All Love Is Saying Yes To Something

“Sucked into a social tornado.” Spending twelve hours a day online, pretending to be happy, is not art. It’s one thing to use the Internet to help your
business, but the Internet should not be your business. During my entrepreneurial days, that was one thing I never understood about my contemporaries. They did everything under the sun to grow their businesses except the one activity that mattered: Actual, physical work. Not checking email. Not digital narcissism disguised as work. But real, physical creation of things that are valuable to the world. Everything else should be secondary to that. This rant brought to you by an article about Woody Allen’s new website.

“All love is saying yes to something.” Yes to the changing of pronouns. Yes to the sharing everything. Yes to the modifying of expectations. Yes to the desires of the other. Yes to the things we don’t want to do. Yes to a life that stretches us. Yes to the vulnerability we swore off years ago. Yes to the surrendering of selfish impulses. Yes to the beautiful, ecstatic energy that cannot be conducted alone. Amen. Life works better when we say yes. To everything. Especially love. Inspired by eavesdropping on a conversation between a mother and a daughter. 

“Inspiration is found through verbs.” Fresh ideas demand fresh fuel. When I get the urge to restock my creative reservoir, I go fishing. Not for fish, but for inspiration. I’ll start by taking a long walk to the bookstore. En route, I’ll listen to a podcast and take pictures of cool things I notice. Next I’ll spend a few hours reading magazines, taking notes and staying open and vulnerable to every shred of stimuli that crosses my path. Once I’ve inhaled all my lungs can handle, I’ll email the notes to myself, switch back to a podcast and make my way back home. Works every time. It’s amazing how easy it is to have the world arrange itself for your work.

“Pay your bills while still lea­ving enough band­width after­wards to really pur­sue your calling.” After reading Hugh’s theory on following your bliss in your downtime, I’m convinced that day jobs are wildly underrated. Never thought I’d say it. But If you’re lucky enough to get a job doing work you love with people you love, and still have time at night and on the weekends to work on passion projects, you won. It’s the best of both worlds. Yes, negotiating that situation is a lot harder than it used to be. But if you can pull it off and still pay the rent, holy crap. Sweet gig. 

“The
word vacation was not used at the turn of the twentieth century.” Going on a cruise, sitting on a beach for a week or spending four days fishing is torture for me. I don’t care how blue the water is. After two days of doing nothing, I get restless. It’s just the way I’m wired. I need to make things and be active and contribute to the intellectual and creative commons of the world. Otherwise I don’t feel fully human. I’d rather set up a life I don’t need vacation from than get into a staring match with the calendar. Thanks to Michael for sharing this interesting factoid.

“Every moment is a relationship.” What an interesting way to approach the world. What a powerful filter to install into our daily lives. I wonder how differently people would treat each if they operated that way. Reminds me of an amazing book I read years ago called Playful Perception. Talks about awareness plans, which are procedures or mental recipes for perceiving and thinking about the
world around us. This book should be required reading at every art school. Thanks to Rashida for the inspiration on this one.