Category: Life

Last week I wrote two posts discussing the desire to find fulfillment in your work¹. As I thought about it over the weekend, I noted that many people call the quest for fulfillment “following your passion.” If you live in the culture I live in, that phrase is all-too-familiar. We experience such inspirational advice in every venue from education to advertising. It feels really good. I love indulging in the mental exercise of dropping the seemingly “unnecessary” elements of my life and focusing on the few things that I’m most passionate about.

Continue reading On Following Your Passion, Part 1

1. You can read the first article, The Challenge of Not Having a Challenge, here. You can read the second article, From the Comments: Is It Wrong or Selfish of People to Crave Fulfillment?, here.

I recently wrote a post called The Challenge of Not Having a Challenge.² Here’s an excerpt:

I believe we’re embedded with the desire to accomplish things—to make something with our skills, abilities and resources. On the other hand, I think that unbridled desire can lead to an unhealthy sense of entitlement and lack of commitment (according to Forbes, “ninety-one percent of Millennials (born between 1977-1997) expect to stay in a job for less than three years.”).

I was delighted to be asked a really good question in the comments and I thought the exchange would be interesting to publish as a post.

Continue reading From the Comments: Is It Wrong or Selfish of People to Crave Fulfillment?

1. You can read the full post, The Challenge of Not Having a Challenge, here.

This is the sixth post in a series called Making it Count about getting things done and using our precious hours wisely³ .

Recently I wrote about unsubscribing from a friend’s weekly email and how he challenged my reason (or excuse) of “being too busy.”⁴. I’ve been thinking for some time about the next post in my Making it Count series and an article on how I consume the internet has been at the top of the list. Responding to my friend’s email was a great way to kickstart the writing process.

A Vast Ocean of Information

Intentionally consuming content on the Internet can be an overwhelming task. The speed at which content is created and travels, along with the sheer immensity of information available is simultaneously wonderful and engulfing.

For many of us, though, the Internet can feel small at times. I think there are a few reasons for this. First, we use tools that bring content to us: Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, news feeds of any variety. Secondly, we often use the web to find very specific types of information and search engines allow us to start our journey and arrive at the correct destination in short order. Third, we develop go-to content sources over time. If the information isn’t coming to us, we often go to ‘familiar’ places to consume content from proven sources, just like a favorite restaurant. (There are many more reasons, of course, but these will suffice for our purposes here.)

Engaging a network that is both immeasurably large but can also feel small and familiar creates somewhat of a paradox in how to actually use it, in part because the possibilities are, almost literally, endless. You can find anything you can imagine or only what you’re looking for—and we find value in both.

Continue reading Making it Count: How I Consume The Internet

1. You can read more about the series and view links to additional posts here.2. You can read my post about being to busy here.

I recently had a chance to visit with my dear friend Dan Roge in Washington, D.C. Dan is a big fan of Wendell Berry⁵, an acclaimed author and activist. Recently, Dan had the privilege of sharing Berry’s company in the luminary’s own home.

Dan shared many lessons he gleaned from that visit, but one in particular has been rolling around in my head for the last several weeks. Here’s an excerpt from Dan’s own hand, describing the relationship between the actual work Berry produces and the way he produces it:

Continue reading Dan Roge on Wendell Berry: Process and Product

1. Wendell Berry is “…an American novelist, poet, environmental activist, cultural critic, and farmer. A prolific author, he has written dozens of novels, short stories, poems, and essays.” Read more about Berry on Wikipedia.

Ceteris Peribus is a Latin phrase that means, “all other things being equal.”Economists often use the term to qualify their analysis. In other words, economic models necessarily assume in many cases that variables will remain constant-sometimes a mathematical mandate when you are studying change in a single variable. Using a qualifier is necessary because there aren’t constants—economic variables are constantly in flux and can change in significant ways unexpectedly.

I’ve noticed that I can get into the habit of viewing my life and business in the context of Ceteris Peribus. To some extent, that type of forecasting is necessary because I can’t predict what’s going to happen and we all have to make the best decisions we can with whatever information we’ve got.

That mindset can become unhealthy, though, when I idealize a life where many variables are constant.

Most often this shows up when I live in the “Land of If.” We all play the “if game” with ourselves:

Continue reading Life Isn’t “Ceteris Peribus”

Last night my wife and I were folding laundry. We had two loads to process, so I started on one while she took care of a few other chores around the house.

We’ve been married a few years, but don’t often do laundry together—we both do the laundry, it’s just that most often it’s a solo activity no matter who is doing it (my wife is wedding florist and works weekends, which is why our schedule is a little out of the ordinary).

When my wife came in to help fold the clothes she asked, “do you always separate all of the clothes into piles before folding them?” I didn’t think much about it, but that’s exactly what I’d done: I sorted all of the clean clothes into piles by category (socks, shirts, etc.) and then set about folding them. Of course, I was asked to explain my methodology.

Continue reading Less Decisions for Your Brain

Earlier this month my wife, a florist, wrote a short blog post about messes and failure⁶. It included a few pictures of what her studio and work truck look like after the chaos of a big event.

A lot of bloggers, designers and makers use this phrase “a beautiful mess”. It’s great. Really. I understand it 100%. My work is 95% messy in the flower world. SO not glam. Lots of buckets and lifting and moving and stems all over the place. I have been following the sister team of A Beautiful Mess for a few years now, and have enjoyed watching them continue to create and grow. They were interviewed by Design Sponge recently (read about it here), and I like how they phrased this – “Failure is a funny thing because, if you treat it right, it just morphs into a lesson learned.” If you treat it right. I like that. Do you need to shake something off? Change something you’re doing? Say you’re sorry for something? Ask someone for help? Treat the failure and it will morph into a lesson learned.

That reminded me of a post I wrote a few years ago called Creation and Chaotic Residue⁷ that included a short anecdote about my first experience with the messes that being a florist creates. (It was also fun to look back and see myself writing about this as a fiancee before we tied the knot.) Here’s the original article:

Continue reading Rewind: Creation and Chaotic Residue, Part 1

1. You can read my wife’s post about messes and failure and see the pictures on her blog.2. You can read the original post about chaotic residue on the Brains on Fire blog.