“Either it matters that I am in a marriage with my wife and that we have 3 year old son–either that love counts–or it doesn’t. And I have to live in the world where that counts. If that counts, then what I do with 70 or 80 percent of my time… my craft, my work, my thing that I do… I want that to count too.”
“We are the new customers: The new readers, the new writers, the new publishers.”
This article was very smart and beautiful and long way of saying, “solve a specific problem well. The publishing industry forgot about this, which is why there are so many problems, and now we’re remembering and it’s changing some things.”
“Passion does not exist in the job, it exists in us.”
“Here’s my thought on good design: don’t f*ck up the business. If the idea for the business is truly good, design’s job is to not screw that idea up. Great design is not mucking with a good thing. Excellent design is when you can raise up a good thing, make it true-er, more trustworthy, more resonant with the right person.”
“Show everyone what you intend.”
“Good design is about supplying intent… I chose to enhance this rolling experience with a simple design element. Acting with intent; it conveys authorship, that someone is driving. It’s reassuring, people are drawn to it; someone making the experience their own, covering the tragic tune with something different.”
“Story is there to remind us that it’s just okay.”
“Business should balance profit with preserving natural resources.”
Jiro Dreams of Sushi
The “natural resources” this had me thinking about were my time and happiness. I want to balance my work and life well.
Do you know what your weaknesses are? Not in a “my only weakness is I try too hard” or “chocolate” kind of way. I mean in a real, gut-level, “mistakes I tend to make,” “environments I’m not good in,” “alcohol and video poker” kind of way.
We hear a lot about knowing our strengths and playing to our strengths. That’s fun too. But there’s something special about knowing our weaknesses, something human and honest and raw.
As I think through the big questions — what do I want to do with my life? What will I do next? What’s important to me? Should I enter into this partnership or not? Put everything on hold for this or that or not? — it helps to know what mistakes I tend to make, what weaknesses and blind spots typically affect me.
So I’ve started keeping track of them. They’re on my whiteboard right now. They’re things like, “I’m afraid I don’t know enough,” and “I don’t know enough,” and “women in superhero costumes,” and “I get flustered/overwhelmed when all the little things aren’t organized or I can’t hold the whole project in my head/hands,” and “alcohol + video poker.”
Oddly enough, naming your weakness, doing the work of figuring yourself out, can build a kind of confidence. You’re digging down and seeing the roots a bit, which ones are strong and which aren’t, which are sensitive, which have been there so long you forgot about them.
Doing what little work I have on this has reminded me to get out from under the burden of trying to please everyone, be everything, and build everything myself.
Now back to this here video poker.
“What is school for?”