Category Archives: Identity

Figure out life through the filter of nature

I made the decision to reinvent my career almost exactly ten years after I started my company. Literally, down to the exact week.

And I wondered if there was any significance to such fortuitous timing. So I went for a long walk in the park and ran the following thought experiment. How would this problem be solved in nature? After a few hours, something occurred to me. The number ten is by far the most significant labeling system in nature. Ten is the major organizing principle of the universe. It’s the mathematical base for everything. That’s why decades are such important life markers. There truly is something special about what transpires during a ten year period.

That information activated a professional transformation for me. I began to reinvent myself. To enlarge my concept of work. To expand the constellation of my identity as a creator. To keep more of my passions in play. And to mold my definition of a career to fit anything that excited and fed my soul.

What’s more, I memorialized my journey to finding the next stone on the path through a collection of songs, which ultimately became the centerpiece of this documentary.

That’s what’s possible when we tune into nature’s agenda.

How are you remaking yourself as you grow and as the world changes?

Create something lasting and uniquely yours

Ancient mythology convinces us that pride is the original and most serious of the seven deadly sins. In fact, many religions cite it as the source of all others. Worshipping the self and feeling righteous and creating an inflated sense of personal status, these temptations are the gateway drugs to the much harder stuff.

Fair enough. I can get behind that.

But let’s not forget, one of our goals in life is to make ourselves proud. It’s an existential requirement of all human beings. It’s one of the ways we make meaning in the world. When we take principled action that provides us with a satisfied sense of attachment towards our choices, pride is something we deserve to take.

Since finishing this movie, everyone I run into has been asking me how it feels to be done. And the only answer I can think to give, without reservation or guilt or pride or false humility, is that I’m so damn proud. I worked my ass off to make that documentary happen. It was a dream I’d had since childhood, and now it’s finally a reality. And that makes me proud.

Do you have any idea how good it feels to say that?

Ask yourself what it would take for you to really feel proud of yourself. Don’t let the cultural conditioning around the sinfulness of pride rob you of that meaningful experience. The decision to bite into something, do it really well, and then stand back and nod your head at the finished product, there’s nothing quite like it. To create something lasting and uniquely yours, something that you have complete control over, nothing beats that dancing smile of satisfaction.

Principled action is something nobody can take away from you.

Cynicism is easier than actually making something

The world doesn’t need another cynic. Our planet has enough pessimism to last a lifetime.

That’s why it’s so important to be fundamentally affirmative, relentlessly encouraging and radically supportive towards one other. Because most people have already been discouraged, disenchanted and degraded enough. And the last thing they need is another scoffer to pour salt on their wounds.

On the other hand, believing in people costs nothing. And it has the power to change everything. I remember when one of my musician friends went in the studio for the first time. After years of writing songs, she finally summoned the courage to put them on wax. Hallelujah!

But once the album was done, she began to encounter resistance. Record producers, club owners, music critics and other industry professionals immediately shot her work down. Saying that the songs were uninspired, grating karaoke tunes at best.

She was devastated. To the point that she went into music hibernation for almost a year.

And so, when I ran into her at my songwriting circle, I asked her to share. And when she played the song, I remember thinking to myself, wow, this song is awesome. Not because it’s perfect, not because it’s catchy, and not because it’s radio friendly. But because it’s hers. Because it’s finished. Because she had the guts to sit down, slice open a vein, bleed her truth onto the page and share it with the world.

That’s enough. That’s a win. And nobody can take that away from her.

Are you trying to become best at what you do, or the best of who you are?

Make your own music

Artists follow the muse, painters follow the numbers.

They don’t play cover songs, they make their own music.

When I used to perform music in bars and coffee shops, people would yell out names of songs or artists they wanted to hear. And that infuriated me. Because I didn’t come here to swim in the shallow end. I have an agenda, and people’s crappy childhood songs aren’t part of it.

Eventually, though, I became so frustrated with people’s disinterest in hearing original music, that I stopped performing in public and went into music hibernation for nearly a decade. Which I completely regret. I allowed the voices of mediocrity to get the best of me. I allowed public taste to overwhelm personal expression.

Fortunately, though, hope found its own way back. Thanks to the tunnel, I started performing in public again. But this time, I brought the fire. My fire. I created my own venue, my own permissionless platform, where I could do whatever I wanted. The music was all expression and zero apology. And nobody seemed to mind.

In fact, they quite liked it. Funny what happens when we give ourselves permission to make our own music.

When did you start singing in your own voice?

Figure out life through the filter of nature

I made the decision to reinvent my career almost exactly ten years after I started my company. Literally, down to the exact week.

And I wondered if there was any significance to such fortuitous timing. So I went for a long walk in the park and ran the following thought experiment. How would this problem be solved in nature?

After a few hours, something occurred to me. The number ten is by far the most significant labeling system in nature. Ten is the major organizing principle of the universe. It’s the mathematical base for everything. That’s why decades are such important life markers. There truly is something special about what transpires during a ten year period.

That information activated a professional transformation for me. I began to reinvent myself. To enlarge my concept of work. To expand the constellation of my identity as a creator. To keep more of my passions in play. And to mold my definition of a career to fit anything that excited and fed my soul. What’s more, I memorialized my journey to finding the next stone on the path through a collection of songs, which ultimately became the centerpiece of this concert documentary.

That’s what’s possible when we tune into nature’s agenda.

How are you remaking yourself as you grow and as the world changes?