Category: Art

If You Can’t Beat the Fear, Just Do It Scared Cover

If You Can’t Beat the Fear, Just Do It Scared

Nik

Glennon Doyle knows what fear is. The fear of eating, fear of drinking, and fear of speaking. The fear of saying what she wants, changing her mind, and admitting her marriage isn’t working.

Doyle struggled with bulimia, alcoholism, and other addictions. Her ex-husband was unfaithful. How should she raise their three daughters? How could she explain she now loved a woman?

More so than most people, Doyle needed her own advice: “If you can’t beat the fear, just do it scared.”

I hope your fear won’t come with as much trauma as Doyle had to go through, but I do know this: Today, fear rarely tell us what’s dangerous — it tells us what matters. If you follow the fear, you’ll find the growth. In fact, it’s one of few things reliably pointing in the right direction.

The scariest thing for a blogger is to write a novel. The scariest thing for a developer is to quit her job in hopes of better. A month-long solo trip for a busy stay-at-home dad? Blasphemy! And yet, they’re all steps towards our true north.

When you feel the fear, can you lean forward? At least don’t run away. It’s the better of our usual two options — to escape or wait until the dread fades. While you’re waiting, consider the fear won’t dissolve. Why won’t it subside? Well, how could it? It’s here to show you the way.

Whenever you’re ready, fear will lend you a hand. Oh, it’s coming. You bet. Ain’t no solo seats on this ride. Once you accept that part, you can let fear do its job. Make it your guide instead of your game over.

Welcome the skepticism. Cherish it. Use doubt to keep your head on straight. And always keep growing towards the scary bright light.

Today Is Gonna Be Your Day Cover

Today Is Gonna Be Your Day

Nik

You wake up. You’re eight years old. It’s your birthday. How excited are you?

I’ll tell you how excited you are: Right now, your zest for life is an 11 out of 10. Heck, it might be a 15. I think you should live your life as if it’s your eighth birthday every day. At least once a week.

Psychologically, there’s no reason you can’t. That’s all life is. Psychology. Identifying, managing, changing your emotions — and then projecting what you have procured upon the world. Seriously. Try it.

Smash your alarm with the force of Thor’s hammer. Don’t roll over in bed. Jump out! JUMP! Try the 5 second rule: 5…4…3…2…1 — GO!

Play music. Pick a song that makes you feel unstoppable. Like this one. Or this one. Or this one. Blast it on repeat. Put on headphones. Don’t stop. You’re a train of joy, and you’re just leaving the station.

Brush your teeth. Wash your face. Open the window. Can you feel it? Can you feel the fresh air hijacking your life? Let it!

Make some coffee. Smell it. Realize what a privilege it is. Wonder about the origins of this miracle. Appreciate its journey. Isn’t it worth more than gold?

Speaking of which: If you want something shiny, look in the mirror. Why should the sun rise if you don’t? Make it! Let a smile radiate from your face. Post a selfie. Wave at the postman. Can you feel the warmth? I assure you they can.

Get dressed. Not in that lousy lounging equipment. Wear some actual pants man! Remember those? Go out with pants on. You won’t believe how empowered you’ll feel.

I guarantee you will strut. You’ll parade the sidewalk as if you own the whole block. It’ll be amazing. Fantastic. Bigly. See? When you’re eight years old, even Trump can make you laugh — for all you know is he talks funny.

Infect the world with your laughter. Laugh for no reason. Laugh while waiting at the traffic light. Grin to yourself like the Cheshire cat. For every one person who thinks you’re crazy, nine more will laugh too.

Buy the food you never buy because it’s $2 more than your average meal budget. Isn’t that stupid? Especially on your birthday. It’s $2! And you only have one life! Treat yourself. Make it count.

Learn a new skill. Stop watching piano covers. Buy an app! Get some sheet music. Press your first key. No eight-year-old worth their salt is content watching others. They must do. Try. Replicate. Playing a song feels ten times better than listening to one — and if listening is already that awesome, imagine how high playing will take you!

Take a break when you’re tired. Hell, take a nap! You can, you know? No one’s stopping you. When rested, you’ll spin our planet with twice the gumption. That’s what we need: A force like the one in Star Wars. Energy! A little divine inspiration; a strike of lightning that can come entirely from within if you want it.

Use it to start a new project. Or don’t. Be extra nice at work. Love your job twice as much. If you don’t, pretend you do for the day. Watch how it’ll transform how you feel about it. Has that lightning kicked in yet? Any lightbulbs flaring up?

This day — today — truly is yours, you know? Always has been. Always will be. There’s no one in your way. Look in the mirror. Step aside. There. Your biggest obstacle has fallen. Poof! Jokes on you! It was all in your head.

Don’t be the villain in your own story. You’re supposed to be the hero!

Life is not a sharp object you try to feel out in the dark. It’s Play-Doh. You can mold it however you want. Channel it! Take whatever wants to flow in, and then redirect it according to your desires. Don’t forget to hand out some to others. It’s more fun to play together.

I know it’s hard to remember sometimes, but if you search deep inside, I think you will find: Once upon a time, you were invincible — and just because you’ve grown up does not mean you can’t bring back that feeling.

Today is gonna be your day. I can feel it.

The Japanese Art of Kintsugi: How to Practice Self-Improvement Without Judging Yourself Cover

The Japanese Art of Kintsugi: How to Practice Self-Improvement Without Judging Yourself

Nik

I still remember the commercials: “Clearasil Ultra Face Wash — and in three days, they’re gone!” “They” are the pimples, of course.

Each ad played out the same way: A teenage boy hides from his crush because he has acne. His friend reminds him of the party in three days. “You can’t go with that face!” The boy uses Clearasil, shows up, and gets to kiss the girl.

As someone who suffered three long years of intense acne in high school, those ads hit me right in the feels — first with hope, then with misery. After I tried the product and it didn’t work, Clearasil continued to erode my self-worth in 30-second increments by reaffirming a false belief I held about myself: As long as I have acne, girls won’t be interested in me, so there’s no point in even trying.

Every year, millions of teenagers share this experience, and it reveals a pattern deeply ingrained in Western culture: Find a flaw, worry about it, try a quick fix, and if it doesn’t work, go back to worrying. Repeat this cycle until some magic pill works or you find an even bigger inadequacy. While this may lead to some improvement, in the long run, it inevitably leads to self-loathing.

You wouldn’t think a pimple commercial reveals so much about a nation’s culture, but if you watch a few Japanese skincare ads for reference, you’ll see — because unlike Clearasil, they do clear things up.

The Japanese Perceive Problems Differently

The first thing you’ll notice about Japanese beauty commercials is that they’re not directed at teenagers. There’s no Justin Bieber claiming zits are intolerable, no before-and-after pictures, and no shrill voice prompting you to “get acne out of your life.”

All you’ll see is adults going about their day, feeling good because — and this is the part the commercials focus on — every day, they practice their skincare routine. Pimples aren’t presented as a flaw to be overcome, just a part of everyday life. “If you consistently take care of your skin, acne might still happen, but it won’t have enough power over you to ruin your day.” That seems to be the message.

This is radically different from how we approach obstacles in the West, and it’s no coincidence. The Japanese perceive problems differently. They don’t view them as stumbling blocks to be eliminated. Instead, they see them as stepping stones on a never-ending journey. They empathize with problems.

The Japanese cultivate this worldview at an early age, thanks not just to their commercials but also their teachers.

“He did it!”

Jim Stigler is a psychology professor at UCLA. He once observed a fourth-grade math class in Japan. Surprisingly, the teacher called the worst student, not the best, to the board. The task was to draw a three-dimensional cube.

Every few minutes, the teacher would ask the rest of the class whether the kid had gotten it right, and the class would look up from their work and shake their heads no. At the end of the class, he did make his cube look right! And the teacher said, ‘How does that look, class?’ And they all said, ‘He did it!’ And they broke into applause. The kid smiled a huge smile and sat down, clearly proud of himself.

Imagine this scene in a Western classroom. Based on 13 years of going to school in Germany, I can tell you: It would not have gone this way.

Usually, if a student is called out and doesn’t immediately get it right, they are branded as stupid — if not by the teacher, then at least by the other students. They’ll return to their desk with their head lowered in shame and, instead of discovering the solution, go back to worrying about their pimples.

In Japan, mistakes are seen as valuable. There’s not just something to learn, there’s something to learn for everyone. Instead of being left behind, people who struggle are pulled into the light. Solving the problem becomes a joint effort, and if the student succeeds, everyone wins.

You might say, to the Japanese, mistakes are worth their weight in gold — sometimes literally.

Kintsugi: Don’t Fix — Integrate

Kintsugi is an old Japanese art. It is the craft of repairing broken pottery using seams of gold. Instead of trying to hide the object’s cracks, it accentuates them. The message is simple but meaningful: Our trials and flaws are not scars on our character — they are the very fabric that makes us human. Each obstacle, each mistake becomes a building block of a better tomorrow, thus making us a little more unique and beautiful.

In the West, we tend to throw things away when they break. Each year, millions of perfectly usable products end up in landfills. To some extent, we do the same with people. This is sad but unsurprising, given the perpetual message in our education and media: If you struggle in even the slightest, you’re not good enough. You can buy some Spanx, muscle supplements, or an online course to fix it, but until you have, don’t bother, and definitely don’t bother others with your problem.

But what if our mistakes are just for learning? What if our flaws aren’t flaws at all — just puzzle pieces that make us different and, thus, lovable?

There’s a difference between fixing and integrating: One is done to compensate, the other to move forward. When we obsess over correcting our flaws, we may succeed, but we’ll never feel content. It takes a general appreciation of life’s transience to focus on learning, accept what we can’t change, and even see beauty in our little imperfections.

The Japanese call this appreciation “mono no aware” — an empathy toward things, a sense of impermanence. Mono no aware is at the heart of kintsugi, and it can make the difference between a laid-back, joyful pursuit of growth and a never-ending spiral of self-flagellation — just like a golden thread can make a repaired plate look more beautiful than it was before it broke.

Summary

From your skin to your mind to your bank account: A desire to improve your life is a wonderful thing. It’s less wonderful if that desire leaves a constant taste of “I’m not good enough” in your mouth.

Not always but often, Western self-help wants you to feel self-conscious. The industry points out your problems, twists the knife, and then happily sells you a plethora of quick fixes to combat them. Whether they work or not, in the long run, this will damage your self-image.

While it’s good to confront our problems head-on, the Japanese aim to do so without negative connotation. They stress consistency and effort in their marketing, parenting, and education. Mistakes are a valuable source of learning for everyone, and our flaws are not just not so bad, they make us unique and beautiful.

The next time you spot a pimple or give the wrong answer, remember the art of kintsugi: Don’t fix. Integrate. As long as you make them steps to something bigger, not a single one of your obstacles will go to waste.

Funny Shower Thoughts Cover

44 Funny Shower Thoughts That Will Snap Your Mind in Half

Nik

On any given day, your brain is either growing or deteriorating. There is no such thing as “maintaining” your mind.

When you don’t challenge your brain, that day, your mind will shrink a little. When you solve a problem or entertain a new idea, your mental ability will grow.

If you do the crossword every day, at first, it’ll make your brain sweat. Eventually, you’ll have memorized all the coded prompts, and it’ll only be a rote memory exercise. So how can you keep stretching your mind?

The answer is not to read a book a day or work crazy hours. Your brain would soon overload and demand a long break. Neither complete stagnation nor excessive learning is the answer.

What you can and should find time for, however, is five minutes a day to engage with new ideas. That’s enough to get new combinations of neurons to fire together, and that’s what mental growth is all about.

Ryan Lombard can help you do just that. Ryan has a series he calls “Thoughts That Will Snap Your Mind in Half.” So far, he’s made 20 parts. Here are the first eight, totaling 44 funny shower thoughts, ideas, and mind-bending questions.

Some made me think deeply, some just made me laugh, and some I didn’t understand at all (yet). I’m sure a few of them will send your mind in new directions.

Here are Ryan Lombard’s 44 “Thoughts That Will Snap Your Mind in Half.”

  1. If you weigh 99 lbs and eat a pound of nachos, are you 1% nacho?
  2. If you drop soap on the floor, is the floor clean, or is the soap dirty?
  3. Which orange came first — the color, or the fruit?
  4. If two vegans are arguing, is it still considered beef?
  5. When you’re born deaf, what language do you think in?
  6. If you get out of the shower clean, how does your towel get dirty?
  7. If Apple made a car, would it still have windows?
  8. When we yawn, do deaf people think we’re screaming?
  9. If you’re waiting for the waiter, aren’t you the waiter?
  10. How do you throw away a garbage can?
  11. If you buy a bigger bed, you’re left with more bed room but less bedroom.
  12. Why aren’t iPhone chargers just called “Apple Juice”?
  13. If you work as security at a Samsung store, does that make you a Guardian of the Galaxy?
  14. When you feel bugs on you even though there are no bugs on you, are they just the ghosts of the bugs you’ve killed?
  15. When you clean a vacuum cleaner, aren’t you the vacuum cleaner?
  16. Nothing is ever really on fire, but rather fire is on things.
  17. If life is unfair to everyone, does that mean life is actually fair?
  18. What happens if you get scared half to death twice?
  19. Why is it called taking a dump when you’re leaving it?
  20. Being down for something and being up for something mean the same thing.
  21. If you’re in the living room, and you pass away, did you die, or are you just knocked out?
  22. Why is the pizza box a square if the pizza is a circle and the slice is a triangle?
  23. Why is it called a building when it’s already built?
  24. How does a sponge hold water when it’s full of holes?
  25. The blinks of your eyes get removed from your memory.
  26. What would happen if Pinocchio said, “My nose will grow now?”
  27. Actors pretend to work.
  28. People who need glasses just got bad graphics.
  29. Why is bacon called bacon and cookies called cookies, when you cook bacon and bake cookies?
  30. Do clothes in China just say, “Made down the road?”
  31. If your shirt isn’t tucked into your pants, are your pants tucked into your shirt?
  32. If you’re invisible, and you close your eyes, can you see through your eyelids?
  33. A fire truck is actually a water truck.
  34. Why are deliveries on a ship called cargo, but in a car, it’s called a shipment?
  35. If one teacher can’t teach all subjects, why is one child expected to study all subjects?
  36. Are oranges named oranges because oranges are orange, or is orange named orange because oranges are orange?
  37. What happens to the car if you press the brake and the accelerator at the same time? Does it take a screenshot?
  38. The youngest picture of you is also the oldest picture of you.
  39. If we have watermelon, shouldn’t we also have firemelon, earthmelon, and airmelon? The elemelons!
  40. Why do we drive in parkways but park in driveways?
  41. Your burps are just your puke’s farts.
  42. If it rains on a Sunday, does that mean it’s now Rainday?
  43. Clapping is just hitting yourself repeatedly because you like something.
  44. Your alarm sound is technically your theme song, since it plays at the start of every episode.

Some of these questions don’t make sense, others have fairly obvious answers. Some are just jokes, while others seem like they can’t be answered at all.

The more of these “shower thoughts” you consider, the more patterns of creative thinking you’ll spot.

There’s the “flipped logic,” as in the cookie vs. bacon example, the “circular reasoning” of being a vacuum cleaner, and the paradox of life being fair by being unfair. There’s the “incomplete set” of the elemelons, the “chicken vs. egg” problem of the orange, and the “all roads lead to Rome” behind your youngest picture also being your oldest.

Once you recognize such patterns, you can think about where else they apply and come up with your own examples. The latter is the ultimate creative exercise, and it proves: It only takes five minutes a day to grow your mind instead of shrinking it.

Don’t waste this opportunity. Just like we must share joy in order to grow it, we must snap our minds in half to double them in size.

How to Not Waste Your Life Cover

How To Not Waste Your Life

Nik

If you’ve wasted your whole life, can you make up for it in a single moment?

This is the question at the heart of Extraction, Netflix’s latest blockbuster and, at 90 million viewers in the first month, biggest film premiere ever.

Following Chris Hemsworth as a black market mercenary trying to rescue the kidnapped son of India’s biggest drug lord, the movie is full of car chases, gun fights, and a whopping 183 bodies dropping at the hands of Thor himself.

At the end of the day, however, it is about none of those things. It’s a movie about redemption.

After freeing his target, 15-year-old Ovi, from the hands of a rival Bangladeshi drug lord, Hemsworth’ character Tyler shows true vulnerability in a brief moment of shelter.

When Ovi asks him if he’s always been brave, Tyler claims he’s “just the opposite,” having left his wife and six-year-old son, right before the latter died of lymphoma.

Sharing the kind of wisdom only children tend to possess, Ovi replies with a Paulo Coelho quote he’s read in school:

“You drown not by falling into the river, but by staying submerged in it.”

You’re not an ex-special forces agent. Your life is not a movie. There will be no obvious signs. No excessive violence. No rampant drug abuse.

Just a slow, steady trickle of days, each a little more like the last, each another step away from your dreams — another day submerged in the river.

The river is pressing “Ignore” on the reminder to decline a good-but-not-great project request. The river is saying, “When I’ve done X, I’ll start writing.” The river is postponing asking your daughter about her dance hobby because today, you’re just too tired.

The river is everything that sounds like a temporary excuse today but won’t go away tomorrow.

Trust me. I’ve been there. It really, really won’t. No matter how much you’d like it to.

At first, it doesn’t feel like you’re drifting. You’re just letting go for a bit. You’re floating. The river carries you. It’s nice. Comfortable. Things happen. Time passes. It’ll keep passing.

Eventually, the river leads into a bigger river. You’re in new terrain. You’ve never seen this place before. Where can you get ashore? Where will this river lead?

Soon, you don’t know what’s ahead anymore. You can’t see what’s next. The river could become a waterfall. It might send you right off a cliff. You’ll stay submerged forever.

There won’t be a big shootout at the end. Just a regretful look out the window. A relative visiting. “Oh yeah, that. I never did it. I can’t tell you why.”

All rivers flow into the sea. If you don’t push to the surface, if you don’t start swimming, that’s where you’re going.

No one is coming to save you. You won’t get an extraction. No one will beat you into writing your book or asking her to marry you or being a good mother. No 15-year-old boy will serve you the answer in a quote from a book.

The only way to not waste your life is to do your best to not waste today.

Write a sentence. Make a hard choice. Pick up the phone.

We all fall into the river from time to time. But we can’t stay submerged in it. Don’t let small regrets pile up in silence. Take one step each day. One stroke towards the surface.

You’re not a soldier, and no single brief can save you. No standalone mission will define your legacy.

Don’t hope for a shot at redemption. Redeem yourself with your actions.

Redeem yourself every day.

Why Everyone Should Write Cover

Why Everyone Should Write

Nik

If you’re reading this, you know how to write. And even though you picked up both in elementary school, right now, you’re likely doing too much of the former and too little of the latter.

You might write sales reports, shopping lists, and birthday cards, but none of those are really productive, are they? They’re just necessary. Ironically, all the most productive forms of writing aren’t necessary at all — but that doesn’t make them less important.

Everyone should write.

Why? So you can get rich and famous and build a personal brand and attract millions of readers? No. Everyone should write because writing imposes discipline on your thoughts and emotions.

Writing is the only art where refinement is inseparable from the craft. You can’t take the paint back from the canvas. There’s no need to stop talking on video. You can, of course, make an effort to improve your work in other arts. You can shoot multiple takes, sketch on an iPad that allows for edits, and re-record the song a thousand times. But if you don’t make the effort? Then improvement never happens.

Writing is different. The only way to write is to curate what you think. Every waking second, you’re choosing one thought over another. Now, you have to select which thoughts will go onto the page. You can’t pick all of them. You have to choose.

“Don’t edit while you write,” they say. Nonsense. You’re always editing — because you’re always changing your thoughts. Sure, you can make an effort to not filter yourself as much in early drafts, but it’s impossible to turn that filtering off altogether.

Language is structure. We pick words to assemble sentences and chain together those sentences using commas, periods, and paragraphs. Then, we can build pages, chapters, speeches, even books of great magnitude — but they’re all works of structure and the process of structuring starts with the smallest unit. It affects every part of the coherent result because it affects every second we spend producing it.

You cannot write without structuring your thoughts. But what are your thoughts? Your thoughts are how you respond to your emotions. When someone insults you, you feel hurt. That hurt then starts to inform your thoughts. The connection may last for a second, ten minutes, or a lifetime, but it’s there. Therefore, in curating your thoughts which follow from your emotions, writing is nothing other than structuring your emotional responses.

Again, the difference between writing and other forms of art is that some discipline is imposed merely by engaging in the act itself. You can record a four-hour rant following that time you stubbed your toe, but even if it’s possible to write a really long essay about it, chances are, the fire of rage would fizzle out much quicker — because you’re forced to select which sparks you burn into the page.

That’s why writing breeds self-awareness more so than other crafts and why most of other crafts are, at least in part, also based on writing. Songs are written both in lyrics and tune, videos are scripted, and most radio shows and podcasts follow some sort of outline. That’s not a coincidence. Writing allows us to form and shape our selves unlike any other form of expression. It is the best version of that self that we want to put into our art, and so writing is a critical part of the process, no matter which medium you ultimately choose.

None of your writing needs to happen in public for it to be valuable, for this transformation to take place. You can keep a journal, a diary, or dabble with poems in the notes app on your phone. You can write essays, fiction, or short articles that merely serve as reminders to yourself. You can do all of this for five minutes or two hours, but I encourage you to try any one of it at all.

Whenever you write, however much of it you do, you’re unequivocally, irrevocably telling your story, and you’re doing it in a way that makes processing your emotions inevitable. That’s why everyone should write.

If You Can’t Do Big Things for Yourself, Do Small Things for Others Cover

If You Can’t Do Big Things for Yourself, Do Small Things for Others

Nik

Your latest article flopped. Your boss criticized you in public. Your income is 30% down from the last month. It hurts, doesn’t it? To give your all and still fail. It happens to the best of us.

In moments of intense frustration, the weeks when nothing seems to be working, it’s easy to see each missed swing as a third strike. Can you ever recover? How will you come back from this?

The truth is simple and undramatic: You have a good meal, go to bed early, and show up again tomorrow. Except death, there are no third strikes in life. You’ll never have to go to the bench. You swung the bat and missed the ball. That’s all that happened. Nothing more, nothing less.

Most of all — and this is one of the best lessons you can teach yourself — hardly anyone noticed. The world doesn’t need you to be great just yet. We’ll get through the day without your grand achievement — just like you.

This isn’t to say your mission isn’t important or that you shouldn’t keep up the fight, it’s simply a reminder that, yes, it’s okay to be successful tomorrow.

There’s a story about Larry Page and Sergey Brin that, in the early days of Google, they were happy about small user numbers. “Good. Our product will be better tomorrow. Let people find us then.”

In Twitter’s first office, there was a big, upside down sign. It read, “Let’s make better mistakes tomorrow.”

Of course, right now, you don’t want to think about mistakes. You don’t want to think about tomorrow. You want to wallow in your failure. You want to steep in it like a teabag, but we all know what happens to tea that sits too long: it gets cold, bitter, and devoid of the energy it’s supposed to bring.

So what else can you do? You can take a deep breath. You can remember the world doesn’t revolve around you. You can forget yourself for a while and do something for others.

Answer your friend’s voice message from five days ago. Hold the door for someone at the grocery store. Buy flowers on the way home. Or ice cream. Or frozen pizza. Whatever makes your partner, kids, or neighbor happy.

Scan your inbox for a simple question. Instead of a one-liner, write a five-sentence response. You’ll get a beaming “Thank you!” back. Donate to your friend’s fundraiser. Their cause can use ten bucks. Recommend a good show to a colleague. They might return the favor at lunch.

When you can’t do big things for yourself, do small things for others.

It’ll take your mind off the monumentality of your task. Like that first gulp of air after being underwater, it’ll put you at ease. Then, it slowly morphs into a warm, fuzzy feeling.

Most of all, it’ll remind you: That big thing you want to achieve for yourself? It was never about you in the first place. It’ll be the result of serving others.

We look at people who make others shine and call them ‘great.’ We most respect folks who elevate others. Who step aside, time after time, and pass on the credit. The more spotlights you point towards those around you, the more we’ll love you in return.

Steve Jobs didn’t give people a new phone — he made them into pioneers, photographers, and folks with good taste. That’s why we loved him. Not because he invented some device.

Long before he was “Steve Jobs,” he too had many bad days. The latest demo crashed. The board fired him from his own company. I’m sure that, more than once, he wanted to quit. “How can I come back from this?”

But then, eventually, Steve remembered there was one more thing to do. One more task to take care of. Why aren’t the fonts perfect yet? How can we make initial setup easier? Which click can we do without?

Steve Jobs obsessed over details because it allowed him to keep going where others would have quit. It was a brilliant coping mechanism. No matter what disaster had happened, if he could get this one thing right, he still had a chance to make someone’s day.

Steve was a visionary. His commitment to innovation was remarkable. His greatness, however, rests on a million acts of service. Tiny, near-inconceivable ways of elevating the users of his products. By pushing him towards those acts — if only as a distraction in the moment — his worst days contributed as much to his success as his best ones, if not more.

If, one day, we tell your story like we tell his today, we might say the same about you. For now, remember that it’s okay to be great tomorrow. You may have failed, but it’s never too late to get back in the game.

If you want to do something big, do something small for others. True greatness is about making others shine.

6 Paradoxical Truths of Life

Nik

The first paradox I ever saw was Waterfall by M. C. Escher.

Examples of Paradoxes Cover
Image via Facebook

How does a four-year-old come across a perpetual motion illusion by an artist who died 20 years before he was born? Well, it hung in our hallway. Not the original, of course. The copy provided enough staring material for hours.

How does that work? Why does the water flow up and down at the same time? How fast must the wheel spin to make it all go round? Most importantly, why aren’t they staring? The people in this painting have no care in the world. To them, this magnificent delusion barely exists.

When you first encounter a paradox, your brain goes on the fritz. Which version is true? Why don’t they add up? And why do they feel like, somehow, they still kind of do? It’s easy to get stuck on this part. To obsess and try to cram the contradiction into a box labeled ‘consistent’ in your mind.

If you don’t however, eventually, something wonderful happens: Your brain turns off. It stops trying. Suddenly, you can, somehow, accept the idea at face value and, instead of dissecting it, appreciate its beauty.

If you’ve ever felt this way, if you’ve ever been mesmerized by something you could not understand, then you’ve witnessed not just the beauty of paradox but, actually, the essence of life: It’s a mystery, but it’s marvelous.

Just because we can’t understand something doesn’t mean it’s not there by design. This applies to the mechanical parts of your coffee machine as much as it applies to a breakup, a car accident, or, well, this painting. All of it was designed just for you, just for this moment. You might not “get it” at the time, but, later, you most likely will. “You can only connect the dots looking backwards,” Steve Jobs once said.

Deep in our subconscious, we know this, and that’s why our brains allow us to eventually gloss over the details and focus on learning, enjoying, and finding the positives. Yes. This is the paradox we need right now. If we accept it, it’ll give us peace of mind, a sense of ease, and freedom from worry.

If we appreciate it even, it’ll open a door to a new perspective: Maybe, both versions are true. What if the paradox combines two ends of the same spectrum? And what if we can stand on that spectrum and re-balance as needed? Might what looks like a flaw actually be an advantage?

Open your mind. Let the paradox in. Appreciate its beauty and accept its truth. It’ll prove useful time and again. It’ll prove to be part of the design.

Here are six of my favorite examples of paradoxes that can make your life a lot easier.

1. You didn’t come this far to only come this far

Dean Karnazes ran 50 marathons in 50 states on 50 consecutive days. Imagine being on day 49 of such a feat. “I can’t run another marathon. I just can’t.” Yes. But then, he did.

I’m sure there was more than one mile Dean hated. On the 30th marathon. On the 10th. Even on the first. But each time, whether it was mile two in race one or mile 17 in race 43, he remembered: You didn’t come this far to only come this far.

When you have trouble starting, remember how you got to the starting line. When you have trouble finishing, remember how you got close to the goal.

No matter how far you’ve come, no matter how daunting the obstacle ahead, there’s always a little more to go. This isn’t sad. It’s life — and simply a reminder of all the great things that lie behind you already — even if, sometimes, these great things consist of small steps.

2. Wherever you go, there you are

While life is a never-ending journey and we should always move on and strive forward, it pays well to stop sometimes and look around. “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”

Heeding Ferriss Bueller’s advice lets us take a breath, enjoy the scenery, and celebrate our accomplishments. It also affords us a chance to look at the path that brought us here. We didn’t take all turns deliberately, and not all deliberate turns take us where we want to go. Yet here we are. This is it.

Why did you send that careless email? How come you stayed in this city? Why did you tell her your embarrassing story? Maybe you know, maybe you don’t. But it led you right here. To joblessness. To friendship. Into love. And that’s all that matters.

3. The easiest way to getting what you want is learning to want less

Once you’ve arrived, the best way to be present is to not look too far ahead. You’ll hit your next obstacle soon enough. That’s a time for forward-thinking.

For now, again, look around you. Look at what you have. Isn’t that enough? Slowing down today makes tomorrow feel like we lived more yesterday. Like we had it yesterday. Enough. And if we start from enough, today is a gift.

“Desire is a contract you make with yourself to be unhappy until you get what you want,” Naval says. Wanting is powerful. It makes you do things. Doing without wanting is joyful. It makes you love things. You choose.

4. You can’t *change* the people around you, but you can change the *people* around you

How many of the people you’ve met made you think, “I wish they’d never change?” That’s rare. Wishing for others to be different is the norm.

Of course, most people don’t change quickly, easily, or at all, let alone according to your wishes or because of anything you did, and so, eventually, you’ll leave most of them behind. That’s okay. It’s necessary. But when you find someone who makes it easy to stay, think long and hard before you leave.

How many true friends do you need to be happy? Five? Three? One? It’s easy to wander through life, hopping from circle to circle, always meeting people, always hoping for better but never quite connecting.

What if we stuck with those to whom we feel connected already? Let’s leave behind who we must leave behind but cherish the people we never want to change.

5. Don’t try to find people you’re willing to be with — be willing to try with the people you find

As little as you can do to change others, as much there is to be done inside yourself. Meeting the people who fit into your life like perfect puzzle pieces takes inner work — especially in love.

Bring out the best in yourself, then let those parts act like feelers, just waiting to register a signal from someone else. In the meantime, the strongest signal you can send is showing up.

Don’t wait for someone to open your eyes, mind, and heart. Choose to go through life this way. Hand out trust advances. Be willing to try, and you’ll be surprised how many people will extend you the same courtesy.

6. Take care of yourself so you can take care of others

If our lives didn’t end, they’d be meaningless. That’s another example of a paradox. Maybe the biggest. Most of us want to spend this limited time in the most meaningful way, and that usually means taking care of others.

Whether it’s being a mom, a great husband, a kindergarten teacher, a writer educating readers, a coach helping entrepreneurs, at the end of the day, life revolves around people. One of the hardest commitments to make is to hit pause on that carousel, step back, and take care of yourself. It’s also one of the most important.

The only way to bring the most and best of your time and energy to the grand human table is to ensure you have time and energy to spare. It’s not egoistic to put yourself first. It’s generous.

The guy gazing at the sky. The lady hanging her laundry. The reason the people in Escher’s painting don’t care about the waterfall is that they’ve accepted it. They rest easy. They don’t mind the inconsistency.

Paradoxes can seem like they’re here to make our lives harder. Little puzzles to keep our heads banging against the wall. They’re not. Paradoxes give us more options for truth because the truth always has more than one version.

Pulling from opposite ends of different spectrums lets us navigate even the most challenging situations with relative ease. Ironically, we can’t see this when we try to explain everything away.

To live life is to live inconsistently. To love life is to love inconsistency.

So smile at contradictions. Grin wide as you take on their challenge. Appreciate the beauty in life’s many little discrepancies.

It may take you a while to see it, but once you do, you might even think life’s better when the water flows both ways.

4 Tips to Improve All Your Writing Cover

4 Tips to Improve All Your Writing

Nik

Three years ago, I shared four writing tips. I found them through trial and error. That was hard but made them easy for you to pick up. Three years later, I have four more tips. Like the others, they’ll improve all your future writing.

Don’t Hedge Your Bets, But…

Writing is thinking. The only way to write is to think. Therefore, we want to know what you think, not that you think. It’s obvious. You could not have taken any other path to get here. Spare us the real-time transcripts.

“I think,” “I suggest,” “in my opinion,” throw them out the window. Say what you want to say. Don’t just think, believe in what you conclude.

Before:

“Writing improves your thinking. I suggest you write daily.”

After:

“Writing improves your thinking. Write daily.”

…Acknowledge That You Don’t Know Everything

Rick Rubin says, “The best art divides the audience.” While divisive art works, it’s not the only kind that does. You don’t need a slew of euphoric comments and hate-mail to know what you made is valuable.

Sometimes, the best feedback is no feedback. Sometimes, we want to just nod and think, “Yes!” to ourselves. So as much as you shouldn’t hedge your bets grammatically, acknowledge your faults contextually. This may look like an exception to the above, but it’s actually possible to do both at the same time. Believe in what you say, just don’t say you know everything.

Before:

“Writing daily is for everyone.”

After:

“Writing daily may not be for everyone, but if you try it, you might find it’s for you — and that’s all that matters.”

Don’t Write Words — Write Music

Gary Provost, a famous American writer, once demonstrated how to balance parataxis and hypotaxis. Without knowing what they are, you’ll understand.

This sentence has five words. Here are five more words. Five-word sentences are fine. But several together become monotonous. Listen to what is happening. The writing is getting boring. The sound of it drones. It’s like a stuck record. The ear demands some variety. Now listen. I vary the sentence length, and I create music. Music. The writing sings. It has a pleasant rhythm, a lilt, a harmony. I use short sentences. And I use sentences of medium length. And sometimes, when I am certain the reader is rested, I will engage him with a sentence of considerable length, a sentence that burns with energy and builds with all the impetus of a crescendo, the roll of the drums, the crash of the cymbals–sounds that say, “Listen to this, it is important.”

Aaron Sorkin says dialog is music. It’s not just dialog. All writing is music. Here’s a colored version of the above. Can you see the rainbow? Write rainbows. Vary your sentence length. Give us short, long, then more of the one and less of the other, until you flip it all around.

Before:

“I am a writer. I write daily. It is good for me. It helps me think. It is the best.”

After:

“I am a writer. I write daily. Writing helps me think, and thinking is good for me.”

English Has 171,476 words — Use Them

There are 171,476 words in the English language. In our daily lives, we use 3,000 of them — less than 2%. That’s a shame for our conversations, but for our writing, it’s an outright disgrace.

Since the ‘60s, the average pop song has become nearly 20% more repetitive, and the top 10 have the least verbal variety. Express yourself, they say, but that requires having the words to do so. You can find them for free in a thesaurus. 171,476 words. Use them.

Before:

“I am a writer. I write daily. Writing helps me think, and thinking is good for me.”

After:

“I am a writer. I do it daily. The craft helps me think, and contemplation is good for me.”

It takes a long time to find short tips — and even the best of them only pay off after a while. Thirty seconds to implement one tip, eight hours to execute 1,000, and much longer still to discover your own.

Have discipline. Believe. Be transparent. Write music, and use your words.

I’ll see you in three years.

One More Time Cover

One More Time

Nik

You ate all the candy and told your parents you didn’t. Oh, that damned first lie. But eventually, you forgave yourself. One more time.

You said you’d be home by ten, but you weren’t. They were worried sick. Your stomach twisted as you lay in bed. But eventually, you forgave yourself. One more time.

Your boyfriend said he was seeing someone else. How could he do that to you? What did you do wrong? Nothing. So eventually, you forgave yourself. One more time.

The girl you liked was never into you. You just refused to hear the message. When it finally sank in, you broke down and cried. All this time, wasted. But, finally, you know. So you forgave yourself. One more time.

You felt lonely and isolated. Why didn’t anyone understand? One day, you realize you never told them. That you pushed them away. But time heals all wounds, even if not all bridges can be rebuilt. You found a new start, a new chapter, a new life. And forgave yourself. One more time.

You knew you weren’t fit to work. But you showed up anyway. You wanted to look professional and strong. Of course, the project went sideways. You blew past the deadline. The final number was wrong. Your boss ripped your head off. Worse, she was right. But you could do better next time. Take the day when you’re sick. So you forgave yourself. One more time.

The voice in your head said “no.” That you couldn’t do it. Who should believe you? Why would anyone care? It brought up some nasty things, and you surrendered. To the couch. To Netflix. To ice cream. But you’d still be here tomorrow. You’d have a chance to try again. But to take it, you had to forgive yourself. One more time.

You were supposed to be so much farther by now. More money. A family. The job you really wanted. You don’t have any of these things, and, yet, life is still beautiful. There’s so much more to it than this. Maybe, it’s a sign to forgive yourself. One more time.

You don’t have to do it all alone, you know? Whatever it is, someone out there feels the same. But if you don’t raise your hand, they won’t see you. Can’t help you. Can’t tell you they’re going through the same thing. Don’t stay quiet. It’s okay. You can forgive yourself. One more time.

Whatever happens today, or tomorrow, or 36 days from now, promise me one thing. Promise me, you’ll forgive yourself. One more time.