If something helps you secure a measure of control in a world of chaos, then it’s worth doing.

Even if that sense of control is delusional, it still provides utility value.

Because feeling able to influence your reality in any way is deeply motivating and satisfying. My therapist once told me, control may be an illusion, but empowerment isn’t.

Meaning, if you believe that you have a role in determining your future, it doesn’t really matter if you’re right or wrong. If your expectations and efforts help to steer your fate in a positive direction, then that mindset is enough to fuel you to take useful actions on your own behalf. Those actions will bring you closer to the fulfillment you seek. Which tells your brain that when it does what the software tells it to do, it gets rewarded. And the cycle repeats until you win.

That’s empowerment. The ability to make decisions that influence the outcomes of your work. You should take it wherever you can get it.

Besides, what’s the alternative to this belief? Preoccupying yourself with the millions of terrifying possibilities you can’t control?

That’s no fun. It just puts you into a victim mindset.

It’s better to focus on the small handful of positive possibilities that you can control. It’s better to embrace the possibility of success, small as it may be, rather than the probability of failure.

During the first six month of the coronavirus pandemic, our collective sense of control hit record lows. It’s one of the reasons panic buying of toilet paper was so rampant in the first few weeks. Our perception of scarcity created feelings of insecurity, and that activated a prehistoric mechanism that triggered hoarding behaviors.

Honey, do you think two hundred rolls is enough? You’re right, better make it three hundred.

There was a study in a psychiatry journal that year which showed how during a crisis period, people generally like to control things because brings them some aspect of certainty. The phenomenon is explained as a remedial response to reduce fear and anxiety of losing control over the surrounding environment. Unsure when the pandemic would end, people were saving basic needs by purchasing as much toilet paper as possible is a shortcut to cope with the feeling of insecurity.

Now, personally, hoarding toilet paper wasn’t at the top of my shopping list. It’s cheaper to wipe your ass with junk mail if you ask me. But every family is different.

Point being, the panic buying still made sense to me. It was helping people secure a measure of control in a world of chaos.

Are you currently feeling like life is one of those bizarre dreams where you’re half awake, but not in control? It’s an awful, helpless feeling.

But when life’s restrictions start chipping away at your joy one by one, simply asking the following question will put the power back into your hands. Think of it as a nursery rhyme.

If you can’t choose where to go and what to do, how could you bring that joy to you?

With this question, instead of using worry as a tool for trying to predict the future, you engage with your life in whatever capacity you still can.

You access more choice to give yourself more freedom.

Remember, control may be an illusion, but empowerment isn’t.

Save your lies for when you need them most, and you might just make it out of this thing alive.

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
Are you focused on the small handful of positive possibilities you can control?

Some people wake up in the morning fraught with potential crises.

They constantly feel that the bottom is about to fall out. Minor details that would be nonissues to others seem like insurmountable hurdles to them. Having to cope with life’s daily events is a second full time job.

And they’re either late, afraid of being late, or freaking out because they were late.

As a result of this toxic emotional baseline, they have a continual need for others to serve as their sounding boards. They live for long debriefing sessions and pep talks, where they can exaggerate the gravity of their manufactured emergencies.

Do you have someone in your life like this? Does it ever seem like a form of theater to them?

It’s a frustrating and bizarre thing. Like the guy at my yoga studio who always took the same class as me. He was constantly asking for my advice about whether he should get his master’s degree, join the military, go full time as a print model, start a business with his girlfriend, study to become a stock broker, or relocate down to the jungle and become a plant medicine shaman.

It was a bit much for seven in the morning. The guy was all over the place. Each time we’d chat before or after class, it turned into his little one act play. He bombarded me with all of these mini traumas.

But he must have smelled my codependent, midwestern, passive aggressive nature. Drama queens usually have a nose for people like me. They seek out competent, compassionate individuals who love being the hero to save another person from themselves. And then they suck the savior in by becoming this sad creature who needs their help. Works every time.

Because when you’re the sounding board, you feel a gratifying sense of service and support and usefulness. You’re a good friend. A great listener. You’re the lighthouse for that person, and if you collapse, they’ll collapse too.

Which is why you let them unload on you all the time without putting up a fuss.

The problem with this dynamic is, it leads to a vicious cycle of unhealthy dependence for them, and resentment for you. They never learn how to regulate themselves properly and troubleshoot issues on their own. And the onslaught of requests and intrusions makes you feel helpless like you’re drowning.

But because the gratification of managing havoc in someone else’s life outweighs the fear and guilt of telling them how much they’re exhausting you, the cycle perpetuates.

Whew, what an exchange.

Have you ever been sucked into one of those dramatic interpersonal vortexes before? It’s surprisingly difficult to unhook from. Like trying to kick heroin. The sweet neurochemical high of helping someone is deeply intoxicating, and the withdrawal symptoms of telling someone that their needs aren’t our priority at the moment is very painful.

However, we must remember to set boundaries. We must remember that each of us has the right to let others know when their actions are unacceptable us.

Yes, we fear they’ll abandon us if we stop being there for them all the time. But in reality, they will be fine. And so will we.

Besides, what’s the alternative? Being a human landfill for other people’s emotional waste until the end of time?

Next time someone offers you a complimentary season pass to their perpetually unfolding life drama, tell them you’re not much of a theater person.

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
With whom do you need to have a courageous conversation to reinforce your boundaries?

If your entire identity centers around how much you hate someone or something else, you lost.

If you define yourself solely by what you dislike rather than what you enjoy, you’re not living.

Now, there’s no rule that says you have to love everything and everyone, but if your default response to the world is to demonize things, give problems even more energy and create unnecessary psychological fuel around them, then you’re building negative value for the rest of us.

I’m reminded of a widely quoted study from the national sociology review. It explores how the process of leaving deeply meaningful and embodied identities can be experienced as a struggle against addiction.

Scientists found that involvement in extreme hatred often includes a complete identity transformation, in much the same way a person describes opiate addiction. Researchers demonstrated that although we can’t definitively conclude whether involvement in hate produces a legit form of addiction, empirical evidence proves the sociological significance of addiction.

As an interesting side note, this very study was published on the homepage of the department of homeland security. Which means our country finally accepts the fact that we have a chemical dependence on hate.

And it’s not just our nation. This is a global pandemic. Covid ain’t got nothing on the negativity addiction that’s slowing wiping out the human race.

Because think about what that word actually means. As the aforementioned study states, addiction is defined as thoughts, emotions, bodily experiences, and unwanted behavior of a chronic, relapsing, and compulsive nature that occur despite negative consequences, characterized by episodes where people feel they have lost control.

Doesn’t that perfectly describe our culture right now?

Dozens of times a day, emotions like hate and anger give us powerful neurochemical hits. Searching for targets at which to spit our vitriol is intoxicating. It makes us feel alive and vital and motivated.

What’s more, we gain power and authority by putting everything down.

But not unlike snorting cocaine, those effects wear off very quickly. Which means the hit needs to be administered again. And again and again and again.

Uh oh. Pulse slowing. Haven’t flooded my brain with outrage porn in thirteen minutes. Must find new hate target. Must engage the infinite scroll of notifications and information that passes by at a steady clip. Must perpetually micro dose my brain with feel good chemicals.

But the question we have to be asking ourselves is, who would we be without any resentments? Are we trying to make the world a better place, or are we just worried about our favorite villain disappearing?

Look, we all have justifications for our resentments. Hate is attractive because it’s a cheap and quick way to cement people together. Our plethora of poisonous feelings is like a prized possession.

It’s our precious. We wants it, we needs it. Must have the precious. They stole it from us.

But isn’t it about time we started crafting our identities around things that were more life giving? Perhaps feelings like love and joy and compassion might release neurochemical hits that reduce our need to hate in the first place.

They may not feel as glamorous, rebellious and gratifying as shitting on the world all the time, but the long term health effects emotional sobriety are worth it.

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
Do you define yourself solely by what you dislike rather than what you enjoy?

When someone’s opinion goes against the majority it’s deemed unpopular.

Which is essentially just code for wrong, infuriating, shameful and offensive.

People are now ostracized, penalized and cancelled for what the world assumes they meant. Discourse is not even about listening anymore, it’s about judging.

I’m right, you’re wrong, has officially degraded into, I’m right, you’re evil.

This is why entire message boards and communities are built for people to anonymously share unpopular opinions. Our feelings have become dangerous and expensive to express because we’re afraid of the adverse reaction we’ll get from friends, family, followers and strangers.

For example, here’s an unpopular opinion of my own. Prepare yourself.

Frozen was a boring animated movie with wooden acting that wasn’t even remotely funny. The pacing was awful, the main character was literally and figuratively an ice queen, there was no decent hero to root for, the storyline was pointless, and the songs were rushed and forgettable with the exception of a single hit. Frozen doesn’t deserve its multi billion dollar box office gross. The fact that it’s the highest animated film in history is frankly insulting. Disney has created numerous classics that are ten times better.

How’s that for an unpopular opinion?

What’s interesting is, if I were to express that, people would label me an insensitive, misogynist asshole who doesn’t understand revolutionary art. Which is why it’s not an opinion I bring up in everyday conversation.

But of course, this isn’t about one man’s taste in cartoons, this is about the current state of the freedom of expression. The reason we have stopped taking chances with our own opinions is because our hypersensitive, contentious, politically correct, popularity driven culture has told us that there are certain things about which certain people are not allowed to have an opinion.

Because of age, gender, political standing, personality, career, financial status or religious beliefs, we are simply not permitted to comment. People like us aren’t allowed to say things about things like that.

And that’s why people often change their opinions to go along with others and not feel different. It’s safer and cheaper. The thought police is a very real force, and it is their job as the suctioning body of opinion to dispense demerits to anyone who holds contrarian beliefs.

Go against the majority, and we’ll have your head on platter.

This is all very unfortunate. Our country was founded on the principle that supports the freedom of an individual or a community to articulate their opinions and ideas without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction.

Opinions may not be facts, but they are still the only thing people really pay for.

We should have a lot of them and express them often. 

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
When was the last time you were told that you weren’t allowed to have an opinion?

A leading medical journal recently reported that only a quarter of doctors wear name badges, despite evidence that most patients believe their doctors should do so.

The study showed that three fourths of patients were unable to name anyone when asked to recall the name of the physician in charge of their care, causing additional frustration.

The irony is, most patients get dozens of identification tags from the moment they’re admitted. Think back to the last time you visited someone at the hospital. That person’s name was documented on everything.

Labels, wrist bands, meal trays, patient lists, clipboards, dry erase boards, doors, gowns, beds, medicine bottles, computer screens, bags of intravenous fluid, and so on.

In contrast, doctors only have their names on security badges attached to their hips, lanyards around their neck and embroidered lab coat. That’s it.

Researchers call this an asymmetry in identification. Advocates for better patient care say this is a symptom of the enormous information gulf separating patients and their doctors. And with adherence to wearing badges only around twenty five percent, many healthcare organizations have been testing new solutions to this sticky problem.

Some are rewarding good nametag behavior, like the hospital providing coffee vouchers to doctors seen wearing their badges. This is a nice idea in theory. Bribery can be an effective tool for creating behavioral change.

But employees shouldn’t be rewarded for doing something they’re supposed to be doing. That’d be like offering free cigarettes to chefs who remember to wear their aprons in the kitchen. It’s just part of the uniform. Get used to wearing the thing. It comes with the territory.

Korean doctors take more of the negative reinforcement approach. Physicians are required to wear their name tags by law. The health authorities enacted the nametag law after a string of incidents where fake doctors were found to be conducting surgeries disguised as licensed professionals.

According to the ministry of health and welfare, the name tags must display the medical worker’s name, the license, and the type of the license so that patients and guardians can identify them. Medical workers who don’t comply receive a corrective order with a fine, starting at a few hundred for the first offense, escalating in cost with each repeated incident.

Clearly, this approach is quite different from giving free coffee. Korean doctors recently criticized the law as excessive regulation. The medical union said it made physicians feel like elementary school students and was a violation of their freedom.

But since the law was enacted, only about thirty corrective orders have been issue. Proving that medical workers are abiding by the rules quite well. Maybe negative reinforcement is the way to go.

Ultimately, there is no perfect answer for how to increase nametag adherence, in the medical community or anywhere else.

My recommendation to any organization trying to solve this problem is empathy focused. When you do orientation with new team members, spent ten minutes helping them understand the bigger picture.

Nametags aren’t for you. They’re for everyone who interacts with you. Here, think back to all the incidents in your career when you chose not to wear your nametag. You didn’t want people knowing your name. You forgot to put in on. You were annoyed by attaching the damn thing each day. You disliked how it looked on your clothes. Your hair got caught in it. You were cold so you put a sweater over it. You wanted to lower the amount of complaints about your service to your employer. Or you were rebelling against the badge rules just for kicks. Notice that each of those excuses has everything to do with your ego and nothing to do with other people’s needs. Notice how few of the reasons for not wearing the tag have nothing to do with improving communication, deepening connection and increasing transparency.

Listen, if you work in any kind of customer service or patient care field, part of your job is setting aside your own issues for a moment and fulfilling someone else’s needs.

And if that means suffering the momentary vulnerability of revealing your name to another human being, then so be it.

In a world hell bent on keeping people separated from each other through their differences, perhaps the nametag is a simple way to keep the gulf between us from growing any bigger.

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
Why don’t you wear your nametag?

Making major life decisions when you’re emotionally overwhelmed is a bad idea.

That’s like going grocery shopping during a five day fast. All those strong emotions distort your perception of reality, activate the decision making process with little oversight by the logical part of your brain, and incite you to take action on the wrong grounds.

You begin pumping a cocktail of stress hormones into your bloodstream, feeling helpless to fight back against powerful biological forces.

Meanwhile, the people in the checkout line at the supermarket are giving you strange looks.

I’m sorry sir, but we have a store maximum of ten rotisserie chickens per customer. Please come back tomorrow.

Here’s a strategy that’s healthier and ultimately leads to a lower amount of resentment and indigestion.

Wait until you’re on steadier ground, and then decide.

See if you can get out of your emotional limbic system and back into the rational parasympathetic system of your brain. Use soothing practices like deep breathing, verbal mantras or other trusted routines to reconnect with self. If possible, perform a physical act of some kind to interrupt the patters.

In my own experience with anxiety and depression I’ve found playing guitar or piano for five minutes pays huge dividends.

Because when I engage in a physical act that requires me to focus, concentrate and synchronize my body’s movement across multiple dimensions, it drains the energy from my emotional brain. Those neurons are suddenly required for my motor reflexes, and so, the anxiety struggles to compete for resources, and simply fades away.

How do you get yourself on steadier ground? What’s is your emergency anxiety plan?

Once you figure out a solid subroutine, you’ll find that the basic awareness of the psychological transition will bring you from subconscious to conscious, and help regulate your emotions. And as for that major life decision you were thinking about making, well, for now, just see if you can change your state first, where you can feel calm, relaxed and intentional.

And then you can revisit that same decision with new eyes.

You might discover that it was a terrible idea in the first and thank god you didn’t book that transcontinental flight.

Or you might realize you were onto something, and it’s actually worth exploring further, but not from a reactionary place of fear.

As my therapist once said, never decide how to respond to a crisis during the crisis itself.

Have a recovery plan in your back pocket, that way you can execute when the pressure is on.

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
How could you drain the anxious energy from your emotional brain right now?

Have you ever had an art attack?

Not a heart attack, but an art attack?

This is a real thing. Stendhal syndrome is what sometimes happens when people are exposed to art of great beauty. Audiences experience psychosomatic responses such as rapid heartbeat, fainting, confusion and even hallucinations.

Kind of like those iconic black and white photos from the sixties. Beatles fans would watch their heroes arrive at the airport, and experience physical attacks. People would work themselves into a state so frenzied, that police would have to carry hysterical fan outs of the concert and into medical care.

Most of us have experienced some version of this. Maybe not fainting, but we’ve all witnessed a performance, art exhibit or movie that made us feel physically overwhelmed.

And objectively, it’s wonderful thing. It’s a unique feature of the human experience that everyone should experience at least once in their lives.

Now, this condition has been widely debated in the psychology and art worlds. Stendhal syndrome hasn’t been officially added to the latest version of the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders yet, and it’s hard to tell if it ever will.

But audiences around the world agree, the buzzing afterglow of amazing art is undeniable.

My question is, to what degree can these art attacks become weaponized?

Because let’s face it, a fundamental purpose of consuming art is to make us forget about our miseries. A central reason why we attend concerts and watch superhero movies and play video games and read throbbing member erotica novels, is to distract us from our suffering. To forget about the fact that we’re going to die.

And again, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Avoidance is a powerful coping mechanism, when used judiciously.

But moderation isn’t exactly the strong suit of our species.

Look, I’m as guilty as anyone of using mass culture to soothe and seduce and mesmerize myself into forgetfulness. During college, the amount of television I watched was appalling. We’re talking about dozens of hours a week, for years. Just thinking about it fills me with shame.

Is that what my parents paid twenty thousand a year for?

God damn it, I should have been out there on campus learning things and making friends and having adventures and getting into trouble.

But unfortunately, at that period in my life, I was lonely, confused and unfulfilled. Despite not being a drinker or a drug user, I fell into the habit of using television, among other things, as a substitute for meaning. Soothed by the warm hypnotic cultural trance, I developed a series of avoidant behaviors, rather than confronting my own issues.

Do you have a version of that? Have you ever weaponized great art to chase some high, some soothing sensation, that sheltered you from your real feelings?

It’s not the healthiest place to be. Because the relief obtained from avoidance is only temporary. And when that avoidance becomes the major action in our lives, we can’t move to where we want to go. It may soothe us, but it answers nothing.

Mellin, in her brilliant book on wiring ourselves for joy, explains that if you are not securely attached to yourself, you’ll have nowhere to go when the going gets rough, so you’ll naturally soothe and comfort in some other way. Without this secure attachment to self, then you’re vulnerable to using external solutions as false attachments.

The good news is, this process can become art of great beauty in its own right.

Reconnecting to self. Developing a robust inner life. Building a strong internal locus of control. Having a practice of facing everything with no distractions or avoidance mechanisms.

Shit, that’s what should be in a museum.

And so, by all means, let us consume great art as often as possible. It’s a necessary fuel for our lives like food, water and oxygen.

At the same time, let us also learn to see advanced avoidance techniques for what they really are. Let’s remember that all mass culture exists to create a hypnotizing trance that soothes us away from critical thinking.

And let’s admit that human beings have a litany of beautifully crafted dodges that we use to avoid our real feelings.

To quote the fab four’s song about strawberry fields, living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see.

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
Do you need to forget life right now, or do you need to look in the mirror? 

Changing jobs can feel like attending your own funeral.

Whether you quit, are forced to resign, get terminated, or go through corporate layoffs, the sensation is quite morbid.

Particularly if there’s a time lag between the announcement and your departure. During those last few days or few weeks, fellow employees greet you with a look of fear. They see the devastation in your eyes and speak in hushed tones and guard their comments in your presence.

Hell, some of your soon to be former coworkers won’t even look you in the eye anymore. There’s a distance there. People don’t interact with you the same way. It’s like you’re a ghost, and they don’t understand why you can’t be around forever.

Not surprisingly, patients with terminal diseases often have this experience, albeit thousands of times more powerful.

There’s a devastating editorial written by a man who was dying of aids. He said that when you’re going to die, everyone looks at you as if you have a skull and crossbones over your head. They feel like they have license treat you like you’re already dead. And it’s hard to keep living when people insist on seeing you as dead or dying.

The man wrote:

I’m not dead yet, and I wish people would stop burying me.

Sadly, he dropped into a coma because he didn’t have the strength to fight against people’s constant projections.

Wow, talk about the denial of death. Talk about living half obscurity about our own condition. This man’s editorial went on to give the following advice on behalf of all sufferers of this awful disease.

We are not dead. We are dying, but so are you. And if you were more open to your own frailty, if you were less consumed with overcoming your own insecurity, if your psychological immune system weren’t so good at making you feel that it’s not you who’s dying, it would give many of us a bit of reprieve and you the chance to touch life more intimately and to know more of the beauty of giving and receiving love.

Have you ever attended your own funeral?

It’s a scary and complicated and bizarre experience.

But when it happens to you, and if you’re lucky enough to come out alive on the other side, maybe you’ll walk away with greater compassion for self and other.

Remember, just because someone is closer to the end than you are, doesn’t mean they’ve been evacuated of all value, humanity, and agency.

Don’t treat them like a piece of meat thrown on the floor.

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
Who in your life is not dead that you’re trying to bury?

Everyone is the same everywhere.

We’re all on the same side of the fence, for better and for worse. Wherever we go, we end up with the same beauty and craziness of humanity, no matter who we meet.

People are people. They generally act the same.

Now, if this sounds like a gross overgeneralization to you, let me invite you to not be so ethnocentric. Because it’s a philosophy that makes interacting and understanding others much easier.

Once we accept that all people are seeking the same things as we are, being seen, heard, felt, loved, useful, proud, connected and fulfilled, then their behavior will make much more sense to us.

Here’s a question you might ask yourself next time somebody behaves in a way that is baffling to you. It’s a good tool to help you make the empathetic leap when it otherwise seems too difficult.

What universal human need are they trying to satisfy?

The mere act of posing this question helps us more fully participate in the other person’s experience. We can start to figure out how it’s possible that they could think or behave in a certain way, and under what circumstances would it make perfect sense to do so.

Here’s an example from my own life.

When my startup got acquired by a large agency, their buyout team informed our founders that they would be keeping every one of our employees on staff, except me.

Turns out, that organization didn’t have a business need for a brand and content specialist like myself. Our company was going to be nonexistent in a matter of days, and so, all the assets my job revolves around would ultimately be absorbed or eliminated by the acquisition.

Despite my significant talent and positive reputation, my role was simply phased out.

Damn, talk about terminal uniqueness. I love being special and everything, but this is ridiculous. Hearing that news made me feel unwanted, rejected and sad. As it would anybody.

But over the next week, here’s what ran through my mind.

We live in a capitalistic system. Commerce has a cruel bite. Sometimes a company has an asset, and they need to ring the register, and that day finally came. Any smart business person would have done the same. Shit, if you had the opportunity to sell out for millions and cash in on the brand you spent years building, wouldn’t you take the money?

Absolutely. America would not exist if it weren’t for opportunists like that. Selling out sounds amazing. Good for them.

And fuck them, obviously, for making a massive mistake by not keeping me on staff, since my contribution is highly valuable. But good for them.

That’s empathy. Reminding yourself that this person, or in this case, these people are just like you. Under the circumstances, it made perfect sense that they would think and behave in that way.

Doesn’t make it fair or right, but then again, what do we know about what’s fair or right?

Wolfram, the renowned scientist who developed many highly influential computational systems, recently released a detailed report based on what people reveal about themselves on social media.

His data proves everyone is the same everywhere. His team is made up of experimental particle physicists. These are people who are used to doing experiments on neutrinos, where they would get data at some rate and make plots on the behavior of particles. Believe it or not, the data rate in their web analytics system is the same as what they got in their particle physics experiments.

The number of clicks is about the same as the number of particles going through a detector.

Crazy part is, the curves in web analytics are actually smoother than those they were used to in particle physics. According to the scientists, people are, in a sense, more predictable than the quantum mechanics of particles.

And all this time, we thought we were so different from each other.

Ha. Good one. 

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
What universal human needs are the people in your life trying to satisfy? 

Conventional business wisdom tells us that our sweet spot is found at the intersection of three key elements.

Passion, talent, and opportunity.

All we have to do is answer three simple questions.

What are you deeply in love with? What are you genetically encoded for? And what makes economic sense in the marketplace?

Or, to paraphrase the famous theologian, the place where our deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.

In my experience, however, not all three of these elements are created equally. Each gives you a different kind of leverage than the other.

Say you have an innate talent for acting. Getting into character and doing voices and emoting in a compelling way in front of an audience is something you’re so good at, you make look easy.

But it’s not your passion, merely a talent. Sure, acting is an enjoyable activity for you, and you’d be delighted to perform when the spirit moves. Just not for eight hours a day. Acting isn’t how you’d want to earn your livelihood. It’d be exhausting and unsustainable as a career for you.

Even if there was a line of customers around the block willing to pay good money for your show. In that scenario, you can see the limited leverage of things like talent and opportunity. Both are important to have, but they’re not the most critical.

Passion, on the other hand, is.

My old manager used to tell me:

If you’re fired up about doing something, then that means working on it will make you happier. Which means the quality of the work will be higher, and your positive energy will infect team members and customers. Don’t worry, we’ll find a way to use it. Your passion will give us the leverage to channel that energy into a direction that meets our business goals.

That advice my manager gave me validated one of my favorite contrarian theories.

Passion follows you, not the other way around.

Turns out, passion is agnostic to things like location, platform, audience or company. Passion can set up shop anywhere it needs to, making itself at home wherever you go. It’s like a universal power adapter with twin voltage converters that can channel electricity in whatever outlet is available.

Which path you take isn’t that important. It’s what you carry with you that matters. You make a decision and commit yourself to a new project or a job or an endeavor. And once you start moving, you find various ways to embed your passion into the pavement that leads the way, giving yourself and everyone around you a smooth road on which to travel.

People mistakenly think passion is a place we get to, but it’s quite the opposite. It’s a place we come from.

Think about the friend or coworker of yours whose passion is undeniable. They’re someone who knows exactly what gets them fired up, and how to use that in the service of their goals.

Odds are, that person can walk into a room where not a single person believes them, besides them. But they have so much belief of their own, that they’re unstoppable. That sense of inevitability of success can only come from deep, consistent expression of passion.

If you know that you’re playing your game, and you’re playing it in the way that only you can play it, you will play it better than anyone else in the world.

Focus on building everything around that uniqueness of who you are, and that will give you enough leverage to help the economic opportunities fall into place.

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
Are you following your passion, or letting it follow you?