by Mike Singer
on June 30, 2009
“Most of us have two lives,” writes Steven Pressfield in The War of Art. “The life we live, and the unlived life within us. Between the two stands Resistance.”
If you’re reading this blog, then chances are good that you’re trying to create something new in your life. If so, Pressfield’s statement above probably rings true. It does for me, and having just finished my annual reading of Pressfield’s magnificent manifesto on the psychology of creativity, I thought I’d encourage you to read it too.
Pressfield is no stranger to resistance. You don’t write a best-seller like The Legend of Bagger Vance without encountering some resistance along the way. Why? Because creating something is always a struggle. Most people don’t realize this, and even those of us who do frequently forget. We look at the shiny finished product of someone’s creative process (a book, a film, a businesses, an ultra-fit body) and forget that getting there was probably a struggle. The act of creating is not the problem—once you’re in the zone the words, images, business plans, and sit-ups come easily. It’s getting into the zone that’s tricky. It’s staying there. It’s returning. [click to continue…]
by Lane Wallace
on June 26, 2009
Somehow, after all these years of evolution, you’d think we’d know better. For centuries, salesmen have been promising something for nothing—quick fixes, no-effort results, and instant, easy solutions to complex problems. And for centuries, humans have bought and followed these regimes, without much result. Temporary gains, perhaps, but the bottom-line truth, which surely we all must know, somewhere in the midnight of our most honest souls, is that there isn’t a short-cut to lasting improvement, success, or change.
You don’t get six-pack abs and an Olympian’s body without an extraordinary amount of training effort. You don’t lose 100 pounds without increasing your exercise and reducing your caloric mix and total intake. You don’t become successful by following someone else’s three rules of success. And you don’t get the strength of a hero by reading a book on the couch that lays out a no-fail paint-by-number path to strength and knowledge.
Lasting strength, knowledge, and positive change are the end result of steady, concentrated effort. And while information and assistance can be helpful along the way, those rewards generally come along uncharted paths that most of us navigate the hard way—because each person, and each battle, is unique. In the end, we all have to find our own way home, and do the work of getting there ourselves. [click to continue…]
by Lane Wallace
on June 23, 2009
A few months ago, I was talking to a friend who runs an innovation and management consulting company. After hearing about some of the firm’s current projects attempting to spark more innovation at large, established corporations, I posed a simple question:
“Does it work?”
My friend paused for a moment, then laughed. “Well, sometimes,” he admitted, “it does feel a little like trying to teach pigs to fly.”
Which raises the question … are entrepreneurs, who tend to excel at innovation, hard-wired different than people who are drawn to corporations? And if so, can corporate types ever successfully innovate? (And, perhaps conversely, can entrepreneurs run steady companies?)
I don’t have a full answer to those questions. But I got some interesting new insights last week at an international conference sponsored by the Boston-based Design Management Institute. Jeanne Liedtka, a professor at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business, told me that personality types definitely play into both management decisions and levels of innovation at a company. [click to continue…]
by Lane Wallace
on June 20, 2009
A follow-up to the thoughts expressed in two recent posts: my own piece on commercializing adventure, in which I talked about my discomfort with highly-publicized, sponsored adventure quests, and Mike Singer’s piece earlier this week about what taking on adventure really means ….
A reader recently sent me a scanned copy of an article called “Dreams Delayed” by Peter Egan, the acclaimed Road & Track columnist. Unfortunately, the article is old enough that it’s not listed in Egan’s “Side Glances” archive on Road & Track’s Web site. I did, however, manage to find a grainy copy online: on page 7 of a Lotus enthusiasts newsletter (PDF) from 1986.
In the article, Egan relates the story of testing three GT cars at the Willow Springs race course with Allan Girdler, another car industry writer. The two were taking a break, race helmets in hand, when a man drove up in a 300ZX Turbo with “trick wheels, a bra, and an after-market sunroof.” He approached Egan and Girdler and gushed about what a racing fan he was. “Racing a car is something I’ve always wanted to do more than anything else on earth,” he said.
“There was a long, uneasy silence,” Egan wrote. “Allan hefted his helmet for a minute, brushed some imaginary dirt off the face shield and said, ‘No, you haven’t.'” When the man reacted with perplexed confusion, Girdler responded, “You haven’t always wanted to race more than anything else on earth. If you really wanted to race, you’d be doing it. Or you would have done it 10 or 15 years ago.” [click to continue…]
by Mike Singer
on June 18, 2009
Here’s another opinion on the “optimism vs. pessimism” debate raised in last Friday’s Question of the Day.
In a recent post on his Four Hour Work Week blog, lifestyle entrepreneur extraordinaire Tim Ferris wonders: “Could defining your fears be more important than defining your goals?”
A video of a five minute “Ignite” presentation he gave at the Google I/O Developer Conference at the end of May is pretty thought-provoking. As the slides auto-advance every 15 seconds as per the rules, Tim discusses his two favorite productivity techniques of late:
- Negative visualization (defining your fears instead of your goals)
- Rehearsing the worst case scenarios
Both techniques are borrowed from the philosophy of Stoicism, a school of Hellenistic philosophy founded in the 3rd century B.C. Anyone who’s read Ferris’ blog in recent months knows he’s as passionate about Stoicism today as the ancient Greek and Roman elites were back then.
I’m sort of knocking myself now for choosing not to study all that back in high school. Who knew?
If you have five minutes, the video is definitely worth a watch.
by Mike Singer
on June 15, 2009
Choosing which paths to take in life would be easy if we could know what lies beyond the horizon with any semblance of certainty. But alas, as writer Natalie Goldberg eloquently put it in Wild Mind:
“Life is not orderly. No matter how we try to make life so, right in the middle of it, we die, lose a leg, fall in love, drop a jar of applesauce.”
So how do we choose? Well, in recent months, I find myself returning over and over again to a simple phrase that came to me one day almost two decades ago:
“There are certain experiences that are only available to those who are willing to have them.”
I love this, because it motivates me to do some things … and reminds me why not to do others. [click to continue…]
by Angela Torney
on June 12, 2009
Taking a more adventurous, risky life path is tough, and optimism is an unbelievably important asset for anyone facing challenges. It allows us to take our initial steps into the unknown and helps us face any obstacles that crop up. But when does optimism become a liability rather than an asset? Can optimism lead to complacency and then failure? Read on for some interesting perspectives on how optimism can help or hinders us as we take risks and try new things. [click to continue…]
by Lane Wallace
on June 9, 2009
My attention was brought, last week, to a Web site of a young sailor who was nearing the completion of a round-the-world solo sailing adventure. His highly promotional site was touting his quest as a record-setting feat because, if he succeeds, he will be the youngest person (by a few months) to do a solo circumnavigation of the globe. Books and DVDs and fame to follow.
I posted some of my reactions and thoughts about pursuing fame through adventure or sports on my Atlantic Monthly blog last Friday. So I won’t repeat any of that here.
But regardless of what amount of fame might follow an adventure or sports quest, I’ve never been very comfortable with the whole concept of commercializing adventure. Does that make me a purist? Perhaps. [click to continue…]
by Steve Wallace
on June 5, 2009
I‘m intrigued by the discussion of whether or not we learn from failure. My own take on the question is that it depends on the individual. At one end of the spectrum are those who are not particularly introspective. They merely learn what did not work—which is to say, they learn by rank process of elimination. At the other end are those who are self-reflective and therefore able to find out why they failed; extrapolate what other activities might likewise fail; and finally chart a path that might lead to success. So while failure may not always be an effective teacher, one’s ability to persevere after failing is a crucial skill … and one at which every entrepreneur worthy of the name must excel.
Let me share one example of an early failure—a small one in retrospect, but one that might have colored my entire experience in Ghana and prevented me from ever starting my chocolate business there. [click to continue…]
by Lane Wallace
on June 2, 2009
A number of years ago, I overheard an adventure-sports friend trying to convince his girlfriend to take more risks snowboarding. “If you’re not falling, you’re not learning!” he argued. “If you’re not falling, you’re not getting hurt,” she replied curtly.
Clearly, the two of them had two distinctly different approaches to risk—or, at least physical risk. But why was that? Personality? Worldview? Genetics? All of those are thought to play a role (see “Adrenaline Rush” from March 29th for another take on the subject).
But what about gender? Do women approach risk—or at least physical risk—differently than men? [click to continue…]
