Month: August 2016

When is it a good time to get married? To start a family? How about starting a business? Or that project you have been putting off? When is it a good time to make art?

Never and always.

The logical choice is to wait. Wait for market conditions to be right. Wait until you’ve gained more market share. Wait until you have more credentials. Wait until you are in a better financial situation. Wait for the recession to be over. Or wait until you have enough experience. Wait until someone gives you authority. Wait until your ducks are in a row.

If all we do is spend our time waiting, then we never spend any time doing.

Disruptions are never practical and they never occur at the right time. Because of nature. It feels safer to fly low, to blend in, to follow. But paradoxically waiting makes ourselves more desperate and less likely to make a difference. We trade in for what we believe is safety for what makes us alive: to fly high, to stand out, to lead.

To dare and create something that matters. These spaces. Is what makes us human.

A few weeks ago, I had an opportunity to attend a local arts festival where two scholarships were handed out to the community. Long story short: only one person picked themselves to play the game.

To follow-up what happened, that night I went home and wrote a letter to the Mayor of Midvale. I asked if the scholarship was still available. I also recommended a young man who I personally knew in the neighborhood.

Since that time this young man wrote a follow-up letter to the Mayor. Met with her. Met with Steven Henager College. Received the scholarship and now has an opportunity to go to college. Not only that his sister accompanied this young man to the Steven Henager meeting. Had the courage to tell her story and she also received a scholarship.

The bottom line: it all starts by picking yourself to play the game. Yes, the original letter could have been rejected. That rejection could have confirmed the voice that screams,”How dare you! You see, you flew too close to the sun. This is proof. You can’t do this. Who do you think you are?” But what was the worst that could happen? The risk of rejection and shame was small. The world wouldn’t even known about it. As James Carse wrote, the goal of the infinite game is to keep playing. And if it doesn’t crush you then you can keep playing.

Anyone watching an hour of television a day has just demonstrated that they have an hour of their time to do something that matters.

The average American is watching 5 hours of television per day, but somehow we don’t have time to do the things that make us happy: connect, make a difference, make something new.

The internal narrative needs to change. If we could get rid of the things that take 80% of our time that only bring 20% of their value: what could you do with all this extra time?

The amount of choices are overwhelming and can be crippling (we are the most obese, most medicated, and might be the most unhappy generation of Americans than ever before).

The only way to fight the busy is to say no. No to the extra curricular activities that are not bringing value to the home. You might be judged. You might think you are a bad parent. It might seem weird at first to cut the cable. But it may just be the thing that saves your life.

Icarus was instructed not to fly too high. His wings made of wax would melt if he flew too close to the sun and he would surely parish.

However, Icarus was also instructed not to fly too low. The weight of the sea would inhibit his ability to fly and he would parish.

We are not hard-wired to fly high. It’s easier (and if feels safer) to fly low. It’s difficult to stand up and say follow me. It’s not easy to take responsibility and to not worry about credit.

We fly too low too often. We give in to the resistance and accept that we are not like the few who are chosen to fly higher.

When Kerouac said grab your rucksack and climb a mountain.

He wasn’t saying wait until you get your ducks in a row. Wait for the market conditions to be right. Or wait until you have enough school or the right job and then when its safe take a leap.

He was saying, “Follow me.”

And it ignited a revolution. It broke down the old system to enable the impossible.

He changed the way we think.

Imagine how much easier it would have been to say, “Follow me” with Twitter or Facebook to spread your ideas back in the 50’s and 60’s.

This is the golden age of connection. It is easier than ever before to stand up and say, “This is me. This is what I do. Follow me.”

Why can you still find people using a rolodex? It is a far inferior technology. Better yet, why can you still buy a rolodex?

It is because of lock in. An unwillingness to change.

Change is hard. Change is difficult. It’s easier to keep doing it the way you have always done it. (However exhausting it is to maintain the status quo.) Change can be scary. Only because it might not work. But people who are unwilling to change stay on the hook. They hope that something better will come along that they can chase. But in the end they are chasing Killdeer.

The Killdeer is a bird that spends a significant amount of time on the ground (particularly around golf courses). They make lots of noises causing distractions to get your attention. The interesting thing about Killdeer is that they will run in front of you to try to get you to chase them. They will pull ahead and stop. Repeating this process over and over again. At first, it is really amusing to chase them. But after a while you realize that they stay just far enough away so that you can never catch them. They just make you think you can. But you can’t and you never will. This gets so infuriating that eventually you quit.

There are lots of Killdeers out there in the world. They are distracting us. Taking us down a path you don’t want to go. Causing us to waste our time and talents. They frustrate us. They take away hope.

Too many of us think that we have missed our opportunity. We were too distracted. Too many of us saw what was happening and got caught up in following Killdeer. Now we think that it’s too late to try that thing we always wanted to try. So we keep chasing Killdeer: by checking our status, seeing if the world has ended, catch up on a never-ending conversation, watch more cat videos. It is all leading us away from the work that actually matters.

The iPhone is not even 10 years old yet. Think about that for a minute. (It will be on June 29, 2017).

We have come so far in the last decade. But the leap is now. And we are only starting to scratch the surface of what is to come. Right now, it is only getting easier to do something that matters. Not harder. But it won’t be like this forever.

It’s a big ocean. And there is plenty to go around. We don’t need to wait for the tide to come back in.

It never seems like the right time to start something. It’s risky. And yeah someone out there doesn’t approve.

When Gutenberg launched the printing press in 1467 less than 30% of the population in Europe was literate. What a terrible time to go into the book publishing business.

But we don’t have to wait for the next card to turn. Or our number to be called. Or to be picked for a promotion.

Technology is going to keep going. And it’s getting faster and cheaper and easier to access.

The time is now. It’s better than ever before to leap into something new. What are you waiting for?

At some point it pains people to be doing the wrong thing over and over again without getting caught.

65% of our grade-schoolers may end up doing work that hasn’t been invented yet. So how can the school system prepare us for something that doesn’t exist?

They can’t by doing it the way it has always been.

It’s not good enough to know the answer (Google takes care of this). It’s not even good enough to say that I am studying to become a lawyer, CPA, or doctor. Who knows what these industries will look like 30 years from now?

We have to be able to go find the answer.

Instead of teaching us specific formulas and measuring specific results; we should be taught things that are universal: how to make a difference, solve interesting problems, relate with each other, virtues, community, art, find higher purpose and meaning.

One of my favorite authors, Seth Godin, has a short lecture called Leap First.

At the 25 minute mark, there is a distinct humming noise in the background. Going back, you can hear someone vacuuming in the background during his lecture.

You got to think that he is in front of a live audience, being recorded, and now you have a vacuum creating a distraction. For most of us, it can throw our game. But it didn’t phase him. He didn’t miss a beat.

Because he is a professional. He is someone who steps up and does what he does best despite the distractions. Amateurs blame the vacuum for not doing their best work.