Lord Celebrimbor, greatest of the Elven-smiths, is the most pitiful character in The Rings of Power. Genius of mind, a fountain of creativity, and ever ambitious in his next great pursuit—yet he gets played like a fiddle from the minute he first appears on-screen.

Try hard as they might to save Middle Earth, Celebrimbor and his allies’ efforts can’t help but whither—for the very evil they hope to defeat is standing with them in the room. Three rings they forge for Elven kings, seven for dwarf lords beneath the mountains, and nine for mankind, the most fragile of species. Lured by the promises of darkness personified—a disguised Sauron—Celebrimbor happily hammers on until the very end.

As a result, the seven are tainted by the dark lord’s blood, and that is to say nothing of the nine’s capacity to corrupt. Only by chance does the first batch escape Sauron’s evil touch, but with his counsel contributing to Celebrimbor’s breakthrough in making them, how could anyone ever fully trust their power? By the time the illusion falls apart, it is too late—for the rings, for the craftsmen-city of Eregion, and yes, even for Celebrimbor himself.

Alas, redemption is for everyone, especially those still drawing breath, and with some of his last, Celebrimbor gets the nine into the hands of someone who may yet carry them out of Sauron’s reach. Then, he returns to the lion’s den one last time.

It is not a happy ending Celebrimbor faces, not even a heroic one. Weak and defeated, pierced by arrows and spears, it is only in his last moments that he realizes the full extent of his folly. With so little to now contribute, he does what he can: keep his mouth shut and let Sauron rage on about the loss of his glimmering weapons.

Ironically, it is in that very rage that Celebrimbor finds his final comfort. If even evil incarnate is prone to helplessness, perhaps the weak might yet prevail? And so it goes that the most striking words of Celebrimbor, greatest of the Elven-smiths, were neither his last nor heard by a large audience, yet so filled with sparks of hope that they’d forever be remembered:

“It is not strength that overcomes darkness—but light. Armies may rise, hearts may fail, yet still, light endures, and is mightier than strength. For in its presence, all darkness must flee.”

And though witness it he would not, in ages long past Celebrimbor’s passing, the light would shine indeed—brighter still than even the most imaginative Elven mind might have pictured, for in the end, it not only drove out the darkness but vanquished it altogether.

And so it is neither sword nor muscle, not even the cunning of our mind that defines us. Armies may rise. Hearts may fail. But so long we choose the flame in our soul, our collective glow will not perish. Light endures—and is mightier than strength.

It’s a great recipe for disaster: A woman travels alone with four men, three of whom are in love with her. In the case of Lady Brett Ashley, the main female character in Ernest Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises, the disaster is made no smaller by her constantly finding even more men whose heads she can turn.

One of those men, the wealthy and decorated war veteran Count Mippipopolous, brings a rare breath of sanity into the delirious air among the group, but even he can’t help himself. In an attempt to get to the real Brett beneath her hardened but beautiful exterior, while once again fueling her alcoholism with more champagne, the count says: “I should like to hear you really talk, my dear. When you talk to me you never finish your sentences at all.”

All Brett’s got? More teflon for the count’s words—but not his champagne—to roll off of: “Leave ’em for you to finish. Let any one finish them as they like.” “It is a very interesting system,” the count admits. “Still I would like to hear you talk some time.” As if the count is little more than thin air, Brett asks into the room: “Isn’t he a fool?”

Having lost her original and true love in the war, Brett is now adrift at sea. She appears independent and strong, but actually, her armor only makes her weaker. She follows whichever man she finds attractive or will pay her bills. She lets his imagination paint a picture of her the real Brett could never sustain. And when the booze runs out, she simply moves on, in search of a new vessel to board on her metaphorical journey across the ocean with no port to ever arrive in.

It must have been a special kind of isolation they felt, the Lost Generation. But millennials, Gen Z, and later age groups, too, all eventually discover: Sooner or later, you’ll have to reveal yourself. It’s a risk, this vulnerability thing—but only in taking it can we avoid the much larger risk of not having lived at all.

Yesterday, a hedgehog stopped by our terrace. A rare sight to behold, I stepped out, checked on him, and took a picture. When he hid under our conveniently covered barbecue, at first, I moved it so he would as well. Naturally, he snuck right back into the shade.

I thought about moving the grill again, but then I figured: “You know what? Just let the hedgehog sleep. It’s not affecting you in any way.” A little later, I checked again and, indeed, found him sleeping beneath one of our seat cushions. I put the cushion back in its place and left him alone.

It’s now been 24 hours. Is the hedgehog still there? I have no idea—and actually, it doesn’t matter. A hedgehog napping on my terrace does not affect my day whatsoever.

What we perceive as a nuisance is often of little consequence. A snide remark by a coworker. A triggering tweet. An animal on our terrace. But the initial surprise catches us off guard and shocks us into a quick, unreflected reaction. We engage with the bait. We feel offended by this sudden incursion into our territory. And so we start typing, yelling, or poking the hedgehog when, actually, we could have just let it rest. The situation. The animal. The other person.

The next time life sends you an unexpected visitor, ask: Is this a required detour or merely a distraction? Whenever you can, let the hedgehog sleep, and stay on the path you’re meant to walk.

“It only takes one,” CoolTrainerRyan says in his Pokémon card opening live streams. He’s talking about booster packs, of course. One card can recoup the cost of an entire box. One pack can make a four-hour slog worth it. Life is the same.

Sometimes, the gods won’t be generous. Karma won’t give you anything. Week after week, it’s more bad news after bad news. Until, one day, it isn’t. It only takes one. One project approval. One job offer. One email from the right person.

It’s ironic, but: The same attitude that keeps a degenerate gambler inserting coins into a slot machine can, sometimes, allow you to walk through hell until you make it back to paradise. The key is knowing the difference—but when it comes to life, “it only takes one” can be a perfectly valid reason to get up again the next morning.

You wouldn’t say that if you’ve watched the recording of a talk—because you can’t. The speech is the same. The information is the same. The duration is the same, and yet…

Even in times when we can permanently store and re-access everything, live presence still has value. Especially then. A Youtuber might see you in his live chat. A mentor may catch a glimpse of your face during a webinar.

Online or off, show up to the events that matter to you. Others will take note, and you’ll get to say the empowering club motto reserved for true believers: I was there.

I’m a big believer that inertia is better than waste, but I’ve also been “busy” on many days in the last decade. As I progressed in my career, I thought that, eventually, only focus would matter.

To some extent, that turned out to be true. As a creative, I’ve reached the point where more isn’t better. To improve the quality of my writing, I now need to tackle bigger projects. Books. Longer essays. I need to spend more time on each piece instead of just cranking out more of the same.

But as a worker, an entrepreneur, an earner, I’m currently discovering that, sometimes, busy is all you need. Since my main source of income has fallen apart, I’ve put countless irons into the fire. On most days, I spend an hour here, an hour there, and nothing feels all too focused. For many of these endeavors, I have no idea how they’re going to work out, if ever.

But sometimes, as Cammi Pham notes, “more is more.” When you’re stumbling through the fog in hopes of arriving somewhere, anywhere, really, the faster you stumble, the higher your chances of making it back into the sun.

When I started my self-employment journey ten years ago, it all began in that same spirit. Back then, I simply didn’t know how to do anything, nor what I should be doing to begin with. Ergo, I just tried it all. I dabbled and played and learned and failed—and eventually, the threads started running together.

A decade later, I didn’t expect to find myself back where I began. But as it turns out, focused and busy are simply two more of the many seasons we go through in life.

Sometimes, your focus is taken away without you asking for it. Being busy can be a wonderful way to stay occupied while you’re waiting for ambiguity to give way to a new direction.

“Are you productive?” does not equal “Are you focused or not?” The real question is whether it’s focus or busyness that most equates to productivity in your current phase of life—and either is a valid answer if you believe it’ll get you where you’re trying to go.

They just do it with themselves.

In a rare, slow moment during Wheel of Time‘s second season, three warriors meditate together. One of them only lasts 15 minutes. After he wanders off, the third warrior makes an observation of the second.

“It’s something she said,” Ihvon notes of Lan’s master having abandoned him. “You keep saying it to yourself over and over. A thousand cuts for her one.”

Lan is surprised that Ihvon can read him so well. But Ihvon, like Lan, is an introvert. And for his empathy, too, he has an explanation: “People don’t understand that we quiet ones are quiet because the conversation’s always…playing out in our own heads.”

Introverts aren’t people who talk little. They’re people who only say 30% of everything out loud.

Remember the quiet ones have as much need for conversation as the most talkative among us, and help them bring the right words to the light.

Yesterday morning, I did my Makko Ho exercises for the first time in weeks. It wasn’t so much the pain of stretching that I dreaded. It was the time commitment—which, at four variations held for 40 seconds each, is less than three minutes. Ridiculous, right? But such is life!

Still, by focusing on how much stretching would “eat into my schedule” and how unpleasant the first time would be, I managed to postpone a good habit for months. Yesterday, I decided to shift focus: Instead of concentrating on the first session, I concentrated on the second.

As soon as I did that, I realized that my second round of morning stretches only had one requirement: I had to do the first in order to get there. Suddenly, the stakes of my return dropped to almost zero. What I needed was permission, not perfection. Who cares if the first session takes longer? Who cares if you’re bad at it? Who cares about two and a half minutes of pain?

Now, all I had to do was get through one round of Makko Ho. And so I just did it. It wasn’t great, but it was also over as quickly as it had begun. And today, I had the chance to do my second session of Makko Ho. To do it a little faster. To feel less pain. To start thinking a bit about technique.

When the first go-around feels overwhelming, don’t think about it. Focus on the second time, and before you know it, you’ll be back in the saddle.

Sometimes, I slouch when I meditate. My shoulders droop, my head angles down, and my back arches forward.

When I catch myself, I rise. I straighten my back, raise my shoulders, and lift my head. As I do the latter, even with my eyes closed, I can tell it gets brighter. I can feel the sun on my face.

Whether the darkness comes from your head hanging low for too long or from your tunnel vision starting to blur around the edges, remember: When you lift your head, it gets brighter.

If you want more light to reach you, all you need to do is look up.

Belmonte had been one of the greatest bullfighters of his time—at least if you ask Jake Barnes, protagonist of Ernest Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises. Before his retirement, Belmonte had killed over a thousand bulls, each time dancing with, around, and so close to the animal that the mesmerized audience half-expected it to be his last.

But alas, even greatness eventually fades, as Belmonte quickly discovers when he makes his grand return during Jake’s latest visit to the Festival of San Fermín in Pamplona. “When he retired the legend grew up about how his bull-fighting had been,” Jake explains, “and when he came out of retirement the public were disappointed because no real man could work as close to the bulls as Belmonte was supposed to have done, not, of course, even Belmonte.”

Now older and more cautious, Belmonte had picked out his bulls in advance. He didn’t want to get hurt, even risk as much. In the ring, however, he regretted his decision. “Belmonte was no longer well enough,” Jake comments. “He no longer had his greatest moments in the bull-ring. He was not sure that there were any great moments,” but every now and then, his former brilliance would shine through.

“He had flashes of the old greatness with his bulls, but they were not of value because he had discounted them in advance when he had picked the bulls out for their safety,” Jake says. A sudden jump here. A quick dodge there. Belmonte’s old glory would glare like a coin in the sun, but then he remembered the bull in front of him was never a real contender to begin with, and it left a bad taste in his mouth.

“So he had two small, manageable bulls without much horns,” Jake tells us, “and when he felt the greatness again coming, just a little of it through the pain that was always with him, it had been discounted and sold in advance, and it did not give him a good feeling. It was the greatness, but it did not make bull-fighting wonderful to him any more.”

In the end, Belmonte leaves the arena defeated—victorious on the sand but booed away by the audience. If there was greatness left for him out in the world, bullfighting was not where he would find it.

In the book, we don’t discover what Belmonte does next. In real life, it pays to avoid his fate. Don’t cling to your old medals. You’re not a one-trick pony. When flow and form elude you in what used to be familiar waters, don’t be afraid to seek unknown shores. Find new greatness, and never let a too splendid past keep you from a meaningful future.