📢 Quick announcement: I'm offering 3x pro bono coaching sessions to 3 individuals who want to start a personal writing practice or to deepen their existing one. Drop me an email if you're interested; more info on this at the end of this newsletter.
What does it really mean to be alive?
Sometimes, when I think it's no longer possible to be surprised by the human experience or by anything in this world, something comes along that knocks me off my feet.
Earlier this week, my brother told me about this excel sheet that he shares with his girlfriend. On it, they log every game they've ever played together—whether it's a board game, console game, etc. They've logged thousands of sessions so far, and the goal, he tells me, is that when they die, the person who has won more games gets to laugh at the other.
That is what he says, but of course it is also about so much more than that.
Maybe this sounds perfectly mundane to you. Maybe this is something unremarkable that couples do when they've been together for a while and need to keep things interesting.
But it was a profound moment for me, and I was quietly overwhelmed by the thought of everything invisible and unexplainable that must have collided to become this very specific expression of love. How this combination of absurdity and playfulness may perhaps be possible only in their story, and not in anyone else's.
I have similar feelings about bluetooth technology. There are still days when I will plug my wireless earphones in—these frail pieces of plastic and aluminium, and it still blows my mind that music, MUSIC, is playing over high frequency radio waves.
I know there is science behind this. But to me, this is a supernatural phenomenon.
All this to say that I was recently listening to a podcast episode with John Fiorentino, a product inventor and entrepreneur who has bootstrapped four products to hundreds of millions of dollars. When asked about what exactly it is that he competes on, that has allowed him to find such success, he answers: “I deeply believe that magic is real.”
He goes on to say:
"You can't plan for it. The things that shape the world are these anomaly things, these events that no one ever could ever see coming. And they happen and then the entire world is different.
You can't plan for these things. And you sort of have to get to that magic by throwing out every rule and exposing yourself to this. The only rule is that there are no rules.
... Anyone who's made anything that has truly resonated with another human being, I think when I try to explain this to them, they really, really understand it because they've been there. And that's unbelievably scary because your brain immediately wants to have these rules that lead you to a specific outcome.
When you start to build something in that way, it feels really good and it makes you feel calm and secure. But I can almost guarantee that if you can quantify your plan with a certain number and a certain step, there will be no magic that emerges from that."
I was in the middle of a run when I heard this, and it made me stop.
I stopped because it made me think about how little I understand about what it really means to be alive; to exist as a human being in this world.
That we walk around in bodies made of flesh—bodies that bleed and leak and poop and fall asleep. That you can meet someone one day and just like that, they become your center of gravity. That you can eventually come to find them boring, or maybe you lose them and it literally feels like you are dying.
That something a stranger carelessly said to us 20 years ago can still be haunting us, and will likely continue to do so for another 20 years. That for some of us, joy is jumping out of airplanes, while for some of us it is taking a nap on a patch of grass.
That we can be completely ignorant of why something works until it does, and yet we are still expected to trust the process, trust the timing, and trust that hopefully, in spite of there being no guarantees, it will work.
Over the last month or so, 2 things happened.
One, I found myself wrestling with a decision. The details are not important, but it was essentially about whether or not I should accept an opportunity to do something I've already done before.
I ran it by a couple of friends, most of whom asked me incredulously, "Why do you want to go and do that again?" One friend was particularly unforgiving in their delivery, which made me hate them for a second. But it was also what I needed to hear.
Later on, another friend would ask me the question that has continued to stick: "Would that really be enough for you?"
Two, a handful of people informed me that they were leaving their current jobs to either start companies or move on to new opportunities. These all came as huge surprises because, based off our last conversations, they were not due to make these transitions until the end of this year.
"Is that sooner than expected?" I asked all of them. All said yes, and also that they just knew it was the right time. There was no big gesture from the universe, just the unconscious accumulation of thoughts and dreams now surfacing within them as an inner knowing.
So I listened to a podcast, and then these things happened, and I found myself thinking about what it means to be ambitious.
The internet tells me that being ambitious is about having goals, working hard, constantly improving oneself, being resilient, decisive, tenacious, and never settling for anything short of progress. These sound like broadly positive things, but really they are all implicitly oriented towards career success and the accumulation of status symbols.
Instead, I started thinking about magic.
I started wondering when I was last in a place where I had no idea how things worked, and yet I had fun.
Or when I was last in a conversation with someone, and I had no idea what they were going to say next, and yet I didn't want to leave.
Or when I last had no idea where my next month's salary was going to come from, and yet I was completely at peace.
I started wondering when I last felt a genuine, abounding sense of wonder at what's possible in life.
Then I started thinking about how, if the world were to end tomorrow, and I were to find myself standing there, naked and afraid, watching the sun fall out of the sky, what is it I would like to say I was ambitious about?
And I think I would want to say that I was ambitious about:
Having many perfect days—days when I did something creative, connected with people, did something small that made the world a better place, drank coffee, listened to music, and found that that was enough.
Loving the people in my life for who they were, and not for who I wanted them to be.
Laughing a lot, swearing a lot, making many inappropriate jokes in churches and fancy restaurants, and being unafraid of saying the wrong thing.
Living with less fear and more courage, and never becoming jaded and cynical even when things didn't go my way.
Forgiving myself for all the mistakes I made and the people I hurt when I didn't know better, and extending this same compassion to others.
Treating my life and career as one big experiment, learning ways to work and live beyond what I grew up with, and not caring what 'the culture' defined as right or successful.
Reading many books, taking lots of afternoon naps, being bad at my hobbies, wandering aimlessly in foreign countries, and doing things simply because I wanted to.
I loved that John Fiorentino podcast because he was not just talking about creating million dollar products. He was talking about a way of being in the world, and somehow managed to articulate so precisely the texture of what it means to be human.
It left me thinking about this: What have I not done? What am I hungry for? What still terrifies me? What is it that I know, deep inside, I need to do next?
“I think this undeniable magic rules the world. And I think the people that are able to tap into that and shape that rule the world, and I think money follows that.
Money is not the thing. Money is the measurement of the thing. And we've kind of forgotten about that. I call it money worship or number worship.
We've become obsessed with this idea that truth is quantifiable. I just don't believe that that's true.”
— John Fiorentino
Some final things:
I’m running an experiment to figure out for myself if I want to niche down as a writing coach. As part of this, I’m offering 3x pro bono coaching sessions to 3 individuals. This will be a fun way for me to iterate on my approach, and in return you get some free coaching. The only requirement is that you want to start a writing practice or deepen your existing one; if you’re not sure whether this is for you, let’s chat anyway and see what comes up.
If you’re interested in giving this a shot, you can drop me an email. If you’re wondering why me, you can read more about my background!As I mentioned last week (or the week before?), I’ve started sharing links to interesting things in the subscriber chat instead. In case you missed that, you can follow along here or by downloading the Substack app.
Some of you are new here, so hello and thank you so much for subscribing! If you want to find out a little bit more about the person who writes this strange newsletter, this should help.
Otherwise, that’s all for this week. Stay safe, drink lots of water, and I’ll see you at the next one 👋🏻