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I started writing books when I was twenty years old.  And at that time, both in my life and in the world, writing a book was a big deal. Because not everybody could do it. It took time and money and connections and resources and courage and maybe even a dusting of talent.  Fast forward fifteen years, and now the industry has completely inverted. With the infinite shelf space…

Our greatest currency in this world is our originality.  That’s the one thing we have that nobody can take away from us. In fact, we couldn’t get rid of our originality even if we wanted to. It exists as a genuine outflow of the self.  The hard part is, and this is where the real work comes in, originality demands a willingness to experiment. Otherwise we’re just the echo…

To make an earnest, exposed statement is itself an act of bravery.  After all, the world is a cynical, corrupt, snarky place. One where people fetishize irony and have zero tolerance for earnestness.  And so, it’s no surprise that we’ve develop a conflicted relationship with our most earnest aspirations. There’s too much social risk.  Think of it this way. When we’re sitting in traffic and another driver catches us…

Champion racehorses can win up to a few million dollars in purse money if they’re the first to cross the finish lines.  Not bad for two minutes of work.  However, the real payday, horse owners say, comes from breeding. Stud fees, to borrow a term from the animal kingdom. Derby winners, for example, can often expect to double, triple and sometimes even quadruple their value as breeding stallions. Thanks…

The recent onslaught of research on how ambition is an important character trait and predictor of positive life outcomes bothers me.  I don’t doubt that having ambition makes you happier. I don’t deny that it’s a prerequisite for success. And I don’t dismiss research that shows people with ambitious goals tend to be more satisfied than those with lower expectations.  But we do ourselves a disservice when we believe…

Here’s a list of things I believe.  Feedback is useless, failure is overrated, authenticity is pretentious, teamwork is wasteful, balance is bullshit, ambition is insufficient, competition is stupid, effectiveness is relative, quality is unnecessary and planning is pointless.  These aren’t exactly popular opinions, but I still believe them, and I have zero feelings of guilt or fear or shame around them. Because I give myself permission not to buy…

Success bubbles to the surface several emotions.  Initially, you feel elated and confident and proud of your abilities. You smile to yourself and think, good for me. Way to go. Because you get this vision of all the hard work you put in, knowing that it finally paid off. Hell yes.  But shortly thereafter, you also start to feel powerful and vindicated and satisfied. You smile to the world and think, everyone…

Our emotions are actually something that want to move through you. They don’t want to stay, they don’t want to be controlled, they don’t want to be part of your body, they actually want to move out.  And if you welcome them instead of resist them, they move out. They go away. But if you suppress negative emotions, rather than accepting and appreciating them, they can paradoxically backfire and…

Most skills are sellable, but only if you want to sell them.  That’s the challenge of diversifying your career portfolio. It’s mainly a matter of permission. Allowing yourself to capitalize on something undernurtured. Letting yourself bring a quiet talent to the forefront of your career and truly owning it as a critical piece of your professional value.  It’s a scary proposition. Because you’re worried that the thrill of performing…

Innovation isn’t about how big something grows, it’s about how small it starts. That’s how creative people become legends. Because they possess the miraculous ability to expand something beyond its original roots.  The question is, how do they do it? How does a person turn a seed into a forest?  One of my clients is a leading provider of marketing, rating and management software and services to the insurance…