I started rowing due to peer pressure.
The only people I knew in my new city were rowers, so I took up rowing. That was fine with me — I love early mornings, being on the water, and working as part of a team.
I didn’t love rowing, though. Not at first. It was confusing, physically demanding, and even a little bit painful (blisters upon blisters). And if I messed up particularly badly, I might unwittingly toss a half dozen people into the sea.
Read MoreIt used to be very difficult for me to send out a mass email to my clients. Whether I was sharing information about my policies, giving them details about an event, or offering a new service, I was deeply concerned about what they would think.
Not just they — They.
Read MoreWhen I first moved to Atlanta a million years ago, I used to get lost on purpose.
This was the pre-smartphone era. I actually had a paper city map that I would use to find my destination, scribbling the turn-by-turn directions down on the back of an envelope the way we used to do in the olden days.
I would make my way to my destination using the map, and then I would find my home without it. Sometimes this led to trafficky adventures in unsavory neighborhoods, but I always figured it out eventually.
Read MoreWhen I wake up in the morning, if I have been unwise enough to charge my phone beside my bed overnight, my phone is the first thing that I reach for in the morning. After all, it’s my alarm clock, my weather report, and my connection to everything else in the outside world.
It’s also huge distraction. Every morning, under such circumstances, I have to be aware that every moment spent looking at my phone is another moment in which the traffic is stacking up outside; I’m not only delaying my arrival at my office, I’m increasing the total amount of time that I will spend commuting. Unfortunately, my phone is set up so as to increase the perceived rewards of engaging with it and to decrease the sense of immediacy I have about my obligations. With every click and swipe, I get a little hit of dopamine that creates a conflict: Will I listen to the little voice inside the tells me it’s time to put down the phone and go, or will I linger and keep hunting for the next thing that will give me that little neurotransmitter high?
Read More“Where should I put the ice cream?”
This is a real question I received from a teenager who was helping to clean up after a meal.
Questions like this come from fear of getting it wrong. Instead of thinking the problem through for ourselves, we imagine that there’s a “right answer” floating out there in the ether, and we give up and ask someone else when we don’t find it.
In work and life, success comes from the ability to make good decisions consistently. And good decisions come from clear thinking.
Read MoreWouldn’t it be great if you could transmit all of your wisdom and experience to your child?
You could help your kid avoid making the same mistakes you made. They would then benefit from your knowledge and make better decisions.
Unfortunately, your can’t just plug your thumb drive into their built-in USB port and transfer your knowledge files. The download will fail. The ungrateful brats don’t want to listen!
Read More
