A – Loose Thoughts
Complexity is the enemy of resonance. Any story that leaves its audience confused is one that eliminates its capacity to spread.
That’s why great storytellers can take any idea – regardless of its complexity – and distill it down to its essence. There are many reliable ways to do this, whether in the form of simple diagrams or metaphors that make the idea to easy to understand.
The key is to identify the parts of your story that might confuse people, and simplify it down to a shareable nugget that makes it memorable.
People often invent imaginary problems to address in their stories for the sake of building an audience. But people are smart. They can tell when you’re trying to pander to their interests or if you’re riding some trendy wave.
Rather than finding problems for you to address, take a closer look at your own. What problems have you experienced that you’ve gained clarity into? What are some pressing problems you care deeply about now? Better yet, which problems have you always cared for that give them a timeless quality?
Once you’ve identified these problems, then your job is to make your audience care about them as if they were their own (this is a technique I call Problem Framing). The biggest difference between a great storyteller and a mediocre one is the ability to do this well.
The best way to alleviate someone’s pain is to give them space to talk about it. Because by discussing the hardships they’re going through, they’ll feel like they’re sharing their experience with others, and it is through this connection where their pain can be contextualized in a different way.
As James Baldwin once wrote, “You must understand that your pain is trivial except insofar as you can use it to connect with other people’s pain; and insofar as you can do that with your pain, you can be released from it.”
Self-love doesn’t mean complacency. Nor does it mean lethargy. If anything, loving yourself requires a lot of work, primarily because when you have self-love, you become aware of the potential that lives within you. You understand that you’re not a mere summation of social expectations, but that you have the personal agency to be the best version of yourself.
Self-love isn’t the presence of narcissism, but the absence of criticism. The person that aggrandizes himself is secretly seeking the approval of others, which makes him vulnerable to what people think. But the person that has compassion for herself builds a quiet confidence that requires no other voice to be validated.
The people that will be crying when you depart the world are not doing so because of any number that is tied to your name. They are doing so because you were a loving partner, a caring friend, or a shepherd of kindness. You are dearly missed not because of what you’ve earned, but because of what you represented.
This highlights the distinction between traditional success and metric-less success. Traditional success will get you on magazine covers, but metric-less success will get you on family albums. While society as a whole worships quantifiable success, what will ultimately matter most to the individual is everything that can’t be counted.
What’s interesting is that a number of astronauts have become politicians. In fact, former astronaut Mark Kelly (who said that “when you’re looking down from space at Earth, it really puts it into perspective that we’re all in this together”) is now a Democrat who holds a Senate seat in Arizona.
Here’s how I interpret this: Even if you’ve internalized the oneness of humanity in a way that only a few people ever have, you still can’t escape the fact that you have beliefs about how culture should be shaped. So the antidote is not to deny that you are a political animal, but to accept that you’re a political animal who understands that we’re all navigating this conundrum together.
Pursuing purposeful work is difficult, but such is the case for the most meaningful endeavors in life. Difficulty requires ingenuity, and ingenuity is what makes you feel like you’re working toward your potential. The thing about potential, however, is that it’s invisible and can’t be photographed. But intuition is about trusting that it’s there, even if you’re the only one that can see it.
When you’re worried about what someone thinks of you, it’s rarely about that person’s opinions of you. It’s about your own opinions of yourself. This happens when you present a version of yourself that you don’t like, and you’re left wondering what stupid or regretful things you may have said when you embodied that projection. It’s only when you’re back in the comforts of your true self where the spell is broken and you’re left ruminating about what that prior version of you may have done.
The natural world has no straight, defined edges to it. Everything is a series of wiggles, and these wiggles make a mockery of our desire to draw straight lines through them. Mountain ranges are continuous, and desert stretches show no regard for clear boundaries. Fluidity is the only feature, and all this fluidity is contained on this one gigantic rock that’s hurtling through the universe.
The reason why we want to visit national parks or take treks through forests is because we want to experience this fluidity in our lives. We desire a respite from the endless compartmentalizing of both ourselves and of others. When we take a moment to take in the grandeur of a beautiful landscape, we realize that control is an illusion, and that all this categorizing of our goals and other people is petty and insignificant. Ultimately, it’s the recognition of this pettiness that’s the biggest lesson of all.
What technology provides in the form of reach comes at the expense of depth. This is the great tradeoff of technological progress, which Martin Heidegger predicted well before the advent of the internet. He argued that as technology is further harnessed to serve our individual goals, it will come at the expense of a deeper connection with others. Since most of our goals revolve around social success, we will ultimately view other humans as mere objects of utility that help us achieve what we want.
Technology is nothing more than an aid to these individual goals, which is why any usage of it to connect with others involves some form of compression. Whether you mildly enjoyed an essay or thought it was life-changing, the only way you could express this great variance of emotion is through clicking a tiny heart.
Nuance is a bug of technology, not a feature.
The ability to study your own mind is often the result of subtraction. It doesn’t happen by reading more books, listening to more podcasts, or having more friends. Rather, it happens by removing the influences that no longer serve you, and allowing the remainder to act as guideposts for the person you know yourself to be.
A thoughtful question shows people that you’re tuned into what they think, and what they share will reveal something deeply interesting. After all, the more opportunities you have to show interest, the more you’ll get back in the form of knowledge and experience.
As long as you remain interested in the lives of others, there will be no shortage of intriguing stories that will inspire you to live a more meaningful existence. This, in turn, will be shared with other curious minds, and the cycle continues.
A thoughtful question indicates that you’re curious about what someone thinks, and what they share will reveal something deeply interesting. After all, the more opportunities you have to show interest, the more you’ll get back in the form of knowledge and experience.
As long as you remain interested in the lives of others, there will be no shortage of intriguing stories that will inspire you to live a more meaningful existence. This, in turn, will be shared with other curious minds, and the cycle continues.
Integrity is the ability to navigate the outer world without discounting your inner values.
In the context of work, it’s to be able to make a living without sacrificing your interests and ethics. In the context of family, it’s to be able to listen to your loved ones without outsourcing your agency. In the context of community, it’s to be able to form lasting friendships without relying upon flattery.
In each case, there is an anchor of authenticity that you’re unwilling to budge, no matter how fervently people want you to.
When you want to gain respect through success, then it’s usually done through quantifiable variables. We respect people that have made a certain amount of money, built a sizable audience, or have won a number of awards.
But when you want to gain love through success, it can’t be achieved through anything quantifiable. The people that care about you most aren’t doing so because of a number that is tied to your name. They do so because you are a loving partner, a compassionate friend, or a shepherd of kindness.
Respect is the result of what you earn, whereas love is a reflection of what you represent.
