not have been made more powerful by others who add to the self-doubt and fear. But,
Opening a better door. It's tempting to look for a smaller, less scary, more realistic door to open when another one closes for us. Instead, we can choose to look for a better door, one that requires us to be more courageous, to raise our hand and volunteer, to lead. Interestingly, there&
Recharging the creative battery... It can be done with intention. Eating better food, drinking more water, getting comfortable sleep, having healthy social interactions, spending time in nature, or by the sea and getting enough rest. Decision fatigue is real and it doesn't do us good to make decisions when we are running
Back on the territory. A territory provides sustenance. A writer’s territory is the blank page. A dancer’s is the studio. A boxer’s is the ring. When a professional is far from their territory, they feel uneasy. The only solution is to get back to what makes them feel alive. What’s
Out of the boat... Excerpt From The Art of Possibility by Ben Zander & Rosamund Stone Zander “Out of the boat... It signifies more than being off track—it means you don’t know where the track is anymore. “Out of the boat” could refer to something as simple as losing all memory of
Afraid of making mistakes. If a decision has a 100% probability for the desired outcome, it's not a decision, it's simply an action. Any decision would have a best case scenario and a worst case scenario and other potential scenarios in between. Rarely would we see the extreme scenarios happen.
Smart or stupid? When we try to be smart, we tend to overanalyse and overthink. We hardly take action. But if we allow ourselves to make mistakes (or to be stupid enough) to take action, we are much more likely to become smart.
Emotional energy reserves. We are usually attentive about money and time. We are conscious when we are running short of either. And we are also sometimes aware of our physical energy and mental energy bandwidth. But when it comes to emotional labour, we are usually not compassionate with ourselves. A reason being that
Navigating fear. Fear shows up every time we are engaging with possibility and by definition with uncertainty. It especially shows up when the action in front of us can change our life significantly for the better. The goal is to not eliminate fear but to navigate it.
