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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…

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…

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…

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…

Years ago on my last day of work at a startup, my boss sent me one final memo. Scott, you’re the only employee who ever consistently emailed the company leaders with a thank you about your bonuses. We really appreciate it. I was both touched and shocked. How could that be possible? You’re telling me that when forty employees get a bonus check for a thousand dollars apiece, simply for…

Going from zero to one is significantly different than going from one to two. Because the first time you have an experience, you’re just a rookie. You don’t have the benefit of context, comparison, data, precedent and perspective. And so, the event makes you feel blindsided. Disoriented. Like somebody pulled the rug out from under you. Here’s an example of a zero to one experience from my own career….

Starting with why is a fine idea. But what about starting with who? As in, who you are? If it’s true that you are the most important person in your life, then it stands to reason that your true self should be the baseline from which all actions are taken. Because when you know who you are, every moment isn’t a moral challenge, it’s just a checklist. Motivation is…

Everybody want everything both ways. It’s the law of unreasonable incompatibility. Westerners use the idiom, you want to have their cake and eat it too. But this principle has its own quirky expression in just about every culture. Albania says, to take a swim and not get wet. Bulgaria says, to have the wolf fed and the lamb in tact. Italy says, to keep the barrel of wine with…

Decisiveness is a universal quality of successful people. The ability to make choices quickly and confidently, and not hastily and arrogantly, is precisely what gives us the ability to take action and move our story forward. However, when it comes to the deeply complicated issue of our identities, making a decision isn’t always necessary or even useful. Because we’re not supposed to be one thing in life. Part of…

Some people believe every choice they make is a significant life decision that will have a profound effect on the whole of their existence. The butterfly is forever flapping its wings. Anything could mean everything, and so, each move they make is carefully scripted and manicured. It’s not worth doing if it’s not worth over thinking first, right? God forbid their choices are not optimized for perfection. The problem…