What do you really want?

Unless you know what you want, you can't get it.

Want is the only prerequisite for getting what you want.

This may not feel true if you've ever gotten something without really wanting it, but here's the thing: you got it because somebody else wanted it for you.

What do you want so badly that you're willing to suffer for it?

You're going to suffer in life one way or another, so you may as well be suffering for something that feels worth it.

What are you willing to sacrifice precious time to obtain or achieve?

This life doesn't start over. Time goes in one direction. You might get another chance in another life, but this chance happens only once.

So what do you want? It doesn't need to be a grand thing. It doesn't need to be a world-changing thing. It only needs to be something that you really want, something that's meaningful enough to change your life in a positive way.

It's okay to be selfish with this step because if it's something that's truly good for you it will be truly good for others too—nothing ever only affects you.

Be specific. Write it down. Start small, but start. Take it seriously. It doesn't need to be perfect, but it does need to be specific.

If you want everything, you'll get nothing. If you want nothing, you'll get what everybody else wants for you. But if you learn to start with something, if you learn to be specific, if you learn to achieve clarity around whatever it is that you really want, then you can get anything.

Start by moving towards something. The journey, no matter how short, will expose you to new perspectives that will reveal bigger and better things.

But you won't even see what you can get until you start moving, until you decide and clarify what you really want, right now.

Finding Your Why

I was sitting on the balcony of my apartment in Ulcinj, Montenegro, overlooking the Adriatic Sea. The sound of small construction echoed through the valley as men worked on roofs and inside houses preparing for the big tourist season that was just around the corner. 

I looked over at one of the workers on a neighboring roof and wondered, what's his 'why'? Why is he doing what he's doing right now? He likely wants to earn money to feed himself or his family or to provide himself or his family shelter. 

What are his 'whats'? What does he do that backs up and reinforces his why?

Well, he spends large amounts of his time doing work that is laborious and difficult. He travels whatever distance is necessary to get to that work and he acquires the tools necessary to complete the work.

I've been listening to the audio version of Simeon Sinek's book, Start With Why, and the insights are fantastic. I highly recommend it. The premise of the book is that everything starts with why and that "people don't buy what you do, they buy why you do it." But this principle extends much further than just business. In fact, it applies to everything in life. 

Everything starts with why. 

This got me thinking about my own 'why'. Why do I do what I do? At first, the answer seemed obvious. But in reality, this is exactly the trap that nearly all businesses in the world fall into: they confuse their why with their what and their how. (Simeon gives many real-world examples in his book, all of which are quite eye-opening.)

I decided to make two small lists in a text file on my laptop, a list of my whys and a list of my whats. I didn't bother with the hows immediately but instead focused on making sure that only real whys were put on the why list. Here are my raw, unedited lists:

WHY'S (Why do I do it?)

  • I believe in living deeply
  • I believe in thinking beyond myself
  • I believe that technology will unite humanity
  • I believe in living and thinking deeply beyond myself
  • I believe technology empowers human evolution
  • I believe that technology is a catalyst for human progress

WHAT'S (What do I do?)

  • Write
  • Publish and share things online
  • Value quality, strength, durability, thoroughness, thoughtfulness
  • Seek other perspectives
  • Remain realistically optimistic
  • Dig deeper
  • Ask Why
  • Helpful
  • Think deeply 
  • Think deeply about what matters most in life
  • Question the status quo
  • Seek change
  • Learn new things and share what I learn
  • Live minimally, while maximizing the potential of available tools
  • Think sustainably
  • Ponder the future
  • Ask what role technology plays in human evolution

The whats list came surprisingly easy, but the whys list was hard! I started adding things to my what list and it kept growing. Every time I thought that I had a why to add to the why list, I realized after a bit of thought that it was actually a what, not a why. It was something that reinforced my why, not the why itself.

Eventually the real whys began to emerge and I was easily able to cross-check them. From Simeon's book, I knew that whats should always reenforce whys, so I was able to take any of the whys and ask myself, "do my whats reenforce this?" If the answer was no, then I knew immediately that it wasn't really my why. (Asking myself that question assumes that what I do is already in alignment with my why, which I feel that it is, or at least that it's pretty close.)

If you're interested in trying this exercise, take a few minutes and follow these steps:

  1. Make a list with two headers: "WHAT'S" and "WHY'S"
  2. Start with listing what you do, the things that you love doing in your spare time and that you see yourself always doing in the future.
  3. After you have 10-15 items on the list, start looking for patterns and overarching themes. Start asking yourself, "why do I do these things? Why do they matter to me?"
  4. Now slowly, but cautiously (remember, whats are easy to confuse for whys) add things to the whats list. If you come up with something that seems like a why but ends up being a what, simply transfer it to the what list.

(If you try this exercise and you're willing to share the results with me, I've love to see them.)

I certainly haven't figured out all of my whys or all of my whats, but I do feel a lot closer. I will continue with this exercise and add a third list of hows. Then I'll keep revisiting this and checking if what I'm doing in my life properly reflects my core why

Exercises like these can be helpful for everyone in many ways. They help clarify why we wake up in the morning, why we do the work we do, and why we make the choices we make. But it's easy to miss the why. If you go back and re-analyze the construction worker that I mentioned earlier, you'll discover that even his whys go much deeper than food and shelter.

If we get more clear about our why, then we can make better decisions and better choices and live more productive, happy, and harmonious lives.

For some additional reading on this topic, check out How to Find Your Purpose and Do What You Love.

Heart Challenges

When I talk about following my heart and doing what feels right it may sometimes sound like life becomes a cakewalk, an easy and sunny path you walk down without a care in the world.

The reality couldn't be further from the truth.

Your heart wants you to grow, to be challenged, to face difficulties that seem insurmountable. It wants to nudge you closer and closer to the edge of oblivion, to hold your hand when you're unable to walk and then slowly let it go, challenging you to walk on your own.

It does this with love, the same way a mother holds her child's hand as she's learning to walk, guiding the her to grow to new heights and new potential, encouraging the child to risk what seems like everything, and doing so because the mother knows through experience that falling is part and parcel of living.

But not all difficulty is created equal and not all challenge is meaningful.

It's difficult to climb a hundred stairs, but the meaningfulness of that difficulty changes dramatically when you're climbing those hundred stairs to save someones life. You can climb stairs all day and night and they won't mean as much as that one sprint to save a life.

It might be stressful to manage a team of people and tackle a big project, but the meaningfulness of that project and the worthiness of that stress changes dramatically when the project you're taking on is aimed at accomplishing a goal that, when reached, changes someones life for the better or leaves the world in a better state than you found it.

No matter how many meaningless projects you accept and no matter how many pointlessly stressful situations you face, you can be sure that neither are making you a better person. They're not helping you grow and they're not helping the world become a better place, no matter how much pain you endure.

Your ego wants you to believe that all challenge and difficulty has meaning, that all sources of stress have value and purpose. Your heart intuitively knows that this isn't true. It knows that without spending your time doing things that actually have meaning and purpose behind them, you have no reason for existing.

Your heart is allergic to things that are meaningless, so wear your heart on your sleeve. Put it right out there for the whole world to see. Let it guide you. Let it take you wherever it takes you. Trust it no matter how risky or how illogical it may seem. A true heart calling will always bring you to a place that's worthy of the challenges you face.

If you follow your heart, if you give it your trust and let it guide you, it will lead you to your purpose for existing. Life won't be easy. You won't get through unscathed. You'll fall down and face challenges that seem insurmountable, but every single challenge you do face, every fall and every scratch, will be worth it. It will be meaningful.

If you follow your heart, every challenge you face will make you a better person and for that you'll grow to love your life.

Has fear replaced purpose?

Can fear replace purpose? Is it possible that in place of purpose, many are living in a perpetual state of fear, going about their daily tasks with the driving force behind all action being fear? Do they smile out of fear and love out of fear?

Am I being driven by fear? Is fear driving me to write this right now? Am I afraid that if I don't write regularly I will lose whatever gains I've made, that my skill will begin to deteriorate and that my readers will begin to lose interest? Am I afraid if I don't start writing right now that I will lose these thoughts I want to share?

What about all these people in their cars, driving here and there. Are they going places because they're afraid of something? Are they afraid of being scolded at work, or of being fired, or of not having enough money, or missing the due date on their bills, or running out of gas, or not having a refrigerator full of food in case the grocery stores are overrun and they're trapped in a hurricane with no means of survival?

Are they afraid of not getting to their next appointment on time, or running out of fuel for their generator in case they lose electricity and can't watch TV to see what else they should be afraid of?

Do they put on jackets because they're afraid to get wet, adorn unique layers of clothing because they're afraid to look like everybody else, lock their cars and lock their houses because they're afraid of being taken advantage of? Do they conform in life because they're afraid to stand out, to break the patterns, and to be different?

For most of my life I've marveled at the flow of automobile traffic, a seemingly endless stream of people going somewhere, headed toward a destination whose description was only limited by my imagination. But where were all these people really going? What was it that instigated them to take action? What pushed them to get in their car, choose a destination, and then do something about getting there?

What was their purpose?

I've tried to imagine all the different scenarios, to find a common thing that seemed to describe all the movement in a modern society. I looked at love as the primary motivator, but tossed that out when I saw hate, jealousy, anger, and selfishness far more prevalent than kindness, compassion, honesty, and generosity. I looked at survival, but I tossed that out too when I realized how overly abundant people were already living.

In fact, I looked at as many positive reasons as I could find, but nothing added up.

If our motivation and inspiration was something positive — if it was something that made us feel good — then why were we doing everything with such reluctance? Why were we so reactionary, so easy to anger, and so quick to blame?

I remember thinking a few years ago, while sitting in traffic on the way home from a 10-hour day at the office, if my motivations for living were positive, why was I doing things on a day-to-day basis that made me feel negative? Why was I wishing I was somewhere else? Why were my choices reflecting a fear of the future? Why was I acting and reacting to fears instead of doing things that moved me towards happiness and freedom?

If societies were motivated by positive goals and people were motivated by positive purposes, then why was everybody under so much stress? Why were societies and people so slow to change? Why were those in power more interested in correcting accusations made towards themselves than debating real issues that affected the people they've chosen to serve?

If you throw fear into the mix, suddenly everything makes sense.

We are so afraid. We're terrified of breaking rules, suspicious of change, and paranoid of the unexpected. We seek direction in authority and give our power to the status quo, no matter how dangerous and untrustworthy that status quo may be.

And it's killing us. It's killing us because it's holding us back. It's killing us because it's preventing us from growing and embracing our full potential. It's killing us because we're being suffocated by fear and choked off from the from the flow of life.

Fear has a purpose, but its purpose has no place in our motivation for living.

Edit: Moments after finalizing this journal entry, I came across a project called Humans of New York and I began to wonder if maybe we ultimately find whatever it is we're truly looking for, whether that be love or fear. But then I realized what each of the photos and stories in that project captured: presence. If we live in the moment, we cannot live in fear.

To Fly When We Were Born to Walk

[Photo] Airplane at sunset, landing in Cairns International Airport, as seen from Yorkey's Knob Beach, QLD, Australia.

It is my hope that by the end of this essay you will look to the sky and see airplanes a bit differently than you do now. It is my hope that by the end of this essay you will hear the roaring hiss of a jet engine and look up with a new sense of admiration for who you are.

I’ve watched thousands of airplanes fly over me. I’ve flown in hundreds of them. I’ve watched the earth float by beneath me, studied how these machines work their magic, how humans build their wings, and how pilots master their controls. I’ve even been lucky enough to pilot one myself.

But when I hear one going by, no matter what I’m doing, I still stop and tilt my head to the sky with a childish sense of wonder and watch this mechanical work of art float past (a rather dangerous distraction when I’m driving; I’ve lost a hat this way).

On several occasions in the past few months I’ve found myself on the beach, gazing at the birds and watching as they glide across the ocean. Seconds later I’m presented with the opportunity to observe a similar bird, this time a manmade one, its shiny metal body and heavy engines pushing itself across the sky.

How are these manmade creatures of flight different from those found in nature? They’re both built for the same task: to fly, to temporarily defeat gravity and make use of an invisible force, to float through an invisible landscape.

The natural creature is certainly the more elegant and it’s far more attune with its surroundings. While it blends into the landscape and reacts to the flowing currents of air, its clumsy mechanical counterpart pummels through with sheer force, relying solely on the most basic and most fundamental principals to stay aloft.

One creature was created by nature, the other was created by us, a creation by a creation, a new species of flying creatures designed, engineered, and built entirely by humans. We saw birds flying through the air and we wanted to experience that flow, to obtain that mobility.

For thousands of years we tried manufacturing feathers. We tried making ourselves as light as possible. We tried jumping off cliffs and making contraptions that seemed to mimic the wings in nature.

Everything failed and many lives were lost, but we continued building, testing, risking, and experimenting.

As we began to understand the invisible landscape, we learned to combine visible shapes with invisible forces. We manufactured structures from whatever materials were available and even began inventing and shaping materials that didn’t exist naturally.

Elegance wasn’t nearly as important as function. What mattered was obtaining flight. And so we took to the skies in birds made of wood and metal, eventually refining our models and smoothing our designs.

When I look to the sky now and I see an airplane flying over me, what I see is an example of what it means to be human, that innate desire we all possess to recreate the things we hold with respect and admiration, that need to prove to ourselves and to others that nothing is beyond our ability.

We create because that’s who we are. We live our lives making choices and decisions based on hopes and dreams because we believe. We believe that even the remote possibility is entirely possible, that despite all the odds, the impossible is only two steps away from possible.

To create, to turn thought into action, to push and fight and struggle against all logical reason and bring life to visions and ideas, to shape hopes and dreams into tangible moments of reality and string them together one by one, to learn how to fly when we were born to walk, that is what it means to be human.