I’ve been building a business. Head down, all in, burning through the kind of manic creative energy that people with ADHD will recognize instantly. The sort of period where you look up and realize a year has evaporated and you forgot to tell anyone what you’ve been doing.

The reason I’m back is that something landed in my feed last week that connected two threads I hadn’t realized were the same thread. And it made me want to write again.

But first, some context.

Six months ago, I sat in front of a blinking cursor, trying to organize the strategy for this business I’d staked everything on.

I had the vision. Crystal clear. I could see the market, the positioning, the exact clients I needed to reach. I could see the whole chessboard.

What I could not do was turn that vision into a structured plan, maintain it across dozens of parallel workstreams, and execute it systematically without losing the thread every few hours.

This is the ADHD tax. Not a lack of intelligence or ambition. A brain that sees everything at once but struggles to hold it all still long enough to build something from it.

For twenty years in corporate America, I white-knuckled my way through this gap. Big teams, institutional structure, and the sheer gravitational pull of corporate process kept me on the rails. It worked. I built programs that generated hundreds of millions in value at Fortune 100 companies.

But the overhead was enormous. The energy I burned just staying organized, just maintaining the appearance of the systematic executive they expected - that cost me as much as the actual work.

Then I left. And everything changed.

The thing that landed in my feed to prompt this post was a Fast Company article. The headline: “Why the ADHD brain is a perfect pairing for AI.”

The piece cites Meredith O’Connor, a mental health counselor who noticed that the skills Fortune 500 executives actually want - creative problem-solving, abstract thinking, empathy, adaptability - are precisely where ADHD brains tend to excel. And the areas where ADHD brains struggle - routine processes, time management, organizing large volumes of information - are precisely where AI excels.

A Drexel University study found that people with strong ADHD symptoms solve problems through insight rather than analysis. Instead of working through steps, their brains make subconscious connections that produce “aha” moments. The highest-performing problem solvers were those with the most ADHD symptoms and those with the fewest. The people in the middle weren’t particularly good at either approach.

Reading that, something clicked.

I didn’t just agree with the research. I’d been living it.

The Partnership Nobody Told Me About

Over the past several months, I’ve been building my business in active partnership with AI. Not using it as a search engine or a glorified autocomplete. Working *with* it the way you’d work with a sharp colleague who never loses focus, never drops a thread, and can hold an impossibly large context in their head while you do the thing your brain was actually built for.

Here is what that looks like in practice.

I’ll have an idea at 7 AM about how to position a service for my target market. By lunchtime, that idea has become a fully structured article, complete with market research, SEO optimization, and internal linking to three other pieces I’d forgotten I’d written. Not because I sat there for five hours grinding through the detail. Because I provided the creative direction - the insight, the angle, the understanding of what that audience actually cares about - and my AI partner handled the systematic execution.

The next day I’ll jump to a completely different workstream. Podcast prep. Client proposals. Website architecture. Email sequences. The kind of context-switching that would have destroyed me in a corporate setting because each jump means rebuilding all the organizational scaffolding in my head.

Except now, the scaffolding lives outside my head. The AI holds the context, the decisions made, the files created, the strategy behind every piece. When I come back to a workstream after three days, I don’t start from zero. I pick up exactly where the momentum was.

For someone whose brain works the way mine does, that isn’t a convenience. It’s transformational.

The Gap That Finally Closed

I want to be specific about what I mean, because “AI helped me be more productive” is the kind of empty statement I’d normally skip past.

My brain generates connections between unrelated ideas at a speed that has always felt like both a gift and a curse. In a meeting, I’d see the strategic implication of something before the person finished their sentence. But I’d lose track of the previous five things discussed while chasing that connection.

In corporate, that made me the person who could see around corners but needed a team of people to build the road. The vision was the easy part. The execution infrastructure was the expensive part.

AI collapsed that gap.

The creative leaps, the pattern recognition across industries, the ability to synthesize a market trend with a client pain point and a content strategy in a single thought - that’s still entirely me. AI can’t do that. The Drexel research confirms it. Spontaneous cognition, insight-based problem solving, connecting dots that don’t obviously belong together - these are profoundly human capabilities, and they tend to run stronger in ADHD brains.

But the sustained attention, the organizational memory, the systematic follow-through, the ability to hold forty parallel workstreams in perfect order - that’s where AI fills the gap so completely it feels less like a tool and more like finding a cognitive partner.

I’m doing the best work of my life. Not in a corporate tower with a big team. In my home office, moving at a speed and level of quality that surprises me on a regular basis. In the past month alone, I’ve shipped a complete website with twenty-five pieces of long-form content, built a podcast workflow, created prospect research systems, and designed an entire content strategy across five channels. All alongside managing top class client work with my team. That isn’t hustle culture. That’s what happens when you stop fighting your brain and start completing it.

The Reframe

Here is the part that made me want to write this.

For most of my life, the narrative around ADHD was about deficit. The name itself leads with “deficit” and “disorder.” The world is designed for neurotypical brains, and if yours doesn’t fit, you’re the one who needs to adapt.

I adapted for twenty years. I was good at it. But the cost was real. The headaches. The burnout. The feeling of running at 60% because so much energy was consumed just keeping the plates spinning.

ADHD brains have always had one half of a powerful equation - the creative, insight-driven, pattern-recognizing half. The world just didn’t have a good complement for the other half.

Now it does.

I’m not building my business *despite* how my brain works. I’m building it *because* of how my brain works, with AI handling the parts my brain was never designed for.

If you’re reading this and something resonates - if you’ve spent years feeling like you had the vision but couldn’t maintain the infrastructure, like you could see the whole picture but couldn’t hold it still long enough to paint it - sit with this idea for a minute.

You might not have a productivity problem. You might have a partnership problem.

The tools exist now to complement the exact cognitive profile that traditional environments punish. Not to replace your thinking. To complete it.

I spent twenty years in systems that demanded I suppress my actual strengths to compensate for my weaknesses.

What if the way your brain works was never the problem? What if the problem was that your brain’s other half hadn’t been invented yet?

*The Fast Company article referenced in this piece is [”Why the ADHD brain is a perfect pairing for AI”] by Jared Lindzon, published February 19, 2026.

The most insidious prisons are the ones where you can't see the bars.

It's that time of year again. LinkedIn feeds overflow with celebration posts about promotions and new titles. Meanwhile, in the shadows, others for whom the same carrot was dangled are processing disappointment. And for an even worse off 10%, they're being discarded on the side of the road entirely as the corporate machine rolls on without them.

I spent over 20 years climbing the corporate ladder, believing each promotion brought me closer to freedom. The reality? Each step up the ladder only tightened the golden handcuffs, binding me to a system designed to extract maximum value while convincing me I was winning.

This is a wake-up call for those trapped in the Executive Matrix without realizing it. Here's what I've learned about the system that kept me captive and how you might recognize if you're stuck in it, too:

• Your success is measured by metrics that only matter inside the system

• Your "rewards" come with increasingly painful strings attached

• The further you advance, the less control you actually have

Corporate America's highest ranks offer the illusion of power while quietly demanding your health, time, and identity as sacrificial offerings.

If you're chasing the next promotion, the next stock grant, or the next title bump, read on. The view from the other side might surprise you.

3 Ways The Executive Matrix Keeps You Trapped (Even While You Think You're Winning)

To break free from any system, you must first understand how it controls you. The corporate world has perfected the art of making executives feel powerful while simultaneously reducing their actual freedom.

Let me show you exactly how this works.

The Title Trap

I remember every time I was promoted. The strange mix of pride and validation was intoxicating. It felt like I'd finally "made it" - clear evidence that my years of sacrifice were worth it.

What I didn't realize then was how the significance of that title existed almost entirely within the walls of my company. Step outside those walls, and suddenly, the impressive-sounding title meant very little.

Yet I clung to it, defended it, and worked to protect it. I defined myself by it.

If you're honest with yourself, have you ever:

• Stayed in a toxic situation longer than you should because of your title?

• Made decisions based on protecting or enhancing your position in the hierarchy?

• Felt a strange emptiness when you achieved a title you'd long pursued?

This is exactly how the Title Trap works. Companies create a manufactured value system where people end up competing for what amounts to corporate Monopoly money. The titles have no intrinsic worth outside the system, yet we sacrifice real things - time, health, relationships - to attain them.

What to do instead: Start defining yourself by the impact of your work, not the label on your LinkedIn profile. Ask yourself: "If my title disappeared tomorrow, what value would I still bring to the table?" The answer might be illuminating.

The RSU Handcuffs

"Just stay one more year."

That's the mantra of executives across America as they eye their vesting schedules. Restricted Stock Units (RSUs) are perhaps the most brilliantly designed golden handcuffs in corporate history.

The staggered vesting schedules ensure you're always just a few months away from another payout. Walking away feels like leaving money on the table - and no good executive would ever do that, right?

I watched colleagues stay in jobs they hated for years - sometimes decades - because they couldn't bear the thought of losing their unvested shares. Their relationships deteriorated, their health suffered, but they kept repeating: "Just one more year."

The reality is that RSUs are designed specifically to create dependency. They transform ambitious leaders into risk-averse followers who will tolerate increasingly unacceptable conditions to avoid the financial "loss."

What to do instead: Calculate exactly what those RSUs are costing you in terms of missed opportunities, health impacts, and life satisfaction. Then ask: "Would I pay this price to buy these shares on the open market?" Often, the answer is a resounding no.

The Identity Merger

Perhaps the most dangerous trap of all is when your identity becomes fully merged with your corporate role.

I've seen it happen countless times - brilliant, multifaceted human beings who slowly transform into one-dimensional corporate characters. Their conversations, relationships, even their self-worth become entirely tied to their professional identity.

The symptoms are subtle but devastating:

• You can't remember what you used to be passionate about before this job

• Most of your friendships are with colleagues or industry peers

• You feel anxious or empty on weekends and vacations

• You struggle to imagine who you'd be without your company affiliation

The corporation doesn't just want your time and talent - it wants your very sense of self. And once it has that, walking away feels like an existential threat rather than a career change.

Instead, start consciously developing an identity outside of work. Reconnect with old passions, develop new ones, build relationships that have nothing to do with your industry. Remember that you are not your job title, no matter how impressive it sounds.

It's entirely possible to have a fulfilling corporate career without surrendering your identity. I know many executives who thrive in corporate while maintaining strong boundaries. They've mastered the art of being "in the game" without becoming the game. The key difference? Self-awareness about what they're trading and what they're protecting at all costs.

Surviving Life in The Matrix

The first step to navigating any matrix is recognizing you're in one. This doesn't necessarily mean you need to escape, but you should consciously choose your level of engagement.

Some people thrive in corporate environments, even at the highest levels. The difference between those who flourish and those who get crushed isn't about ability; it's about awareness. The ones who survive with their souls intact understand precisely what game they're playing and what they're willing to trade for success. They don't mistake the corporate game for the game of life itself.

The corporation will never love you back. No matter how high you climb, how many hours you sacrifice, or how much of yourself you give, you are replaceable at the end of the day. The moment you leave, the machine moves on without a second thought.

Define success on your own terms. Because if you don't, the system will be happy to do it for you.

Whether you stay or go isn't the point – it's about making that choice with your eyes wide open.

Remember, your career should be a vehicle for the life you want, not a replacement for it.

PS...If you're enjoying Shifting Perspectives, please consider referring this edition to a friend. They might be trapped in the same golden cage, wondering why success feels so hollow.

PPS If you're trying to understand the invisible forces shaping your corporate existence and what they're really costing you, then here are the resources you need to dig into:

Weekly Resource List:

• The Four-Hour Work Week by Tim Ferriss (Reading Time: 8 hrs) The classic that launched a thousand escapes. Skip the hype and focus on his core message about designing a life that works for you, not your employer.

• Your Money or Your Life by Vicki Robin + Joe Dominguez (Reading Time: 7 hrs) This book fundamentally changed how I view the exchange of my life energy for money. It is particularly powerful for executives caught in the high-income/high-expense trap.

That voice in your head has a lot to answer for.

You know the one. It's that internal warden that patrols the boundaries of your comfort zone, ever-vigilant for any signs of risky ambition. It masquerades as wisdom, whispering about being "realistic" and "sensible." But more often than not, it's fear wearing a prison guard's uniform.

When Protection Becomes Prison

I learned about my internal prison guard early. Looking at my high school report card, you'd see a string of A's marching proudly across the page... until you hit the lonely D in Craft Design and Technology. This wasn't because the subject was impossibly complex. It was because I couldn't rely on my usual strengths of memory and logic. Instead of memorization and pattern recognition, we had to create something useful from scratch.

And rather than risk trying my best and still falling short, I chose not to try. I distracted myself and others, protecting my ego while sacrificing any chance of growth. That certificate still sits in my office folder today – a constant reminder of how early we learn to avoid situations where we might try our best and still fall short.

Your prison guard might show up differently than mine did. Maybe it's the novel you've been "meaning to write." Perhaps it's the career change you've been dreaming about but never "found the right time" for. Or it could be that business idea you've convinced yourself is "unrealistic."

The fascinating thing about these self-imposed limitations is that they operate on a spectrum. Sometimes, they genuinely keep us alive (like preventing us from trying to leap across crocodile-filled ravines). But far more often, they needlessly hold us back from achievable growth opportunities that could transform our lives.

The Adult Ego Maze

As adults, this pattern becomes deliciously complex. We're not just fighting against time constraints or diminishing brain plasticity – we're battling decades of carefully constructed self-image. Every time we step into something new, we're also dragging along every previous version of ourselves, complete with their expectations, fears, and carefully crafted defense mechanisms.

I've been facing this head-on recently in my journey toward competitive chess. At 500 ELO, I regularly face the humbling experience of being outplayed by eight-year-olds. My goal of reaching tournament level (1100 ELO) feels both ambitious and achievable, but only if I'm willing to check my ego at the door every single day. Each loss is a choice between protecting my self-image and improving.

The fascinating thing about the adult ego is how sophisticated it becomes in its self-protection. We don't just avoid challenges – we intellectualize our avoidance. We transform our fears into seemingly rational arguments. "I need to wait until the kids are older." "The market isn't right." "I should focus on my existing career." "Better to be realistic than chase pipe dreams."

These aren't just excuses – they're elaborate defense systems built by our internal prison guard over years of carefully avoiding discomfort. They sound wise. Responsible. Mature, even. And that's what makes them so dangerous.

Think about the last time you wanted to try something new. Maybe you caught yourself watching someone do something amazing on YouTube and thought, "I wish I could do that." What happened next? Did you immediately start listing all the reasons why you couldn't? Did you remind yourself of your age, responsibilities, and limitations? That's your prison guard at work, using decades of experience to keep you safely in your lane.

This is where most of us get stuck in our own pursuits. We're more afraid of trying our best and failing than not trying at all. It's a peculiarly adult form of self-sabotage – we've gotten so good at protecting ourselves that we've forgotten how to grow. We've mastered the art of staying comfortable while convincing ourselves we're being wise.

And here's the real kicker: the more successful you've been, the harder this becomes. Success builds layers of identity that feel too precious to risk. "I'm the person who's good at X" becomes a cage that keeps you from trying Y. We end up trapped not by our failures but by our previous successes.

Finding Freedom in Community

Here's where things get interesting: I've discovered that the key to breaking free often lies outside ourselves. When I joined a competitive 8-ball pool league last year, I was one of the worst players by far. But instead of letting my ego keep me safely on the sidelines, I embraced being the beginner. Each defeat became a question: "What are the other players doing that I'm not?"

The same pattern emerged when I stepped into entrepreneurship. Walking into rooms full of established CEOs and business owners while openly acknowledging my newness felt terrifying. But that vulnerability invited others to share their wisdom and support.

I recently watched a fascinating demonstration of the community's power on Beast Games that left me questioning everything I thought I knew about human nature. Picture this: 500 contestants divided into four teams, each led by someone they'd only known for a few days. These leaders were brought to a platform with buttons in front of them, and here came the twist - a monetary prize that would keep climbing as long as no one pressed their button. The catch? Press the button, and you'll win the money, but your entire team will be eliminated.

We'd already seen in this game that people would take between $20,000 and $100,000 to bow out when they were playing as individuals. So you'd expect someone to crack, right? The prize kept climbing - $100,000... $200,000... $500,000. The tension was palpable. You could see the leaders wrestling with temptation while their teams watched from below, calling out their names and reminding them of their shared journey.

Then came the moment of truth - the prize hit one million dollars. Mr. Beast, the host, let it sit there, tempting them. He even gave them ten seconds after the timer ran out, goading them to take the life-changing money. Yet not one of those leaders pressed their button. None of them betrayed the trust of people they'd only known for 2 days. Incredible television.

This wasn't just about moral fortitude or the power of peer pressure. It was a stunning demonstration of how quickly we can transcend our limitations when connected to something larger than our ego protection. These strangers had formed bonds strong enough to resist life-changing money in just a few days.

Breaking Out Together

The truth I've learned through all this? Growth isn't about avoiding failure – it's about being willing to fail better, surrounded by people who understand the journey. Your internal prison guard thrives in isolation, but its power fades in good company.

Think about that dream you've been putting off. The one your prison guard has convinced you is "unrealistic" or "not sensible." What if believing you must figure it out alone is the only genuinely unrealistic thing?

The path forward isn't about grand gestures or perfectly planned escapes. It's about small acts of defiance against your internal limitations. It's about finding others on similar journeys who can help you see your prison guard's tactics for what they are. Most importantly, it's about permitting yourself to be temporarily bad at something new in service of becoming who you might be.

Your prison guard's biggest lie isn't that you can't do something; you have to do it alone.

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Have you ever caught yourself saying, "I don't have time," when what you really mean is, "This isn't a priority for me"?

We're all guilty of it. We dance around difficult conversations, bend ourselves into pretzels, trying to please everyone, and hide behind convenient excuses that help us avoid uncomfortable truths. But what if I told you that this behavior – this tendency to deflect and defer – quietly erodes the quality of your relationships and opportunities?

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The other day, I reflected on my journey building multiple businesses, and a stark truth hit me: trying to speak to everyone means speaking to no one. It's a lesson that cost me dearly, both in time and missed opportunities.

Take a generic digital marketing agency, for instance. The temptation is to cast the broadest possible net – after all, the whole world could be your client, right? But here's the reality check: if you're a nail salon owner looking to crack TikTok because that's where your young clientele hangs out, who would you rather hire? A generic "digital marketing agency" or someone specializing in "digital marketing for nail salons looking to break TikTok"?

The same principle applies to our personal lives, though we rarely consider it this way.

The Chameleon Trap

For years, I fell into what I now call the Chameleon Trap – that exhausting dance of trying to be liked by everyone. You know the routine: agreeing with every opinion, laughing at every joke (even the bad ones), and carefully calibrating your personality to match whatever the room wants.

The result? You become a generic presence, a social shapeshifter with no real form of your own. Your authentic self gets lost in the endless adaptations, which ironically makes it harder to form genuine connections.

Think about it: I'm a guy who loves eating out, pool, golf, and chess. I think politics is fundamentally broken, and I believe AI will reshape humanity over the next five years. These specific interests and strong beliefs might put some people off – and that's exactly the point.

If someone finds discussing AI over a game of pool while critiquing the latest restaurant dreadful, guess what? We probably wouldn't have a great time together anyway. And that's perfectly okay.

The "No Time" Lie

Let's discuss everyone's favorite excuse: "I don't have time."

This little phrase is perhaps the most insidious form of self-deception we engage in. Because what we're really saying is: "I am choosing not to prioritize this." It's a deflection that helps us avoid confronting our true feelings and choices.

The truth becomes especially obvious when we claim we don't have time for something important while spending hours scrolling through social media or binge-watching the latest Netflix series. We all do it, but at what cost?

Breaking the Pattern

The shift away from these patterns usually happens at one of two breaking points:

1. When the emotional conflict inside becomes more uncomfortable than having the difficult conversation

2. When the cost of maintaining the facade exceeds the perceived benefit of avoiding authenticity

I've learned this the hard way in business. Recently, I ignored advice from 5-8 experienced professionals who warned me against pursuing a specific market. My bullish belief in myself – usually a positive trait – became a blindspot. One by one, I had to go back and admit they were right.

The Freedom in Boundaries

Here's the counterintuitive truth I've discovered: setting clear boundaries and being specific about who you are actually creates more opportunities for meaningful connections, not fewer.

Think about your closest relationships. Chances are they're built on shared interests, compatible differences, and mutual respect for each other's authentic selves – not on careful adaptations and avoided conversations.

The same applies in business. The most successful ventures often aren't the ones trying to serve everyone, but rather those that dare to be specific and potentially alienating to those outside their target audience.

Taking Action

So how do we break free from these patterns? Here are some starting points:

1. Practice owning your choices: Instead of saying "I don't have time," try "This isn't a priority for me right now."

2. Get comfortable with discomfort: Start small – express a contrary opinion in a low-stakes situation, or share a genuine interest even if it might not be popular.

3. Audit your adaptations: Notice when you're changing your behavior to please others. Ask yourself if it's serving your authentic relationships or just avoiding conflict.

Remember: The goal isn't to become inflexible or inconsiderate. It's about finding the sweet spot between growth and authenticity, between being open to feedback and staying true to your core self.

The Path Forward

The journey to authenticity isn't about dramatic declarations or burning bridges. It's about small, consistent choices to be more honest – with yourself and others.

Yes, some people might drift away when you stop being everything to everyone. But the relationships that remain – and the new ones you'll form – will be built on something real.

And isn't that worth more than the exhausting pretense of universal compatibility?

What masks are you wearing in your daily life? Which conversations are you avoiding under the guise of "being too busy"?

The answers might be uncomfortable, but they're worth exploring. After all, the cost of not doing so is far greater than any momentary discomfort.

Until next time,

Graeme

Have you ever felt like a chess piece on someone else's board, moving according to rules you didn't set?

I've been there and want to share my journey from corporate executive to entrepreneur – a path that's challenged everything I thought I knew about success, fulfillment, and living life on my own terms.

For years, I climbed the corporate ladder, transforming businesses with cutting-edge technology:

• Revolutionized executive reporting for a top UK finance company

• Scaled digital marketing to 8,000 analysts at a major US company and transitioned it to the cloud

• Built a real-time web analytics platform enabling AI-driven personalization for millions

Sounds impressive, right? But here's the truth bomb: as I ascended the corporate ladder thanks to all this success I led, my dream job slowly morphed into a nightmare.

The Corporate Game: A Reality Check

Managing employee performance is a significant part of corporate life.

On an annual cycle employees are stack-ranked and, through various methods, the lower performers are encouraged to seek employment elsewhere.

I used to defend this process and do everything possible to make it as fair and supportive as possible. But here's the kicker: the process's priority is increasing the talent at the company rather than supporting all individuals.

As an employee, you're the product of the process, not the customer of it.

Additionally, those denoted as higher performers receive differential bonuses at the positive end of the process.

While this might mean an upgraded vacation or some home improvement for junior employees, these higher ratings can be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars per year in additional compensation in the executive ranks.

We all think we are not sneaky and wouldn’t undermine our colleagues, but everybody has a price, and you see that play out in many ways. I don’t blame anyone for the behavior the system creates - it’s human nature.

Think of game shows or reality TV where contestants build secret alliances or engage in very devious behavior to win prizes of way less than six figures. We expect it, and we laud them for it.

The resultant view behind the executive curtain isn't always pretty. This system creates fundamental cognitive dissonance in corporate life. Leaders preach care, teamwork, and support, but their individually motivated actions can often tell a different story.

For some, it’s a game in which the prizes on offer might not be worth winning, given the personal sacrifices required to secure them.

I needed a different path.

Breaking Free: The Entrepreneurial Leap

In July 2024, I resigned from my executive role at one of the biggest US banks. Was it scary? Absolutely, but it was necessary.

The impact of the transition has been eye-opening:

• My health has improved dramatically

• My relationship with my kids is twice as good

• I've rediscovered my passion for delivering high-impact change

Now, I'm building two AI-powered businesses:

1. Crawford McMillan: Helping mid-market companies to transform their key processes with AI

2. DMV Digital Marketing: Assisting nonprofits in maximizing Google Ad grants and boosting support for their missions.

Starting your own business brings many challenges with it - a different type of hard - but they are challenges that I am much more excited about meeting.

The Unexpected Benefits of Going Against the Grain

Since starting, I’ve already realized some significant personal wins.

Reclaiming Your Time

I've settled into a routine that works for me:

• Mondays for content creation

• Tuesday to Thursday for client work

• Fridays for learning and keeping up with AI advancements

• Saturdays for substack and kids sports

• Sundays for untouchable personal time

The best part? Nobody's telling me what to do. I'm no longer a chess piece on multiple chessboards.

Redefining Success

It turns out I don't need huge houses or flashy cars. Controlling our family’s monthly burn rate has allowed me to build this business on my own terms. I'm focused on creating something sustainable, automation-first, and scale-first.

Prioritizing Health and Relationships

Stepping away from corporate life has dramatically improved my health and family relationships. I even completed an indoor triathlon recently!

Embracing Authenticity

I've had to unlearn the corporate habit of pretending to be productive all day, whether you are or not - you've got to manage that personal brand! Now, if there's not much going on, I'll hit the golf driving range or watch Netflix without guilt. It's liberating!

Challenge Your Beliefs

Question the norms. Just because "everyone" follows a particular path doesn't mean it's right for you.

• Prioritize yourself. A company will never care about you as much as you care about yourself.

• Define your non-negotiables. Everyone's willing to sacrifice different things – time, ethics, personal judgment. Figure out what matters to you.

• Embrace discomfort. Growth often lies outside your comfort zone.

• Redefine success. It's not always about the biggest paycheck or the fanciest title.

Whether you're committed to staying corporate or thinking of making the leap, make it work for you, not the other way around.

It's okay to go against the grain if it means living a life that aligns with your values and aspirations.

Are you ready to challenge your beliefs and reshape your perspective on work and life? What's one small step you can take today towards living life how you truly want to?

Here's to forging your own path.

Have you ever tried to quit something, returned to its comfort, and wondered why you’re still unhappy?

You’d think the human race would be at its peak in today’s world, filled with never-ending stimulation. Yet, we’re sadder than ever, and much of your energy pours into bottomless pits of increasingly well-designed ways to blank out the reality of your existence.

In the last five years, I’ve broken out of some of the most addictive cycles out there and am the happiest I’ve ever been.

Want to know why they are so hard to escape and the fail-safe formula I used to smash my way out of them? Read on.

Addiction is masquerading as everyday life.

The most widespread addictive and destructive activities hide in plain sight. That’s what makes them so dangerous.

They help you forget your problems and feelings while reinforcing and normalizing the cycle. Everyone’s doing it, so it must be OK, right?

These are some of the worst offenders:

Mobile phones: The constant notifications and endless content create a dopamine loop, making it hard to disconnect. This leads to overstimulation and a reduced ability to focus on meaningful, real-world interactions.

Alcohol: By artificially stimulating dopamine release, alcohol creates a temporary sense of euphoria that can only be maintained by drinking more alcohol. Over time, it numbs the brain’s natural reward system, fostering dependence and emotional instability.

Video games: Their achievement-based structure hooks the brain into a cycle of instant gratification, providing a sense of accomplishment that can distract from real-world goals and lead to a skewed sense of progress.

Junk food: High in sugar and fat, junk food triggers powerful dopamine surges at affordable prices, which override the body's natural hunger signals, causing overeating and long-term health problems while never truly satisfying emotional hunger.

News: Negative and sensational news stories are designed to hijack our attention, creating a cycle of fear and anxiety that leaves us addicted to checking updates, even when it undermines our peace of mind.

Social media: Designed to deliver a stream of quick dopamine hits through likes, comments, and endless scrolling, social media fosters a craving for validation and comparison, leading to decreased self-worth and a distorted sense of reality.

Social media is the poisonous cherry on top of the nasty cake of these addictions.

As one of my favorite writers said this week:

Unless you curate your feed very specifically, social media in all its forms is an echo chamber of your choices and opinions.

If you’re making bad choices, it will reinforce them as reasonable. If you have a subjective, one-eyed opinion on something, it will tell you it’s right.

Worst of all, if you’re addicted to anything harmful, it will convince you that everyone else is doing it or that it’s not your fault.

So, you take no ownership or action.

Giving up is hard to do.

The reason you’re not quitting something is simple - it’s because you don’t want to.

You might not consciously realize what’s out of whack because you’re looking for excuses externally. Plenty are available, especially in your social media echo chamber. Almost always, you are the problem.

You *think* you want to quit, but deep down, you don’t want to. Maybe the allure of the cheap or free dopamine hits is too appealing. Maybe there’s a feeling, emotion, or memory you’re not ready to deal with; being comfortably numb is your preferred state.

It's all perfectly understandable. But what if you are done with feeling trapped and want more for yourself?

Here’s how I approached each of the horsemen of normalized addiction:

Mobile phones: My phone never comes into my bedroom. Text messages and phone calls are the only notifications I have turned on. I have timers to set it to grayscale mode for chunks of the day. I looked up and saw the world around me lost in its devices. And I don’t want to spend my day lost in my mobile phone at the expense of deep human connection.

Alcohol: I spent many hours educating myself on the science of alcohol and its impacts on the body and mind. I objectively examined all the highs and lows from my decades of drinking and why I chose to do it. I listened to the sober community's experiences, regrets, and celebrations. And I don’t want to drink.

Video Games: Freeing myself here was more of an indirect byproduct of finding more worthwhile things to focus on. I was simply left without the time to devote to them. With some hard self-examination, I realized outside the scene that I preferred other activities, and now I don’t want to spend hours of my day playing video games.

Junk Food: I stopped ordering from DoorDash and Uber Eats. When grocery shopping, I leave the chips and cookies on the shelf and get healthy snacks instead. Most importantly, I changed my outlook on my health, and I don’t want to eat junk food anymore.

News: I deleted the news apps from my phone and most news sources from my social media. I sought objective sources from multiple angles and saw the deliberate and deceitful tactics that news outlets use to stir up anxiety or reinforce false truths. Now, I don’t want to consume mainstream news anymore.

Social Media: I cleaned out my feeds and made sure what I had left was a good balance of connection, positivity and challenge to my thinking. I try to be deliberate in my engagement and I installed tight daily app limits as safety nets when I fail. I recognized how harmful my use of social had been. And I don’t want to spend hours on social media every day.

I think you get the point.

Remember, true authenticity is the perfect alignment of your thoughts, intentions, and actions. When this triad is not aligned, something always feels ‘off’ inside you.

Taking accountability is too hard to face, so you live with that discomfort for so long that it feels normal, and your new baseline state is ‘uncomfortable.’

Then, you seek things to numb this now-subconscious discomfort, and, as mentioned above, plenty of options are available.

The cycle will continue until you (and only you) break it.

You’re not a bad person.

I can’t sit here, on the other side of five years of hard work, and pretend like it’s been easy. I spent decades in each of these traps.

Wanting to feel good is a natural human desire. Finding the quickest and most efficient route to it is incredibly appealing.

These addiction traps were set up by some of the brightest minds that have ever lived, with knowledge of human psychology at its most advanced. Falling into them doesn’t make you a bad person. Your self-worth will be more critical than ever if you’re going to spring out of them.

Changing the core of who you are and how you want to be requires lengthy self-reflection and a commitment to extreme accountability for your outcomes. Some of the reasons you choose to numb may be rooted in your past or linked to things outside your control—digging to understand yourself at that level is deeply uncomfortable.

The feelings you’ll have to sit with will shake you; you’ll feel negativity and shame that will make the siren song of numbing sound sweeter than ever.

Just one more hit.

Or is it time to reclaim power over your own destiny?

Making it happen.

It may seem impossible, but remember that perfection isn’t the target. I don’t claim to deserve sainthood or perfection myself:

• I have run for the comfort of my phone more than a few times while writing this piece.

• I occasionally give in to my urges for a quarter-pounder with cheese and am a devouring devil when left with unfettered access to sour cream and onion chips at a party.

• Those daft new games on LinkedIn suck me in for 5 minutes every day.

• I can’t resist clicking on whatever ridiculous thing JD Vance has said now.

• I still disappear down Facebook rabbit holes of random UFC highlights and silly dad jokes.

Yet, now those things cause me conscious discomfort because they’re not aligned with the authentic version of myself I want to be, and I hold myself accountable for taking actions out of line with that.

Actions are a lot easier to correct than thoughts or intentions.

The road of self-development is a tough one, but if it’s one you need to walk, then your choices are clear:

• Take those difficult first steps and commit to being accountable for your choices and outcomes.

• Sink back into the haze of distraction, choose ignorance as bliss, and numb away the rest of your life.

What option does your authentic self want to choose?

One of the most popular self-confidence mantras out there is killing your progress.

“I am enough.” is paraded through the streets of personal development like the silver bullet of success. It is well-intended, but many use it as an excuse, silently letting themselves off the hook from doing anything challenging. You’re copping out and being ‘enough’ for other people, stranding yourself criminally short of your potential.

How might you redefine your ‘enough’ and hold yourself accountable to your full potential instead?

Your present self is the softest judge.

Letting the current version of yourself set the bar for your progress is a mistake. Anything can be framed as progress, like these mini-wins I have conjured for myself in the past few months:

• A walk around the block.

• Only eating two cookies rather than three.

• Thinking positive thoughts about taking future action.

Sure, every journey starts with a single step, but if you bask in the glory of the smallest ones, you set an incredibly low velocity for yourself.

Letting those around you set the bar isn’t much better.

Typically, other people will only cheer for your success if you’re behind them—even those who have helped you along the way. Watching you soar past forces them to question the choices they’ve made for themselves. They don’t often love the potential answers, and imagining them sits uncomfortably.

Once the student becomes the master, the student better get used to a much lonelier path.

Your highest potential future self is the best person to set the standards.

Just how amazing might your life be? What would happen if you shed the fear of failure and gave your dream your best shot? What if you remembered that all the people you’re worried about seeing you fail aren’t even watching at all?

Too often, fear of failure is the root cause.

As I have built my business over the last few months, this has been my most significant source of inaction. I’ve tried to dress it up in so many different ways. There’s always an external circumstance to blame. There’s always a way to justify a rest or ‘giving myself a break.’

The crumbs of comfort are easy to find if you look hard enough on the floor.

You need to recognize when it’s time to stand up on your feet and shoot for the stars. Realizing that the worst that could happen is a set of lessons and a redirection to a new path is where the magic happens.

If you embrace your unlimited potential and lose your fear of failure, you will become unstoppable.

You’re striving for an easy life rather than progress.

What’s your dream life?

For most people, the answer is some form of ‘only doing the things I enjoy’. Let’s stop and think about that for a second, though.

• How long could you sit and watch Netflix? How many times could you tap through the ‘Are you still watching’ pop-up?

• A spa day is great, but could you do a whole spa week? A spa month?

• How much ice cream could you eat before you start throwing up?

I love playing golf, but every time I’ve attempted to play more than one round in a day, I've experienced malaise and blisters.

On top of all that, none of these things represent progress.

How about you consider difficult experiences instead:

• Learning a new skill is inevitably laced with frustration and failure when you’re not an instant expert.

• Hard workouts at the gym push your limits, leave you a sweaty mess, and doom you to a painful recovery day tomorrow.

• Telling yourself, ‘No, I can be better than this,’ comes with the pain of acknowledging that you’re not as good as you could be.

The most challenging roads I’ve walked have ended in the most enjoyment: changing my college degree, moving countries, and stopping drinking. Not one of them involved ‘only doing things I enjoy.’

Enjoyment is a state of mind that you can reframe to your advantage; success isn’t a view you get at the top of a mountain.

Success is the climb.

You’re not as authentic as you think you are.

What is the authentic you?

Your authenticity is composed of your inner thoughts, intentions, and actions. However, its measure is not absolute; it’s relative. Only when all three of those line up perfectly do you feel entirely at peace.

Yet, you claim to be authentic and are still troubled - why is that?

The quick and easy answer is always to externalize it:

• Some circumstances have expectations that prevent you from acting according to your intentions.

• Some relationship dynamics are stopping you from living your truth.

• You rarely find yourself comfortable enough to be yourself.

If only it weren’t for the pesky world and its inhabitants, you’d be 100% authentic.

The more likely and more complicated answer lies in flipping the script:

• You want an easy life where everything is handed to you, and you’re never challenged.

• You intend a life of greatness for yourself but are too scared to push yourself to go for it.

• You commit to yourself, but you let yourself down.

How you act in private doesn’t match how you act in public.

Like challenge and progress, authenticity is incredibly hard to achieve. It involves complex internal dialogue; it consists of trying, failing, and trying again.

Most of all, it involves accepting that your inner dialogue and the actions you choose are the source of your inauthenticity, not the environment in which you’re trying to manifest it.

The door to self-improvement always swings inward.

Are you enough?

Personal development can be a trap to help you settle for low self-esteem and free yourself from self-judgment because you're not the finished article.

How long is this cycle going to continue? When are you going to turn it into action? How many regrets are waiting for you on your deathbed? How much power to chart the course of your life will you give away to others?

There’s nothing inherently wrong with ‘I am enough’.

For the world’s most popular mantra to have the intended outcome, it must be treated as a nettle to be grasped, not a blanket to wrap around yourself.

Who are you going to be ‘enough’ for today?

How much of your potential are you sacrificing in the endless quest to fit in?

The urge to ‘fit in’ is a compelling siren song, drawing us like zombies to a life of conformity and burning us with the pain of rejection when we dare to resist it.

I know all about both.

My cultural identity has molded itself to my changing surroundings, leaving me with a strange mongrel hybrid of national identities—ironically, I do not feel fully integrated into any of them.

I’ve spent the majority of my life enjoying alcohol as my primary social pursuit despite, on reflection, never really enjoying the consequences of doing so. Both times I’ve given it up, I’ve had to reinvent my social life.

I’ve recently emerged from a 20-year corporate career I was ‘supposed’ to pursue, even though it never fully fit how I wanted to live my life. I now find myself in the strange new land of entrepreneurship, trying to fit into a new culture that appears to treasure those who break the mold the most.

How powerful are your primal urges to make you oscillate through life, sacrificing your true identity and passion to blend seamlessly in with the herd?

What drives you to want to be another faceless sheep in the pen?

You can’t escape your evolutionary ancestry

Humans are tribal by nature—a characteristic deeply rooted in our evolution.

This instinct served our ancestors well, promoting survival through unity and cooperation within small, tight-knit groups.

Being part of a tribe meant access to shared resources, collective defense against predators, and coordinated care for the young and old. It was, quite literally, safety in numbers.

Being ostracized or left alone often meant a death sentence in the wild, instilling a deep fear of social rejection. This is why you often feel a strong pull towards conformity, even when it conflicts with your identity or desires.

However, the conditions that necessitated this behavior have primarily vanished in today's world.

Modern society provides individual safety nets that our ancestors could never have imagined. Yet, the primal fear of isolation and rejection lingers, often compelling us to conform to societal norms that may not align with our true selves.

In modern society, individualism and diversity are beneficial.

Today's most celebrated figures often defy norms and innovate, showing that success can come from standing out and carving the best path for yourself.

We put them on a pedestal and admire them. The internet moves as one, creating lofty pedestals for the latest objects of our affections—yes, even including Hawk Tuah girl.

So, we feel tension between our desire for social acceptance and our quest for personal authenticity.

You must carefully and consciously choose when to embrace group norms and when to stand firm in your individuality, forging paths that resonate more deeply with your values and aspirations.

Like most things in life, it’s about striking a balance, and it’s tough to get it right.

The media wants you to feel like you fit in so badly that they lie to you

I need to take the media to task for making this balancing puzzle harder to solve.

Modern media is total BS. Their role used to be to inform us, but since information has been thoroughly democratized online, the media needed to find a new schtick.

They chose to appeal to the herd mentality of belonging and, boy oh boy, they do it so well.

Almost all of what the algorithms feed to you either:

• Provides reassuring mental hugs that your tribe and beliefs are the best and a sure path to success.

• Savagely pours contempt on things that run against the cement-y grain of your concrete ideals. Those IDIOTS. How could they even IMAGINE another way of doing things? They’ll see.

Doesn’t it make you feel great? Doesn’t it make you want to devote more of your attention to their content? Maybe click on a few of their affiliate ads?

The current CNN/Washington Post whitewash on Kamala’s momentum is the perfect example. You’d think she’d be cake-walking her way to the White House if you rolled yourself hard enough in their post-DNC hype.

• The Obamas love Kamala! Of course, they do - to whom is this a surprise?

• Liberal influencers and Beyonce love Kamala! Again…hardly tough dominoes to flip in this battle for hearts and mind.\

• Tim Walz is a nice guy! He sure is!! I’d love to have him over for dinner myself.

Are we going to address the impacts of the DNC trying to deceive the entire electorate on Biden’s mental acuity? Or that as VP, Kamala struggled to maintain any sense of a team in her office because she’s so tough to work with?

Or that the Dem election strategy hinges on virtue-signaling to a disillusioned left who watched on in horror as they let abortion bans take hold across the country while, at the same time, they funded wars halfway around the world?

NOOO, that information would make our tribe feel bad! Let’s keep that below the surface. What shall we do instead?

• Remind everyone what a horrific villain Trump is—solid, reliable, outraged eyeballs. Excellent work!

• Make fun of JD Vance. This is the biggest media open goal of all time. He does a damn good job of underlining his unsuitability for office on his own, tbh.

BUT, what about the fact that the ~50% of the country that voted for Trump before already knew he was a crim, even if he wasn’t convicted then? What about the huge wave of dissent from Americans who feel forgotten, who are so pissed off and want to stick it to the system so badly that they would literally put a couch-f*cker in deputy command of the Free(ish) World to get their point across?

Oh no…that would be so jarring. Let’s protect them from that set of info!

The saddest thing about it all is that it’s utterly self-defeating. Hiding the genuine and present risk of losing this election from the Dem base (and that they’re currently behind) may make a few thousand voters in some of the few critical states feel complacent enough to stay home and blow the whole thing.

Not to worry, though. That outcome locks in four years of highly readable and outraged coverage about how this could have happened. If only we’d had the information, more of us would have voted.

It’s like a car crash happening in slow motion.

Trying too hard to fit in is desperate and doesn’t work

Being a Terry try-hard is the best way to ensure that the group you so desperately want to belong to will reject you.

You observe all the norms and opinions; you parrot them back. You work out who the most influential folks are: you suck up to them hard. The waters will be so smooth that they won’t notice you blending in to become part of the furniture.

Alas, the nature of group dynamics prizes people who are different. Complementary strengths, not carbon-copy strengths, make groups question and grow their shared identity. That’s the route to a group that includes you that you feel authentically part of.

Again, though, this has to be delicately balanced. You can’t piss in the porridge toooo much or it will be a leap too far.

The sad ending is that if you fabricate a persona or set of beliefs to become part of a group, you will lose anyway. Either:

• You’re so disingenuously unbelievable that the group sniffs out the BS and rejects you.

• You ‘fake it til you make’ it, and your victory seems utterly hollow. Because you didn’t win - some made-up acted-out version of you did. That’s not going to resonate.

The hard truth is that there are some groups you were never meant to be part of. Quit trying to force it and find a group that will benefit from your membership!

After all that, if there's one thing to take away from this existential merry-go-round, it's this: trying to mold yourself into the "perfect fit" for any tribe might squeeze the uniqueness out of you.

So, chuck the chameleon suit, embrace your inner oddball, and find your tribe that loves the real, unpolished you.

Every square peg eventually finds its square hole.

Have you ever wondered what happens when you finally take the leap of faith to pursue your dream career?

• Loud cheering from your friends and family?

• A triumphant welcome from your chosen new space?

• Fanfares from angels?

Three months ago, I walked out on a long-established corporate career to take a bet on myself as an entrepreneur. Here are the top lessons from my experiences so far.

Going against the grain is hard

Getting to the start line of an entrepreneurial journey is incredibly hard.

It breaks all the rules you’ve been taught. Work hard, stay in line, do well, serve your company, and wait for the reward. Leaving your job behind is a significant risk, especially in the US, where the golden cage has the intimidating double locks of 401K and health insurance.

Breaking out is not what you’re supposed to do.

Your friends and family will wish you the best, but you’ll hear the edge of nerves in their voices. It’s not that they want you to fail - it’s the opposite. Their fears are rooted in care for you.

You'll start to wobble if you don’t have courage in your convictions. I had to fight through two weeks of applying for new corporate jobs I didn’t want. It felt good doing what I was ‘supposed to do.’

When I sat down to update my LinkedIn headline to reflect my new ambitions, it took me two hours—one hundred and twenty minutes of wrestling with the identity I was trying to shed, one that had served me so well and been ‘part of me’ for so long.

I finally put it to rest by declining a warm lead follow-up call from an interested corporate recruiter. It's undoubtedly a sin in this job market, but it was an essential declaration of intent for me.

The sensible playbook will tell you: “Build something on the side while you continue your job!”

Anyone who’s ever worked in a high-pressure corporate role will know just how difficult that is. Rousing myself at 5 am to build a business alongside a senior corporate job was never going to work for me:

• A ready-made excuse every day to prioritize your main job

• No *real* pressure to take action and build

• Adding to the mental and physical load I was already under would probably have broken me

The reading and self-development I did accomplish on the side in the last two years opened my eyes to the opposite part of the risk.

What if you never try? What if you live your years out in cubicles and offices to find yourself loaded with regret that you never took a bet on yourself?

What if you spent the best of yourself in service of someone else’s profits?

What if you spend your life playing a game you didn’t enjoy for a prize you didn’t want to win?

That seems like the real risk to me.

Your new space owes you nothing

After letting the mud settle a little after leaving my old job, I began to explore the entrepreneurial space online.

After finding my feet, I participated in some networking sprints, aiming to get in front of as many fellow entrepreneurs as I could. Surely they’d be wowed by my decades of corporate experience and know the perfect opportunity for me?

Absolutely not.

They didn’t give a crap about what my title used to be, the size of my former team, or any of the other things that are so prized within the corporate matrix. Your money is no good here, Sir.

Imagine playing Sonic the Hedgehog for years, collecting all the bonus rings, and then moving to Mario World and trying to get Mario and Luigi to care about your shiny yellow hoops. We only care for the turtle shells, mushrooms, and stars here, buddy!

Here’s what matters:

• Solving a valuable problem for an engaged audience

• Cashflow

• Momentum

All the slide decks in the world can’t create the illusion of those, no matter how nicely formatted your boxes are.

In terms of progress, it’s like Vegas out there—so many ways to get rich. How could anyone fail to win?? Many people offer the surefire route to success and are willing to share it with you…in return for a handsome price.

Two ways I had to get smart quickly here:

• Find ways to separate the superficial moneymakers from those with true insight to share.

• Realize how easy it is to get caught in the spin cycle of thinking and planning.

My two most significant sources of momentum have been:

• I joined a select few paid communities after careful research. Behind the paywall, these groups are genuinely willing to share insight and support.

• I took action. Forward progress is empowering. Even if it quickly turns into a dead end in the long term, lessons are learned, and the mental muscles required for motion are strengthened.

It’s not easy, but it’s a rewarding struggle. Welcome to the new kind of hard, I guess.

People aren’t watching as much as you think

To break free from corporate's golden cage, I had to free myself from an overactive need for validation.

It was a regular instrument of limiting self-torture while in the cage and would have weighed heavily in the early absence of excited approval from those around me when I leaped.

Paradoxically, it was only when I had moved past that need that I noticed that most of the time, folks are way too consumed with themselves to even notice what you’re doing, never mind having an opinion about it.

The LinkedIn bio that I labored over changing - I’ve since changed it about ten times, and nobody has batted an eyelid.

The ideas I took early action on to discover dead ends - they publicly came and went, and the Earth carried on spinning, untroubled.

The power to shift your identity, realize complete control of your outcomes, and banish your fear of failure out of concern for others is a really enjoyable position to be in.

You get to feel like Neo after his Matrix kung-fu lessons. Watch out, world!

Choosing your priorities is incredibly freeing.

When I embarked on this journey, I had two critical priorities unrelated to work and income: I wanted to reclaim and reset my physical and mental health.

I have traveled, read, worked out, rested, and done as much as possible to relieve myself of pressure to progress with work—a mini monk-mode session.

This effort has yielded significant returns:

• No headaches or illness for three months

• A perfect set of blood panel results

• Resting heart rate back in the 40s.

• Swapped out inner turmoil for inner peace.

• My relationships with my wife and sons are the best they’ve ever been.

I don’t think it’s possible to put a price on any of these things.

However this adventure ends, I already have all the data I need to know it was the right choice to begin it.

I’ll end with a creator post that helped inspire me to keep going this week.

My week in Alaska was spectacular, but not for the reasons you might expect.

The scenery and wildlife were as incredible as you’d imagine. Nearly three million visitors a year couldn’t be wrong, and I loved all that. Something more about the trip captured the imagination, though — something deeper than the whales, more striking than the mountains.

This is what I learned below the surface of the typical experience:

Being fully offline is like a spa for your brain

I didn’t set out with the intention of this trip being a technology diet.

I typically try to control my phone usage. It doesn’t come into the bedroom. I have app timers on social media apps, stemming the flow of their fountains of dopamine.

Thanks to Royal Caribbean and their ‘great value’ $20 per device per day WiFi offering, I had a wholly disconnected week. My ability to override my limits (which I guiltily admit to doing occasionally) was gone.

For a week, my world began and ended on the cruise ship.

Being offline was tough at first. It turns out you reach for your phone a lot more than you realize:

• Out of pure damn dirty habit

• When you see something that reminds you of a friend, and you want to tell them

• When you hear rumblings of a world news event and don’t have any details.

When you wake up, and your phone shows no signal, you go about your day differently. You are full of possibilities; you feel free and present. The world shrinks, and your stresses shrink with it.

I missed the Microsoft/Crowdstrike crisis while I was on the ship. From a hindsight perspective, it seems like little more than a storm in a teacup. I’m sure some folks felt like the world was collapsing into anarchy in the midst of it.

When we docked in Vancouver to go home, all airline systems were back up, all flights were back on schedule, and I avoided all drama and stress about any possibility of that not happening.

Wasted worry, which would have made no difference to the outcome.

I cleared a week of email inbox in the lines to get off and was ready to resume life with the vigor and energy of someone who’s had a proper rest.

Much as you struggle to silence your phone for even an hour, regular offline breaks are what winning looks like.

You can tell yourself, ‘Oh, I could easily do without my phone,’ but see how long you stick with it once reality and the need for convenience and gratification strikes.

It doesn’t even need to be in Alaska. Start with a weekend and change your brain.

Everyone around you has incredible stories to tell

The power of being present unlocks a previously unseen path to people and their pasts.

Two thousand people seem like a lot, but when you’re on a ship for a week, many faces become familiar — the families who eat at the tables near you, neighbors in the hallway, and people who enjoy the same activities.

Many opt for superficial or polite interactions, but if you’re open to it and show some interest, people will quickly open their book life stories for you.

I met a couple wearing matching ‘Just Married’ t-shirts with their wedding date from 1984 on them. They were celebrating forty years of marriage, quite an achievement in this day and age.

They talked about raising their kids and what they’d learned about the balance between providing care and freedom. They talked about managing relationships with adult kids, what to expect, and the wins and regrets they’d had along the way.

I joined a poker tournament one morning. The cost of entry was perfectly pitched - high enough that folks wanted to win, low enough that the game stayed friendly. It created a great atmosphere and camaraderie between the ten of us.

Players shared many stories during the game, including one guy who had played on the final tables of the World Series of Poker. We heard about:

• his interactions with the pros

• his 20 years of studying human behavior to gain an advantage

• his elite strategic approach to the game

He was the second person knocked out. Lol.

I haven’t had an alcoholic drink for 629 days, mainly through my desire to improve my life. AA meetings have never felt necessary, but there was one each day on the ship, so I went along a couple of times to meet some fellow sober peeps.

First, I compliment how open and friendly each meeting was. Everyone was made to feel welcome, regardless of circumstances. Out of respect for privacy, I won’t share details, but I heard:

• A woman sober for 14 years still consumed by guilt over an incident that most people I know (including me) would consider no more than a fleeting embarrassment.

• A man sober for 40 years who had seen unimaginable horrors of war that sent him spiraling to a horrifying rock bottom experience on his return.

Hearing these perspectives in depth recalibrated my understanding of the different paths to alcohol addiction and the wildly different bars people hold themselves to on the way out of it.

As an AA meeting, it was explicitly constructed to suspend judgment and prioritize honesty and support, but it matched the broader vibe of the ship.

I reflected and realized that you don’t need Alaska for this lesson. When forming and growing relationships, time, attention, support, and vulnerability go a long way.

Put yourself out there and make an offer. You’ll be amazed at what you get in return.

The best things can come when you aren’t trying too hard

I’ve never been excited about whales.

Paying many dollars to spend hours in a puffy suit to see some fins and splashing didn’t appeal to me.

Here in Alaska, it was all about the world’s biggest mammals—whale trips, whale souvenirs, whale watching — literally a whale of a time.

I ignored all of it. At Icy Strait, whale fever was at its peak on the boat. On a clear, calm day with no rain, the ship was hyped for some whale action.

Instead, I indulged the kids. They had developed quite the penchant for kayaking during our excellent weekend in Vancouver before setting sail, so we strapped into our boats and went off.

Ten minutes into our paddle, my worldview on whales instantly transformed when a humpback breached 30 feet from our kayaks. I was first surprised, then shocked, and finally in total awe. The size of this thing…

Our guide told us to stay still. Whales navigate via sonar pulses every thirty seconds, so if you’re moving, you’re more at risk of getting tipped out. I shakily got my cameras ready, and shortly after, our rogue solo whale resurfaced with his friends.

Still terrifyingly close for a guy in a plastic boat on freezing water who isn’t great at swimming.

As the world’s newest whale expert, I showed the video to fellow passengers back on board, and they were amazed. It was the best video on the ship, even amongst the hundreds who had gone out specifically looking for whales.

Since coming home and sharing more broadly, it’s become apparent that folks spend weeks pursuing proximity to whales and don’t get anything close to the type of experience I had.

And to think, I wasn’t even trying to see whales. I was literally trying to avoid them.

Beyond appreciating the great fortune, it made me reflect on the weird ways life sometimes unfolds.

• Single friends chase the love of their lives yet have a series of awful dates.

• Unemployed friends frantically chase jobs and never get a callback.

• Kids try so hard to be part of the ‘in crowd’ and get shunned.

There is something to be said about focusing on ‘being’ and letting life manifest its wonders in front of you.

If you chase something too hard, there’s a decent chance your frantic pursuit can make it less likely that you get it.

Then you watch in frustration as some lucky fool gets the outcome you’ve been craving.

The best lessons are the least obvious ones

I had to travel all the way to Alaska to uncover three excellent lessons.

The best part? They unlock approaches that are available to anybody, anywhere, so you can get them for free!

• Try a day without your phone. Lock it away and see how it transforms your life while out of reach.

• Ask a stranger a deeper question, and be open, supportive, and curious about their answer. Amazing stories wait for you.

• Give yourself a break from that thing you’ve been relentlessly pursuing. Recalibrate your approach and be present.

Along the way, look for the lessons underneath the surface. You’ll be surprised by what you can see when you look hard enough.

Further Reading

I’m starting a new feature this week where I share the favorite things I’ve read online since last time.

The Outrageous Rise of Neotoddlerism - is the best objective observer of modern society I have encountered. This piece on recent protests in the UK and beyond is a must-read.

From Codependency to Companionship - is my favorite writer on self-improvement. This week’s piece on ‘opposites attract’ in the context of people carrying damage into relationships is excellent in many ways.

Built By Sobriety - answered my DMs on Instagram during the tough early days of giving up alcohol. She is a source of support and inspiration for many and has just started her Substack. Support!

What if I told you that a mosh pit at a punk concert is not just chaos; it’s a profound display of the human condition?

For the uninitiated, moshing is an aggressive style of dancing in which participants slam and push into each other in a cleared area near the stage. When I found myself staring one in the face last week, my first reaction was fear of getting hurt. My first instinct was to move away fast, but my curiosity won out, and I stayed to watch.

It turned out to be like a human centrifuge, spinning out the pure essence of our shared humanity.

Losing yourself in something has incredible healing power.

Most of those in the middle of the pit were in a state of total surrender to the music and the moment.

They were so carried away in the joy of their favorite music that they forgot all their physical and emotional pain. Rather than being held back by fear, they embraced it. They seemed totally oblivious to the physical pain involved, even during some mighty collisions. Beyond that, there was a sense of release in their faces. Everyday problems were far away and engulfed in the present; every sense turned up to full volume.

The best escapism involves fully letting go.

You don't need reason or payment to care about others.

There’s a unique role to be played around the edges of a mosh pit.

It’s like a protective bumper that contains the chaos. You help those in the middle avoid falling over and keep the flow moving. You also act as a barrier to protect those nearby who aren’t participating from taking an unexpected hit. Not all folks in this role volunteered for it, yet they did it anyway. It was an act of service to the crowd as a whole.

When a community needs its people for the greater good, those called to help will typically step up. Most people are inherently good.

Taking your issues out on others ruins it for everyone.

Every now and again, someone would step in with aggression as their primary intent.

Despite what mosh pits look like on the surface, violence wasn't the primary vibe, at least not in this one. Participants would check in with each other between songs, making sure the rough-and-tumble level was OK with everyone. The group would adjust levels when women came in, and, in one touching moment, space and consideration were made for a younger kid who wanted the experience.

When an aggressor entered, he would seek each individual out and shove excessively hard in a way designed to assert dominance. Very quickly, folks stood to the side, and the proud rooster was left to strut around on his own as “the winner.” With nobody left to ‘conquer’, he would go, and normal service would resume.

It’s clear that these folks were prioritizing taking out internal emotions they needed to vent on others. Maybe other mosh pits are more this style, but even giving the benefit of the doubt in that way, there was a selfish misjudgment of the collective energy.

Dealing with your issues externally first can be a colossal vibe-killer to those on the other end of them.

I’m glad I satisfied my curiosity and stayed to observe after the pit formed right in front of me. It was people-watching at its finest—the type that makes you feel so much better about humanity afterward.

As I sit here writing this, I am tinged with regret that I didn’t have the courage to go and experience it firsthand. Maybe next time.

For now, I’m happy to share what I felt and role-model the rewards of being willing to suspend my judgment.

How will you think differently the next time you’re in an unfamiliar situation that you assume is bad?

PS: If you want to experience this for yourself, Green Day has limited availability for the rest of its Saviors Tour across the US tour. 5/5 would recommend.

The race is already mostly run, my friends.

I will start by saying this is about projection, not preference. Kamala was my first choice from the Dem debates for 2020. She's an outstanding leader and legislator who would restore great credibility to the US internationally. A Black woman president (as foretold by Barbie) would be a hugely welcome step forward for the country in terms of equity. I encourage you to vote for her.

However, despite what the liberal news bubble would have me believe, I think she's going to lose. Here's why:

Trump is enjoying significant momentum

Trump is a con man, a serial sexual abuser, and a (now-convicted) felon. This isn't news to anyone and was certainly not a secret when he was elected in 2016 or narrowly lost in 2020. Those who previously voted for him (74 million/47% in 2020) didn't care sufficiently to let it sway their choice and will not start caring now. Biden's withdrawal from the race has been praised as smart, but it was necessary—those in the know should have made it happen much sooner. The televised debate was such a debacle for the Democrats that nobody remembers what Trump said there. The post-debate focus and subsequent step-down are a massive victory for Trump, and he will ride it all the way to the ballot boxes. Watch how he tries to avoid or reposition a Trump/Harris debate as much as possible because he knows how differently it will go. A bleeding Trump, pumping his fist at the crowd seconds after an attempted assassination, will be an iconic picture of our generation. We saw an admirable demonstration of courage, even for those who had never previously noted anything redeeming in his character. In the face of extreme adversity, this reaction will reverberate all the way to the voting lines with undecided voters. The Trump train is gathering speed and will be hard to stop.

Kamala is running uphill, and from behind

Historically, incumbent presidents have an advantage in elections. It remains to be seen how much of that will be passed on to VP Harris with the nomination, but it will be diluted to some extent. The harmful attachment elements with the current administration (particularly the perception of her role in failing to solve the crisis at the border) will be stickier. Kamala will face struggles with the more liberal elements of the left—undelivered election promises on student loans and climate. Billions of tax dollars were sent eastwards in support of wars that have very little support with this group. This group will never vote for Trump, but if they choose ambivalence, it could be critical. As a Senator from California, the epicenter of the 'radical liberal elite,' Kamala is vulnerable to Trump's fear-based positioning about her 'turning the whole country into California.' Those who study her current and historical policy stance will see that Kamala is typically right of center relative to the party overall. Alas, in the fast-news, post-truth world we inhabit, that will count for little.

Not an impossible position, but a hill to climb.

The GOP has a focused, single-minded election strategy

Trump's victory in 2016 was ushered in on the shoulders of a vast data-gathering exercise orchestrated by Stephen Bannon. Relentless testing of talking points, iteration of messaging, geographical targeting, and ruthless use of digital social media. Aimed not at 'what resonates' as the Dems do but 'how does this win us the White House.'The selection of JD Vance as VP serves one purpose only—winning Ohio. The GOP knows that this critical swing state could win them the presidency. Ohio is so important to them that they overlook Vance's previously harsh criticism of Trump, his lack of political experience, and even his strange relationship with his sofa for the powerful 'local candidate' draw on the ballot. Democratic-led policies are admirable and important. They center around supporting the country's minorities, who disproportionately suffer and who need and deserve our help. The GOP uses fear-based rhetoric to motivate 'forgotten America' to vote for them. This is a far more effective strategy for winning elections, especially in the battleground states. The Democrats play to win hearts and minds and to do the right thing, and the GOP plays to win power.

So this will be a bad outcome if you're a Kamala fan.

A few crumbs of comfort:

• The election is more than three months away. So much can change that might overturn some of these fundamental forces. Politics is never easily predictable.

• The early groundswell of funding and support for VP Harris should feel encouraging and will make for a more competitive race.

• VP Harris has more support in Black communities than Biden, which could pave the way for wins in swing states in the Sun Belt (AZ, NV, GA, NC).

Whatever your preference, please recognize this critical moment and vote in November. Despite the record turnout in 2020, over a third of all eligible voters did not cast a ballot.

We must do better than that for a country that, on both sides of the aisle, claims to prize freedom so highly.

For those convinced I am doom-mongering for engagement….it’s objectively tagged as the ‘most likely’ outcome…

My dear wife and I hosted a party for about 50 friends in our yard last month. Our guests had a great time; equally importantly, we did, too!

I wrote this recap where I look back through the process of distilling:

• Everything that happened

• Everything we learned (about great parties)

In the past, I would tuck these away on a Google Sheet, only to never look at them again. Instead, I now like to share publicly and write about them to stamp them into my brain.

Hopefully, by doing so, you can learn from them (while avoiding the mistakes I made in the past that allowed me to know them).

Planning

1. Manage your invitations centrally. We paid a small amount for Paperless Post, but Evite can do this for free. Life is much easier without remembering and tracking responses across families and invitation methods.

2. RSVPs are helpful for planning but are limited by human psychology. Most slow RSVPers will not come, so assume they won’t and don't spend much time and energy on nudging.

3. Be precise with your invitation language. We didn’t target our party at kids, but we were okay with folks bringing them, so we said it directly in the invitation. The invitation still generated a few questions/clarifications but generally set expectations well.

4. Underpromise and overdeliver. We promised ‘tacos and live music.’ This was enough to show we were serious about a party without putting too much pressure on ourselves. When we catered fresh, hand-made tacos and found a killer singer/guitarist to perform, it made a significant impact. If one or the other had fallen through, we still had space to deliver well on the invitation.

5. Ask your friends for help. As a family of four, we did not have enough furniture and facilities to host 50. Friends were generous and happy to help with tailgating supplies, coolers, camping chairs, and lawn games, which saved us from renting furniture.

Preparation

1. Allow yourself the full day to prepare. We considered squeezing in other activities with the kids during the afternoon before the party but didn’t. This allowed us lots of time and relieved a lot of pressure on the prep.

2. Create different spaces to accommodate various types of interaction. Some guests prefer a big group, while others prefer something smaller and intimate. Guests will also organically create their own spaces.

3. Make super clear bathroom signs. It stops so many interruptions and saves guests from feeling like they need to ask permission to go.

4. Label alcohol and non-alcohol coolers. There’s a hard version of everything these days, so it’s essential to keep drinks separate and clearly marked to avoid confusion. Especially with kids around.

5. Don’t make work for yourself during the party. Lay everything out in advance. Accept that things are out of your hands once the guests arrive so you can enjoy rather than fuss.

6. Doordash is your friend in a pinch. Our ice melted too hard in the afternoon, so we needed more and dashed some in from 7-Eleven. Delivery is also an option if food or drink runs out. Embrace the contingency plan, pull the lever, and take the cost hit if necessary. It’s not worth sacrificing your experience to fix it yourself.

Hosting

1. People don’t arrive on time for parties. Prepare for an awkward 10 minutes where it feels like nobody is coming. Trust that they will show.

2. You can't talk at length to everyone. Even if you allocate perfectly, 2.5 hours of party / 50 guests = 3 minutes per guest. Take time to enjoy your conversations, but be sure to connect guests with shared interests, too.

3. Catering was a godsend. Even cooking for ten people is stressful. Fifty would have been a nightmare and prevented us from enjoying the party. If you can’t spring for catering, choose something you can do entirely in advance.

4. Keep your eyes open for entries and exits. Guests will typically want to acknowledge hosts when they arrive and leave. Be aware of this so they don’t get stuck waiting for you to notice them.

5. Enjoy yourself! You are at the party too! The hosts of any event are highly influential in setting the tone. If you’re smiling, laughing, and having a great time, your guests will too. If you’re rushing around stressing, the vibe will go downhill fast.

Reflection

1. Do most (but not all) of the tidying on the night. Break down any significant pieces, clear perishables away, and get a big chunk of the cleaning done before heading to bed so you don’t wake up to a scene of carnage. Allow yourself some grace to get the house spotless the next day.

2. Group size impacts group dynamics. For a gathering of this 50, guests form into familiarity groups and mix far less organically than a group of 12 or less. Let it stay organic. Don’t try to force anything unnatural. If you want more of a ‘mixer’ vibe, invite fewer people.

3. Remind yourself to take photos. We did such a good job of enjoying ourselves that we took no pictures. These would have been great for memories and to share with guests afterward—a sad omission.

4. Draw on your partner’s strengths to create a shared success. Our party would have been less successful without my ambition for scale and my partner’s attention to detail—killer combo.

5. Congratulate yourselves! A project like this isn’t a minor undertaking. If you pulled it off, take some time for a high five and enjoy the successful evening you created.

And that’s it. We had a great time putting our party on and committed ourselves to doing another one next year. In addition to the fun of the project and then the party, it was a great incentive to spring-clean our house and reminded us to appreciate all the work that goes into making a great party the next time we are guests at one.

What’s your favorite party-planning hack that I missed? Let me know; I’d love to hear it for my next party!

When my family and I moved to the US from the UK, I didn’t approach the switch with any apprehension or anticipation of culture shock. We speak the same language; we can see what American life is like in all the Hollywood movies, and, in my case, I was even going to be working for the same company. So, no big deal, right?

Wrong. Fairly quickly, I realized significant cultural differences in play that I did not know about. As a heterosexual white cis-gender, able-bodied man, I had been part of pretty much every ‘majority group’ going for my life to date. Removing just one of those many privileges was incredibly jarring.

I stumbled through conversations, struggled to make friends, and settled down. At the same time, this vast country around me continued about its business, chewing up my preconceptions and spitting them out at every turn. I had to learn the hard way - hopefully, you now don’t have to.

Additionally, there had been some confusion in my international move, as no social security number had been secured for me, thus inadvertently creating an ‘undocumented’ experience for my first month here. That bewildering experience for that short period opened my eyes to the very different immigrant experiences that folks are living and struggling through for a shot at the American Dream.

Of particular note is being laughed out of a car dealership when trying to buy a car and being refused cable and internet service by Verizon—even when I offered to pay the entirety of my 2-year contract in full upfront.

One element of being an immigrant that I didn’t expect was the weird position that is thrust upon you as a de facto ambassador of your adopted country to all your friends and family back home. Particularly as one of the most privileged types of immigrants — one who had the choice to move rather than having to flee in fear or mortal danger — that choice is often indirectly called into question by folks back in the UK.

A year into our stay here, back in 2016, we reflected on the differences we’d observed around us and within ourselves during those first 12 months. The two that stuck with me, ingrained in the culture to the point that may make it hard to observe from within, are the determined bias towards optimism and confidence. My family’s tendency for awkward bashfulness around ambition transformed into you *can* do this, this *is* possible, never stop dreaming, or, to take Amanda Gorman slightly out of context:

“So, while once we asked, how could we possibly prevail over catastrophe, now we assert, how could catastrophe possibly prevail over us?”

Observing and noting this is one thing; seeing it personify and grow in your young children is another level of magic.

That magic has continued to develop over the years. Still, against a backdrop of increasingly torrid times, political disunity, a shambolic response to a global pandemic, and culminating in the peak of the “uncivil war” of January 6th, 2021, that ambassadorial role became increasingly difficult. America’s priorities around its positioning and reputation on the world stage hugely decreased with its focus on  “America First” actions. While the media abroad mainly placed the blame for that at the feet of President Trump, it was not lost on the people of the world that the rightly-touted democratic processes made President Trump, whether 51% of the voters liked it or not, the nation’s President and duly elected spokesperson. This also rolled down the hill to me as an unofficial and increasingly unwilling ambassador. The confidence and optimism that I relied on and pointed to in America as an ally of many and protector of world peace eroded around me — slowly at first but with such rapid acceleration through the events of 2020 that the connection to those virtues was left hanging by threads both personally and in the nation around me.

My experience of the Inauguration in terms of international attention — a brief burst of interest on the global scene, most don’t understand what’s happening as those involved play it out amongst the glitz and “Oh look, Lady Gaga, is singing the anthem, what a cool dress.” I had never really paid much attention to the previous inaugurations. The 2021 one, however, will stay with me forever. A nation didn’t just begin to heal; it found itself again. The optimism, confidence, hope, celebration of diversity, and pursuit of unity were faintly stitched back together; they roared off the television screen through every part of the ceremony and celebration. None of this will bring back so many dead from COVID, and the wedges of division that have been further hammered in through the last two presidential terms will take longer than ever to remove, but now the path is forward.

It’s hard not to feel ill-equipped when searching for words to do justice to Amanda Gorman’s poem (now banned in some Florida schools). As I sat, every bit as transfixed as the great Presidents of the past sitting just behind her were, Amanda encapsulated in 6 minutes for so many what it means to be American; she pulled together the soul of a nation.

As for this unwitting ambassador, I aimed to approach the future with all the optimism and confidence I can muster, aspiring to Amanda’s call to action and genuinely proud to be able to play whatever part I can in this country’s united journey forward from there.

As I have continued my immigrant life, it has become even more apparent to me that I have carried many privileges into the process of transitioning from immigrant to citizen compared to many others on the same journey.

While there are indeed unique hurdles and challenges that British immigrants will face, they begin to look small and comfortable compared to those faced by hardworking people from other countries who have to spend years—sometimes decades—contributing to the country’s economy while living in fear of making a single wrong step that could see them arrested and deported.

Throughout my naturalization and citizenship process, I consistently observed different experiences because of my ethnicity: the way I’m able to show up, the way I'm treated and spoken to, and the feeling of how much is at stake. For reference, my green card was processed end-to-end in nine months; my citizenship process was four months. These timescales are hugely atypical, and I’m afraid I have to disagree with any argument that my British origins were coincidental.

Sitting in the waiting room for my citizenship civics test, I noticed a massive tension - families who had fought for so long to get to that stage had everything on the line to ensure they could stay together. I’m grateful that all of the stories I saw that day seemed to end with huge embraces and a joyous exit, but I’m sure many deserving would-be citizens were not lucky enough to make it that far.

One story, in particular, will always stick with me - described in heart-wrenching detail by Diane Guerrero in her memoir ‘In The Country We Love: My Family Divided.’ An American citizen, Diane returned home from school at 14 to the horror of an empty apartment. Both of her parents - who had worked hard and been model members of society for over a decade - had been arrested and would soon be deported back to their native Colombia. As you wrestle with the administrative inconveniences of your experience, I highly recommend you read Diane’s story to contextualize your troubles.

When I was sworn in as an American citizen a few weeks later, I was similarly surprised at the start of my journey. Without a requirement to surrender my British citizenship, I expected the transition to feel primarily administrative—securing my family’s lifelong right to live and work in the United States.

It felt like so much more. As I stood and pledged allegiance for the first time, I committed to continuing the story of a great nation built by immigrants. At that moment, I was determined to use my new status and experiences to effect change in an immigration system where the dice are loaded against many who deserve a far better deal.

I plan to use any channels available to me to campaign for common-sense immigration reform that offers paths to citizenship and freedom from fear for those who have earned or are earning their way toward it through hard work and contributions to society.

This is the contribution that I wish to make to defining my American Dream.

Life is going to thrust big decisions on you without serving notice.

Not the kind you can defer or delay. In your face, pick now, gun to your head style. You know the choice is a big deal and will have immediate impacts. Here’s the kicker - you will never know if you got it right because you didn’t do the other thing. Scary, right?

Here’s how to approach these decisions and minimize pointless regrets afterward.

Life’s a beach, and then you get a job

The one where I turned down a free year on the beach.

I wasn’t a great student at university. I threw myself into a broad social life centered around a bar, where I became the manager. Two of my closest friends were my assistants, and we had a great time running it together.

We were completing our final year when one of the guys, through his dad, shared an opportunity to spend a year running a bar on the beach in Barbados.

A dream come true, surely? We could live out the movie Cocktail (hopefully minus the death). We would hang out in the mornings, chat, and serve drinks to partying holidaymakers for the rest of the day. Somewhere to stay for free with a disposable incomine in paradise is an appealing proposition.

Yet these were the days of the corporate “milk rounds” when graduates had their choice of big companies fighting over them. I had significant student loan debt and a burning desire to repay it.

It was classic heart vs. head. Ultimately, my head won, and I joined a corporate graduate scheme at the end of the summer. I couldn’t spin my conscience through another year of debt and was keen to join the ‘real world’ I’d been training for. The decision seemed straightforward at the time.

Looking back, I was driven by subconscious guilt at goofing off into bar work rather than studying and failing to fulfill my academic potential. I didn’t want to continue that narrative.

I still think it was the right choice, so what’s the lesson here? It’s the power of regret.

Of all the choices I’ve made in life, I still ponder this one the most. I took the safe, easy, and least risky path. It worked out well. So, I should be happy with it. But:

• Who would I have met in Barbados?

• How would it have shaped me?

• Would I have set up a home and still been there?

Most regrets in life burn far harder when you have chosen a safe path that involves turning away from an exciting one. Run towards the unique and scary things that set your heart fluttering - usually, the safe path will still be there if it goes wrong.

Any dream will do

The one where an unplanned audition for a reality TV show landed me on stage with the love of my life.

2007. I have a day of meetings planned for an insurance company client. The night before, I traveled to London to have dinner and stay with the bar friends from the story above.

Just as we’re wrapping up the evening and heading to bed, I get a text from the client. An internal issue has arisen, and they cancel our meetings. Doh. Always seeking the bright side, I look for plans on a free day in town before my train home tomorrow.

Even in the olden days, Google knew my penchant for karaoke well enough to suggest open auditions for a Reality TV show. Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber was seeking to cast a lead for a new production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Thanks to my mum, I had been heavily exposed to this musical. So - even though this show was open to professionals - I closed my eyes, drew back the curtain, and made plans to attend in the morning.

I filled in my forms; an interviewer dug (in vain) for a dramatic backstory. We lined up in groups of five. One guy in a time at a time to sing for the panel, then back to hear our yes/no results as a group.

After my group had sung, they broke protocol and called me back alone.

“We wanted to let you know that although we’re not putting you through, you sang really well and we’re sure you’re a credit to your local theatre group.”

I shared that I was not a member and had never been near one. After the theatrical gasps from ALW’s peeps, I was encouraged to seek one immediately upon my return to Nottingham.

As luck would have it, one group was having auditions for a show that weekend—the same auditions where, 17 years ago, I met my beloved wife.

Think of all of the tiny decisions that had to line up:

• My uni friends' availability and draw convinced me to travel in advance.

• An insurance company leader denied entry to consultants in a crisis.

• I summoned the enthusiasm to go and sing in a contest I was never good enough to win.

• A judge decided to interrupt the conveyor for an act of kindness.

• I acted on their generous encouragement to try out for a local group.

And that, kids, is how I met your mother.

It’s easier to analyze and run the pros and cons when you know you have a significant decision on your hands. Yet, what about your many small and often unconscious daily choices? The ones that never hit the radar of importance.

Many small choices drastically altered your path in ways you will never realize. So, don’t sweat the choices too much, however big they seem. Fate gives you many opportunities to mess it up.

Threading the space needle

The one where I said the right thing in the right place at the right time.

A casual comment on top of the Space Needle in Seattle in 2014 led me to decide with my family whether or not to uproot and move to the United States.

My partner and I wanted to share more of the world with our children, allowing them to be global citizens. Unbeknown to me, I shared this dream with the right person to make it come true.

Within a week of that conversation, a surprise resignation arrived Stateside. Several phone calls later, we stared down the barrel of a monumental choice.

Even though I’d learned not to worry too much about each choice, Barbados weighed heavily on my mind as I advocated for the move. I couldn’t stomach another dose of the same regret in the face of such an exciting opportunity.

The UK would always be there if I needed to return, despite their best attempts to float away from Europe with Brexit and become a different country in my absence.

This decision was a shared one with impacts beyond ourselves, creating more layers of complexity. In the end, I don’t remember us hesitating that much. My partner and I had grown accustomed to taking risks and dealing with tricky situations when, five years prior, we had returned from a 4-month trip around the world, spending all our savings and returning ‘with child.’ Other things feel a little easier once you’ve battled through that (during a global housing crisis).

Even when presented with the ‘administrative hurdle’ of getting married to secure a visa, we largely shrugged it off. Our conviction led us to pursue this opportunity, which checked many boxes.

Our underestimation of the cultural differences between the UK and the US is a story for another time (or available in book form on Amazon). Still, we launched into the journey with excitement. Nine years later, it’s been one of the best family choices ever made.

The story's moral is never to be afraid to share your dreams—you never know when the person hearing them might be the one to make them come true.

When an opportunity to seize your dreams presents itself - it may not be fully in the shape you’d imagined or feel like the perfect time. Nevertheless, you should grab it with both hands anyway.

Fork in the road

It’s timely for me to recount these stories as I stand on the precipice of new choices from a career perspective. I have become tired of the corporate Game of Thrones and, as such, decided to step out of it for a while to reconsider how I want to earn my living.

Others have admired my courage to step into the unknown. Beyond courage, the combined experiences above have equipped me with the will and belief to pursue a work-life more aligned with my values and strengths. Even though I don’t know what form that takes yet, I am unwavering in my confidence that I’m doing the right thing for the right reasons. As such, I look forward to the journey excitedly and not bewildered with fear and doubt.

For those of you out there standing at forks of your own, remember:

• Run towards the unique and scary things that set your heart fluttering - usually, the safe path will still be there if it goes wrong

• Many small choices drastically altered your path in ways you will never realize. So, don’t sweat the choices too much, however big they seem.

• When an opportunity to seize your dreams presents itself - it may not be fully in the shape you’d imagined or feel like the perfect time - grab it with both hands anyway.

Trust yourself to choose well, push forward to the next fork, and don’t waste time on what might have been.

Further Reading (watching)

For anyone as fascinated as I am with fate, destiny, and the consequences of choices:

• The classic 1999 movie Sliding Doors tells the story of a London woman whose love life and career hinge, unknown to her, on whether or not she catches a train. We see it both ways, in parallel.

• Dark Matter is a mind-bending thriller about choices, paths not taken, and how far we’ll go to claim the lives we dream of. Available on Apple TV (and in paperback format for the traditionalists.)

Iceland opened my eyes to a better way of life.

The scenery and attractions that draw millions annually fully deliver on their promise. But between all the monumental mountains that pierce the sky, the people and culture left the strongest impression. The country buzzed with community, health, and enjoying the present.

Instead of a stuffed puffin or volcanic face cream, I brought home ideology as a souvenir. Here’s why.

Delicious and healthy food

Iceland’s food is the best. Simple, tasty, and wholesome.

On my first night, I went the traditional tourist route, having a tasting menu at a fancy restaurant. All the delicious boxes were checked—Arctic char, whale, and even puffin (very gamey, if you were wondering).

The food tour the next day went one step better. Our local guide, Karitas, talked us through the traditions and methods of fish stew, braised lamb, fermented shark, and rye bread ice cream. Karitas was a true pleasure and gave a far better sense of Icelandic identity than any guidebook ever could. Local-guided tours in small groups have become a firm fixture for me anywhere I visit.

The formula for food success:

• Prize the protein. Meat was often the centerpiece; its quality is assured by the beautiful way they treat their animals—space to roam, the best food, and raised with such love and care.

• Use carbs sparingly. Potatoes were present but in very light portions. Too much time in America has made me forget the appropriate side dish size.

• Whole foods only. Highly processed food isn’t a thing in Iceland. The one Subway store I saw stuck out like a sore thumb. There’s something to be said about limiting unnecessary chemicals in the body.

I will do my best to adopt as many of these traditions as possible because, despite the tempting deliciousness, none of the thousands of Icelanders I saw on the trip appeared overweight.

Let me know if you’ve got a good supplier of Arctic char.

A deep sense of community

My favorite story from the many Karitas shared with us was the ritual rounding of the sheep.

Icelandic animals are free-range in the truest sense of the word. Other than being protected from cars, they can go whenever they like. So, when summer ends, they all have to be collected.

Everyone pitches in. Anyone who can ride a horse or has pens gathers all the animals, which are then redistributed to their owners via the electronic tags they wear. The process continues until completed. Everyone stays until then. No, ‘I’ve got mine, so I’m done.’ No stealing of sheep. True community.

I heard a similar story from a fellow tourist about the north of the country. When a fishing boat comes in, the whole village goes down to the docks and processes the fish until it’s finished. It might take 24 hours, it might take 36. We work as a team until it’s done, then we rest. Together.

It is embarrassing to compare this to internet forums complaining about helicopter noise and ‘suspicious activity’ and the self-aggrandizing celebration of packing lunches for people in need for 45 minutes that happens where I live.

I need to find a way to connect more meaningfully with the community.

Commitment to the country

Tourism has overtaken fishing as the number one industry in Iceland, and most visitors come in the summer.

Karitas embodied the national approach, working every day through summer to contribute to creating a great tourist experience. This approach is reminiscent of my trip to Jamaica earlier in the year—a mixture of pride at the delights on offer and commitment to sharing the best of them with tourists.

Such generosity has reached limits in other places. I recently read about Alaska and Barcelona seeking to introduce measures to limit tourism. I suspect this has far more to do with tourists' selfish approach than a rising unwillingness to share local treasures.

Back in Iceland, the significant variations in daylight hours across the year concentrate this to peak tourist season and offer balance in the months of long nights in the winter. I imagine it makes it easier to work through the invasion, knowing that quieter periods are always on the horizon.

Icelanders also seem well-traveled, balancing pride in their country with an appreciation for experiencing and knowing the best parts about other places.

I’ll think twice next time my lunch plans are inconvenienced by the flocks of school buses that regularly descend on Washington, DC.

Balanced attitudes to government

I visited Þingvellir, the original site of Icelandic parliament meetings.

Saying Þingvellir is outdoors doesn’t do it justice. It sits on the continental divide, perched on the edge of a tectonic plate above the sprawl of a beautiful glacial plane that spreads as far as the eye can see into the distance. This is a deliberate move designed to remind elected officials of their decisions’ national and global ramifications. The parliament now has a building in Reykjavik, but the approach is still being honored.

Bringing this perspective to running a country seems such an obvious step, yet it’s sorely lacking in much of the rest of the world. Most politicians elsewhere are primarily concerned with getting re-elected and lining their pockets.

Iceland was the first country in the world to elect a female president. Vigdís Finnbogadóttir led the country from 1980 to 1996. She was elected for her demonstrated leadership brilliance in theater and tourism and had a spectacularly successful spell as the country’s leader, including encouraging peace and climate awareness well beyond her country's borders.

Finnbogadóttir’s gender, divorce, and status as a single parent were not factors. Iceland enjoyed unity, progress, and impact by focusing on what is truly important—the best qualities of outstanding leadership.

We are disastrously far removed from that approach in the US.

Living with people in the present

Every town in Iceland has public baths.

To the US-based outsider, this seems a little strange. I don’t even enjoy the prospect of sitting in my own dirty water, never mind sharing everybody else’s. Then you realize it’s not about getting clean.

For the hygiene freaks among you, be assured that you are expected to shower before entering the baths. Once you’re in, you realize it’s far more about quiet reflection and being in the moment. There are no big screens, and phones are discouraged (although some tourists still wander around with them in plastic bags).

Deliberately taking a moment to let your mind be ‘bored’ is a powerful state of being. Our modern aversion to boredom, fueled by omnipresent dopamine addiction, is a significant barrier to mental health. Our minds need time and space to process and to be at peace. Icelandic baths provide this opportunity. The much-extolled benefits to the skin from the volcanic waters are secondary.

I learned a lesson from a local lady in the cold pool. Anxious for the impending sensation, I quickly sunk myself straight under the water. She knowingly looked over and said:

“Those who get in fast, get out fast.”

Sure enough, five seconds later, I was running back to the comfort of the geothermal waters. With her advice in mind, I approached again 30 minutes later. I slowly submerged, remembering what I’d heard about focusing on breath during cold exposure: Breathe in 4 seconds, hold 4 seconds, breathe out 4 seconds, hold 4 seconds.

The breath work forces you to stay in the present, allowing you to acknowledge the sensation of the cold water without reacting to it. To my delight, I could stay there for a solid couple of minutes - long enough to get a humorous close-up view of other tourists making the same mistake I had made.

My cold shower rituals are now a walk in the park from now on.

Thus ends my love letter to Iceland. A land of beauty, majesty, and the awe-inspiring power of nature where, as with most things, the true beauty lies below the surface.

If you can’t get there yourself, please enjoy my souvenirs and import a little slice of Iceland into your life. Realize that a global perspective isn’t zero-sum, care for your body, and remember to breathe.

Your Future Of Being Forgotten

You are not as important as you think you are.

I recently left a work team I’d been an integral part of for over five years. It took three days to complete the full handover and become surplus to ongoing requirements. Despite being excited to move on, the shocking speed of the transition still jolted me. Was all the personal meaning I constructed around the work a mirage? Yes, most likely.

Life goes on, with or without you, especially at work.

Even in a loving family context, people heal and move on. Should tragedy strike and you move on from this life, the relentlessly healing passages of time will scatter your memory like ashes in the wind. People will be sad for a while, you’d hope. Those close to you would think of you often at first. Then less so. Later, only on the anniversary of your passing. Then, in a generation or so, never again. It’s not personal - even those with the most significant impacts on humanity are typically gone from the world’s minds in three generations.

Remembering how close you are to being forgotten is a powerful tonic for making the most of your time.

You can stop worrying about:

• That awkward conversation at a party last week.

• The time you threw up in public last year.

• Those texts that you sent to the wrong person.

• The time you peed your pants in school.

Nobody remembers! Let yourself move on! Tying yourself down with the chains of the past is a big waste of time. Take control of your destiny.

Your Current Insignificance

You are an irrelevant cosmic dust speck floating through space and time with more other specks than you could ever fathom. Whenever I look up at the sky on a clear night and see the stars, I remember what each represents, which blows my mind.

Allow me to put your existence in context:

• The observable Universe is about 93 billion light-years in diameter and contains at least 100 billion galaxies, each with billions of stars. Our Milky Way galaxy alone has over 100 billion stars, and our Sun is just one of them.

• The average human lifespan is around 70-80 years, a blink of an eye in cosmic terms. The Universe is approximately 13.8 billion years old. You’ll be alive for a minuscule and fleeting portion of time.

• There are over 7.8 billion people on Earth, so even considering only our planet in the present moment, the actions of any single individual will not significantly alter the course of humanity.

Yet still, you walk around with your main character vibes, thinking that the Sun is spinning around you. You ponder every move, worried about its ramifications on others and the ripples it will send through the Universe.

Set yourself free! It’s not just beyond your lifetime that others have limited headspace for you - it’s already true. So many of us are so consumed with ourselves that even in the present - yes, right now - it’s highly likely that nobody is thinking about you at all.

Don’t spend your life caught up in what others might be thinking. Here are some things that will instantly get easier for you.

• Decision-Making: Making choices based on your values and desires becomes more accessible as the potential opinions or expectations of others do not sway you.

• Pursuing Passions: Engaging in hobbies, interests, or careers that genuinely excite you becomes more accessible as you are less concerned about external validation or criticism.

• Taking Risks: Embracing new opportunities, experimenting, and taking calculated risks becomes less intimidating when you're not preoccupied with others' potential reactions.

• Personal Growth: Focusing on self-improvement and learning from mistakes becomes more straightforward as you are more willing to embrace failure as a natural part of growth without fear of judgment.

• Social Interactions: Meeting new people and forming connections becomes more comfortable, as you are less worried about making a perfect impression.

The most important prize is authentic self-expression. You will have more genuine interactions and relationships when you can express your true thoughts, feelings, and personality without fear of judgment.

These are the significant upsides to a continuing series of small decisions to embrace the discomfort of charting your chosen path.

Reconnecting With Your Importance

So, what is the point of it all? What can you do from under that pile of evidence diminishing your significance? The answer lies in seizing control and mastery over your impact on the Universe.

We will dip a very brief and shallow toe into relativity here. Using Einstiens’ famous equation, if we accept that the speed of light [c] is a constant, then it follows that energy [E] and mass [m] are interchangeable.

Usually, you consider your body to be mass—a lump of flesh making its way around the world. If we consider ourselves energy, we can transcend the typical physical boundaries we see and consider how we can alter the energy around us, not just with our bodies but with our thoughts. After all, brain chemicals are made up of atoms, like everything else.

It’s a commonly held and noncontroversial belief that negative thought patterns can negatively impact our physical bodies. At times of great stress or anxiety, you get headaches, and your GI systems noisily protest. The same is true in reverse—the energy generated from positive beliefs can positively affect your outcomes. We can observe this in our bodies and the events we experience around us. In other words, you make your own luck.

By viewing yourself as energy rather than mass, you can think differently about how you impact all of the energy around you, in human form or otherwise. If you channel it with intentionality, this can give you an incredible sense of influence and control over your destiny. Way beyond your own body, you have the power to send waves of impact through all of existence, including the dimensions of space and time.

Perhaps you’re not so insignificant after all. With that knowledge, what energy are you putting out in the Universe today?

This is Naval Ravikant. He teaches people how to become wealthy, happy and fulfilled. The routes Naval recommends are the opposite of the way many of us live our lives. I wish I had come across his writing sooner.

Here are 3 takeaways from his excellent book and how I plan to apply them:

Life Is A Single-Player Game

The key tactic here is avoiding zero-sum competition for status. We attach so much importance to ‘winning’, to beating others, but for what ultimate purpose?

The most sobering tool for gaining the required perspective here is remembering that, inevitably, you are going to die. Whether that’s today, next month, or a long time in the future you will meet your end. After which, what will really be important? Even those with the most spectacular lives are forgotten in 3 generations.

Just as the world didn’t know of you before your existence, it will not know of you afterward. Your life is but the fleeting light of a firefly one summer night amidst the millennia of the universe. So then, why choose to spend your time point-scoring?

I have serious work to do on zero sum status games. In particular, the burning need I seem to have to always be ‘proving myself’ to someone. I see this now as particularly futile, as it’s often an imagined authority and an entirely subjective scale I’m operating within. I hope, going forward, that I can settle on pursuits more aligned to my own purpose, whenever I work out what that is.

I do, at least, use social media a lot less than before. The dopamine rush of the likes and engagement, the never-ending availability of cute dogs and trick shots. It’s easy to see how folks get sucked into serving the algorithm and it’s worthless status game - some of the best minds on the planet are heavily incentivized to make you want to.

Every Desire Is A Chosen Unhappiness

Naval says that desire is making a contract with yourself to be unhappy until you get the thing you’ve identified that you want. It’s like putting on a tight pair of shoes so you can feel relief when you take them off.

Two phrases Naval suggests to eliminate for a better life:

• I’ll be happy when…

No, you won’t. We spend our lives focusing on the next thing we want. The new car, the promotion, the new house, the vacation, the weekend. All under the illusion that it’s going to propel us past the final hurdle between us and perfect bliss.

Instead, when we get there we switch our attention to the next level up, the next rung on whatever ladder we’ve created for ourselves to climb. Thus we live all of our life in anticipation of some happy future. Only at the end do we realize that we have created a life that is no more than a prelude to our death.

• Should.

The word should. It’s always connected to either guilt or social programming, neither of which should be driving your actions. If you listen closely enough, ‘should’ carries the feeling that you’re doing something that you don’t want to do. Well, don’t do it then!

On chasing the next ‘thing’, I’ve just about been able to beat it on material items. Our family instigated a ‘lifestyle lock’ about 8 years ago which has prevented expenses spiraling alongside income growth. That has provided a really solid foundation for preventing excessive thirst for material possessions and likely saved us from a monster mortgage - all of which buys us flexibility if and when we change course with careers or geography. We will be holding double hard onto this now, recognizing that true happiness turns out to be a state of not desiring anything at all.

I’ve been a big victim of ‘should’ in my life. I’ve always been a big follower of rules and paths and somewhat of a slave to society’s expectations. Once, I even got engaged because all of our friends kept telling us we should, only to discover afterwards that neither of us really wanted to be. Fortunately, we were able to navigate it to an amicable end.

I entered my career with the advice of ‘continue to do exactly what you’re asked until told otherwise’. Clearly I took it to heart as, thus far, I’ve designed a career around whatever was needed by the company I was working for. A cork, bobbing around in the corporate ocean. This has worked out well for me on many of society’s measures - but I owe some serious thought to what I *want* to do rather than what I *should* do.

The Three Pillars Of Fulfillment

• When you’re young you have time. You have health, but you have no money.

• When you’re middle-aged you have money and you have health, but you have no time.

• When you’re old, you have money and time, but you have no health.

So, the goal should be to achieve a state where you have all three. There are a few different ways to do this.

For the young, it’s accruing a large amount of money. There are two problems with this:

• To sustain you through the rest of your life you need a much bigger pile of money than the old person, assuming standard life expectancy.

• If you are successful enough in this era then you fall into the trap described above. Once you have $1M, you want $2M…then $5M…and so on. Always a next level to chase in pursuit of status, taking your time away.

For the old, it’s finding a way to hang onto your health as long as possible. Also two problems with this:

• Health in old age isn’t a short-term project that you can pick up when your retire. You need to have established and invested in it right through the most busy (middle) part of your life.

• Even with focused and sustained effort, deterioration will work against you as you get older. The probabilities get us all in the end.

So, the best chances of completing the trifecta fall to folks (like me) in the middle part of their lives. Of course, despite having ‘being old enough to know better’ working in our favor, most of us remain victims of the status pursuit. We often do so at the expense of our health, exacerbated by our already-decreasing powers of strength and recovery.

Two things I aim to do here to maximize my chances of fulfillment:

• Wrestle myself free of the status games and work on my happiness skills, realizing that some of things I have pursued in my life to date will not be the answers I’m looking for.

• Double-down commitment to health knowing that even if I fail in the first point, that I’ll have the best possible chance of maintaining the trifecta into old age, if I get there.

I visited my parents in Scotland a couple of weeks ago. My dad hasn’t left the house much in the 5 years since I’ve last been there, which I always imagined to be a tough way to exist. I asked him about it. He said to me that he was living the retirement he always wanted. He gets up early, goes to the garden, watches the birds, reads his books, watches TV then goes to bed.

I struggled to reconcile this with my own version of happiness. However, between Naval’s definition of happiness being the lack of desire for anything, maybe he’s one who has it right.

Applying someone else’s world view to your own unchecked assumptions is a powerful way to look at your life. Have you looked up from the status games recently to examine how your 3 pillars are looking? There could be an exciting new path waiting for you.

For decades, parents pour most of their conscious energy into setting their children up for success. You guide them through the game of life, teaching your kids rules and instilling good values. However, many of the choices that shape their lives and determine their outcomes will happen beyond the reaches of your influence.

Across the decades though, could one or two things you say or do still end up drastically altering their path?

A Brief Summary Of Parenting (Graeme’s Version)

The early years are a game of 'keep it alive’. Pure survival and helping your child understand how to gradually take over those duties. Eat food (not polystyrene). Drink water (not dirty bathwater). Sleep settles the mind. Poo goes in the toilet. Don’t throw yourself down stairs. Sharp things hurt and are dangerous.

Then school begins. They begin to exist and stay alive without you hovering at their back. Have fun! But be good. Follow the rules. Be kind to others. You want academic success for them, but balance avoiding applying the pressure of expectation. They’re still so young, after all.

Nothing leans on the fast-forward button of life more than having kids so before you know it, you’ve got a teenager on your hands. You can now apply all the pressure you like about school because they will say they don’t care what you think anyway (even if they do). Their identity is forming and they need you more than ever as they navigate that through the emotional maelstrom of puberty, yet they actively push you away because you’re not cool any more. They swing from outrageous rudeness to deeply vulnerable sensitivity at the drop of a hat and you need to have the appropriate safety net ready for both.

The tides of independence lap ever more strongly on their shores. Soon it will be high school. Then driving. Then *poof*. Missing them for a day at school will turn into missing them for a semester at college.

It’s clear to see that your influence on the paths your children take diminishes throughout this journey. At the same time, the impacts of the choices they make become more critical and longer-lasting. After all, if careers were decided while you were still enjoying splashing around them in the bath, the world would be full of astronauts, truck drivers and ballerinas.

This is a scary thing to be confronted with. It plays into a viral stat doing the rounds this year:

By the time your child is twelve, you’ve spent 75% of the time with them that you’ll ever spend. By the time they’re eighteen, 90% of your time is done.

I’ve spent a while going back and forth on this with my friend, Josh. It forces us to confront a sobering reality but have both wondered (especially me with both my kids older than 12) if it’s an exaggeration for effect. We’ve both pondered what a mathematical proof might look like (especially Josh as a former mathlete). If either of us gets around to firing up Google Sheets and taking it on in the name of veracity, I’ll be sure to share it.

All of that said, how much better would I feel if I found out I’m only a paltry 65% done with my time with my 12-year-old? Other factors on the shelf for discussion:

• If we accept the purpose of the time is ‘making a difference’ rather than ‘absolute hours’ then do we need an influence coefficient as the kids get older?

• (Trigger: morbidity). Do we need to borrow actuarial models of life expectancy to factor in our likely dates of death? What if I ride a lot of helicopters or juggle knives? (I don’t, btw.)

• If bath-time wishes of a career as a pilot are becoming sticky, does we need a ‘geographical proximity coefficient? (After all, yours truly disappeared to a different continent somewhat out of the blue 9 years ago.)

In me, at least, the search for precision and my questioning of the model belies a desire to escape the uncomfortable inevitably of the message. The sands of time and influence are always running out, no matter how you frame your coefficients and assumptions.

Terrifying Lessons From Euphoria

During COVID, I happened upon a series on HBO that rocked my perspectives on parenting.

Euphoria, winner of 9 Emmy awards, follows a group of high school students as they navigate love and friendships in a world of drugs, sex, trauma and social media.

Now, it’s been a long time since I’ve been in high school so I didn’t think I’d be target market but I gave it a try. The show begins sharply, thrusting you into Zendaya’s frankly stunning portrayal of addiction as Rue Bennett and the increasingly desperate steps her mother is taking to save her from it. There are some pretty messed up parents on this show, but Rue’s mom is not one of them. Dedicated, loving, willing to sacrifice anything for Rue.

The show centers around the high schoolers, throwing their lives and bodies around with careless abandon. However, the story of each character is set in motion and originated in some way by their parents.

So how did Rue, the main protagonist, end up like this? As a young teen, she sat and watched as cancer slowly took her father. Desperate to cope with her pain and grief as he suffered, she dipped into her dad’s oxycodone and the path was irrecoverably set. No bad dogs, a horrible tragedy, one bottle of pills left unattended by a nurse and thus began an experience that no parent would want for their child.

Least of all Rue’s mom, for whom there had been no realistic chance of stopping this. All the organic baby food, tummy time, positive reinforcement, manners, academic support and love - washed away in one moment.

Without giving away too many spoilers, consider this. Your dad has a secret gay NSFW self-filmed movie collection which he keeps very well protected from you. Mom suspects this is a thing but would rather not know so turns a blind eye. Dad denies his true self to protect the home and family he built to support you. You use your near-adult computer skills to hack and sneak your way into finding and watching it. Whose fault is it that you subsequently become a sexually aggressive psycho?

Each episode in Series 1 covers a different character and the influence of their parents. Some of them are wantonly selfish and careless, for sure, but in most cases they are thoroughly well-intended recognizable archetypes of many parents you probably know, who have suffered some combination of the unfortunate events that life throws at people without their choosing.

Two uncomfortable truths for me:

• Even if you get it all right, life will expose them to circumstances and people who make it very easy for them to make bad choices, or be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Life is unfair sometimes and you can’t do anything about that. You can’t protect them from everything.

• You can do your best as a parent, but one wrong move under intense pressure from life’s rollercoaster can trigger a spiral of events that has devastating impacts on your kids.

You must always give it everything and stack the deck in their favor and prepare them to make the best choices at all times. It might make all the difference, even if you never know that it did.

I do my best as a parent but can see that I regularly get it wrong. So scary. Load up HBO and watch Euphoria if you dare.

A World Full Of Cheap Dopamine Addiction Traps

Let’s return to the happy path and assume that you keep your child free of opioids and abusive relationships. The dangers of the online world feature heavily in Euphoria too.

Say you’re able to have great relationships with them and pass on all of your hard-won wisdom of how to be a successful kid. There’s nothing better than saving your child from a mistake or a situation which tortured your existence when you were younger. However, the world is changing at such a rapid rate these days. Dating apps were never a mainstream thing until I was married. Social media and even mobile phones were not something I had to contend with until adulthood.

So how can you watch out for your offspring when they are navigating waters that you never had to sail in?

1. Learn The Ropes

You might never fully understand an experience you’re not immersed in but getting a better understanding of it can position you so much better to help. How can you decide whether to let them download Discord if you don’t know what’s on there any how people use it?

Learning the basics of the platforms your child uses. This could involve reading articles, watching tutorials, or even creating accounts on these platforms yourself. Understanding how these platforms work, what kind of interactions they facilitate, and what their privacy settings are can help you better comprehend the digital environment your child is navigating.

2. Open Dialogue

Maintain an open line of communication with your child about their online activities. Ask them to show you their favorite apps and how they use them. This not only helps you understand the technology but also encourages your child to discuss their online experiences, including any problems they encounter. If it’s a social platform, download it yourself and connect with them. Regular conversations can make it easier for them to come to you with concerns or questions.

3. Set Boundaries and Monitor

Together with your child, set reasonable boundaries for technology use that align with your family’s values. This might include limits on screen time, rules about which platforms are appropriate, and expectations about behavior online. Use parental controls if necessary, but also respect their privacy and foster trust. Monitoring doesn’t mean spying; it’s about ensuring they're using technology safely and responsibly.

As we’ve already learned, you have to undertake all of this knowing that it cannot possibly prevent all harm that might be out there lurking online. But if you want to give them the best possible chance, these are a pretty good start.

Becoming a parent is incredibly difficult and is one of the biggest perspective shifts you will ever experience.

You go into it with everything you’ve got, aspiring to be a perfect role model. You will never feel like you’re doing a good enough job, and you know that your guidance can’t and won’t be the answer to every situation.

Yet you never stop giving because you know that one moment of care in a tough spot may make all the difference. That one decision you might create to call for help when they’re stuck could be critical, even if it’s not you that they call. And as with all risk mitigation, you may never get the satisfaction of knowing the amazing impact it’s had. That’s why we keep trying, no matter what.

That’s sacrifice. That’s love. That’s parenting.

The tingling sweet spot between fear and excitement is an exhilarating place to be. Yet, as life progresses, you’re predisposed to avoid risk; you seek refuge in the warm arms of comfort as much as possible. If you’re not careful, the allure will become too great and you’ll stifle your life into fluffy stagnation.

When was the last time nervous butterflies rampaged through your stomach?

Your Turn To Break

I got called up to practice with a pool league team last week.

I've been on the lookout for new hobbies and played a lot of pool in my 20s so, I put my name down a few months ago. I never really expected to hear back, but then the text appeared.

We’ve got a potential team for you! Come down to practice at 630 on Monday.

A flurry of clarifying questions later it was locked in and I was expected. Great! A game I love playing, in the company of others who also did. What’s not to like?

A few hours later an unfamiliar flutter hit as some tough realizations began to land:

• I was better than average amongst my friends but that’s a small sample size, maybe I’m not any good at all?

• I have played less than 5 times in the last 5 years so would surely be rusty.

• Wouldn’t it be the height of arrogance to walk into a place with people who play 3hrs per week (plus practice) and expect to compete?

I restarted my text flurry.

“Is there a good mix of abilities in the league?”

“Don’t worry about other players’ abilities, Graeme, just come down and have fun.”

Oh shit.

The afternoon before practice was a nightmare. The butterflies rocketed around, distracting me from the most basic of tasks. I paced up and down in the kitchen during dinner preparation. I over-enthusiastically prepared and chalked my old cue, trying to take back control of anything I could. What was making this so hard?

Then I realized - it had been so long since I’d been nervous. About anything.

Do One Thing Every Day That Scares You

So says Baz Luhrmann, the original bro philosopher, in his classic hit ‘Sunscreen’.

It had been way longer than a day for me. Longer than a week? Yup. Just last month I backed out of a vertical drop water slide that my 14yo son was so desperate for me to enjoy. Was my last fear last year? Even longer?

It had taken a casual pool league to make me realize I had wrapped my life in cotton wool.

So why do we humans gravitate away from fear?

Survival and energy conservation

From an evolutionary perspective, comfort can be linked to survival. Comfortable environments and situations often signify safety, which means less immediate risk and threat to life. By seeking comfort, our ancestors were more likely to avoid dangerous situations, which improved their chances of survival.

Pain avoidance and pleasure seeking

Comfort often means the absence of pain and the presence of pleasure, whether physical or psychological. This drive is governed by the brain’s reward system, particularly the release of dopamine, which reinforces behaviors that lead to comfort and pleasure.

Psychological wellbeing

Comfort helps in reducing stress and anxiety, contributing to better mental health. Stressful and uncomfortable environments can trigger the body’s "fight or flight" response, releasing stress hormones like cortisol. Comfortable environments help mitigate these responses, promoting a sense of wellbeing and stability.

The motivations are many. It’s understandable that we’d run to comfort at every opportunity, right? But, isn’t that just a recipe for a boring life? What are some questions you might ask yourself to push into more adventurous places?

What's the worst that could happen?

Evaluating the worst-case scenario can help put the risk into perspective. Often, you find that the potential negative outcomes are not as catastrophic as you initially feared.

What's the best that could happen?

Considering the best possible outcome is very important. This question helps you focus on the positive possibilities and the potential rewards of taking a risk.

Will I regret not doing this?

Looking back from the future, would you regret not having tried? Most of my regrets in life have come from things I’ve not done rather than things I’ve done.

What can I learn from this experience?

Focusing on the learning opportunities rather than just the success or failure can make taking risks feel more worthwhile. You win or you learn.

What is the cost of inaction?

Sometimes, the cost of doing nothing is greater than the risk of taking action. Not making a decision is sometimes a decision by default.

You can use these power questions to set yourself on the path to butterflies, excitement and discovering new joys in your life.

It’s Only A Game

Back to the pool hall.

I was greeted by Christy, the league organizer, who talked me through the rules and then invited me to play a rack. It was very much a nothing game but my heart was thumping when I settled down to every shot. Christy busied herself between turns, getting the arriving patrons set up for the night of league play ahead. Somehow, I managed to get into position to sink a nervy 8-ball for the win!

She passed me on to Phil to play next as a warm-up. He stepped up, broke, and ran the entire table to win without letting me have a single shot. Uh oh. I asked him if he did it often. He humbly said “not really” and proceeded to take me to pieces in the next 2 games. I think I had 3 total turns.

I spent the rest of the night on the ‘practice table’, where folks would drop in for a pickup game between matches. I didn’t win a single game for the rest of the evening. But this was anything but a disaster:

• I got so much better with each game. I learned just by watching and would have won a couple if I hadn’t bottled easy shots on the 8-ball.

• Everyone was so lovely and very welcoming. They offered encouragement, advice and shared stories of their own first nights.

• I settled down into the vibe and felt so much more comfortable by the end of the evening.

Now, I can’t wait to go back next week. The mix of camaraderie and competition will remain enjoyable and will no doubt make me a much better player in a few months.

Going Back To The Well

I took a risk, tried something new, and lived to tell the tale!

It reconnected me with a long-lost feeling and provided a new type of excitement as part of my weekly routine. The question for me now is how to keep this run going and keep challenging myself - what next? I’m not sure yet but it’s a great feeling to form an addiction to.

What have you been sitting on that could set you on a new path?