“One of the reasons I have to take distinct breaks when I work is to allow the momentum of a particular direction to run down, so that another one can establish itself.”
– Brian Eno
(Via Jocelyn)
Brian Eno on Taking Breaks
She Is On her Way
“The system will collapse if we refuse to buy what they are selling…their ideas, their version of history, their wars…their notion of inevitability. Remember this: We may be many and they be few… Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.”
– Arundhati Roy
Staying soft vs Tightening
“Tightness erodes clarity. Tightness reduces expansion. Tightness broadens fear, scarcity, and the feeling of being powerless. Tightness keeps me wound in my own Small Self, forgetting entirely about everything that exists beyond the tightness. Tightness looks like turning away from reality. It looks like worst-case-scenario, all-or-nothing thinking. It looks like ‘What if this doesn’t go the way I want it to?’ and ‘I don’t think I can handle this’ — like worry embodied. It looks like self-doubt and rumination, catastrophizing and smallness. It looks like forgetting about my body and only listening to my brain.”
– Stay Soft, Lisa Oliver
(via Jocelyn)
A Performative Solo
“Social media forms are performative solo forms with an odd conflation of friendship and marketing; the body is alone in a room performing the self, with an undercurrent of desire for applause. Without a town square to gather in and hash out the day with neighbors, social media communications have a shading of loneliness underneath.”
– Annie-B Parson
I Don’t Know What I am Doing
“I don’t know what I’m doing. And if you don’t know what to do, there’s actually a chance of doing something new. As long as you know what you’re doing, nothing much of interest is going to happen.”
– Philip Glass
Life Worth Living
“The most audacious thing I could possibly state in this day and age is that life is worth living. It’s worth being bashed against. It’s worth getting scarred by. It’s worth pouring yourself over every one of its hot coals.”
– Jeff Buckley
Two Solitudes That Meet
“Love consists of this: two solitudes that meet, protect and greet each other. ”
― Rainer Maria Rilke
Isn’t it wonderful to be alive?
“Isn’t it wonderful to be alive? You know, you can forget all about it. Then suddenly you remember, and think of all the things you can do. Here I am. I can walk around. I can talk. I can see things and remember things. I am alive. How wonderful.”
– Sophia Loren
Crazy
“I oscillate between thinking I am crazy, and thinking I am not crazy enough.”
– Joyce Carol Oates
State of Mind
“The essential thing is to work in a state of mind that approaches prayer.”
– Henri Matisse
Crisis
“Bad companies are destroyed by crisis, Good companies survive them, Great companies are improved by them.”
— Andy Grove
Patience
“Patience, I believe, is a core competency of a healthy civilization.”
– Stewart Brand
Boy, I hurried…
“Boy, I hurried… I hurried for a long time. I’m sorry I did. All the time you’re hurrying, you’re not really as aware as you should be. You’re trying to make things happen instead of just letting it happen. You follow me?”
– Bob Dylan
Conditions I Don’t Want
“How am I complicit in creating the conditions I say I don’t want?”
—Jerry Colonna
Care Enough
“You really can change the world if you care enough.”
– Marian Wright Edelman
Enough
“Enough is a decision not an amount.”
– Alison Faulkner
Learn To Relax
“Your mind will answer most questions if you learn to relax…”
– William S. Burroughs
Rule of 3 In Conversation
“Rule of 3 in conversation. To get to the real reason, ask a person to go deeper than what they just said. Then again, and once more. The third time’s answer is close to the truth.”
– Kevin Kelly
Something Worth Noticing
“The body of work you’re creating adds up over time. The consistency and empathy of your vision will seep through. Drip by drip, you’ll create something worth noticing.”
– Crickets by Seth Godin
Laughter
“Laughter is carbonated holiness.”
― Anne Lamott
Audience Capture
“Audience capture is an irresistible force in the world of influencing, because it’s not just a conscious process but also an unconscious one. While it may ostensibly appear to be a simple case of influencers making a business decision to create more of the content they believe audiences want, and then being incentivized by engagement numbers to remain in this niche forever, it’s actually deeper than that. It involves the gradual and unwitting replacement of a person’s identity with one custom-made for the audience.”
The Perils of Audience Capture, by Gurwinder
(via Bailey)
Five Rules of Being a Grown-Up
You must not have anything wrong with you, or anything different about you.
If you have something wrong or different about you, you really need to correct it. You need to be able to pass under all circumstances.
If you can’t correct it, or change it in any way, you should just pretend that you have. It’s not a problem anymore. Good news!
If you can’t even pretend not to have corrected the situation, you should just not show up, because it’s very painful for the rest of us to see you in your current condition.
If you’re going to insist on showing up, you should at least have the decency to be ashamed.
– Salon Tom Weston’s Five Rules of Being A Grown-Up
(via Ann Lammott in this interview)
Despair
“Despair is a failure of the imagination.”
– Wade Davis