We all have heroes in our lives. One of my heroes is the Dalai Lama. So when the opportunity to attend a meditation session led by the Dalai Lama’s physician came up during my third year in the Peace Corps in Mongolia, I jumped at the chance…
Happy People Have Projects
It's easy to forget this little bit of wisdom: happy people have projects.
I've had lots of up and down times in my life, in terms of passion, meaning and happiness, but certainly when I had projects those were the happiest times for me. I know that personally to be true.
Science also backs up that hypothesis. If you read Happier by Tal Ben-Shahar or A Philosopher's Notes by Brian Johnson, you'll see study after study that shows that people who have projects in their life - hobbies or activities they are passionate about - are happier. Whether it's projects on the side or full-time projects, they are happier.
I was reminded of this when I watched this interview with Seth Godin below, which I loved. He talks about "art projects," doing what you love, why it's so hard to step out into that work and also why it's important to realize what is stopping us. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.
How to Be Great
By Leo Babauta
Start by admitting that greatness doesn’t come from the distraction and busywork that often fills up our lives.
It comes from making a difference in the world.
Now consider how you can make a difference in the lives of others. Consider your current work, which perhaps already makes a difference — how can you refocus yourself on this work? Or consider creating a side project, and carving out the time for this.
Be the example of compassion for others around you.
Know that it doesn’t matter if you achieve the compassionate result you set out to achieve — what matters is the intention to improve the lives of others. You can’t control the result, but you can control the intention.
And you can show up, every day. With that intention.
Carve out the time. Put aside everything else. Realize that this life is limited and precious and amazing, and you shouldn’t waste a minute of it.
Pursue this compassionate work with single-minded devotion. This one thing matters, and all else can be put aside for now, unless it’s in support of your work. (Good health supports your work, including a whole-foods diet, exercise, and sleep.)
Practice until you’re amazing.
This compassionate work, with good-hearted intention, pursued with single-minded devotion: this is greatness.
Why The Crazy Ones Succeed
by Peter Diamandis, Founder of X Prize
Excerpt from Peter's book Abundance
In 1997 Apple introduced its "Think Different" advertising campaign with the now famous declaration: "Here's to the crazy ones":
Here's to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They're not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can't do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.
If you were to just hear these words, they'd seem like bravado -- marketingspeak from a company not known for marketingspeak. But Apple coupled sight to sound. Accompanying those words were images: Bob Dylan as a misfit; Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as a troublemaker; Thomas Edison as the one without respect for the status quo. Suddenly everything changes. Turns out this campaign is not all bluster. In fact, it seems to be a fairly accurate retelling of historical events.
The point, however obvious, is pretty fundamental: you need to be a little crazy to change the world, and you can't really fake it. If you don't believe in the possibility, then you'll never give it the 200 percent effort required. This can put experts in a tricky situation. Many have built their careers buttressing the status quo, reinforcing what they've already accomplished, and resisting the radical thinking that can topple their legacy -- not exactly the attitude you want when trying to drive innovation forward.
Henry Ford agreed: "None of our men are 'experts.' We have most unfortunately found it necessary to get rid of a man as soon as he thinks himself an expert because no one ever considers himself expert if he really knows his job . . . Thinking always ahead, thinking always of trying to do more, brings a state of mind in which nothing is impossible." So if you're going after grand challenges, experts may not be your best coconspirators.
Instead, if you need a group of people who thrive on risk, are overflowing with crazy ideas, and don't have a clue that there's a "wrong way" to do things, there's one particular place to look. In the early 1960s, when President Kennedy launched the Apollo program, very few of the necessary technologies existed at the time. We had to invent almost everything. And we did, with one of the main reasons being that those engineers involved didn't know they were trying to do the impossible, because they were too young to know. The engineers who got us to the Moon were in their mid to late twenties. Fast-forward thirty years, and once again it was a group of twentysomethings driving a revolution, this time in the dot-com world. This is not a coincidence: youth (and youthful attitudes) drives innovation -- always has and always will. So if we're serious about creating an age of abundance, then we're going to have to learn to think differently, think young, roll the dice, and perhaps most importantly, get comfortable with failure.
Read more here
