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Imagine you’re on a hike, and a small stone finds it way into your shoe.

You’re in a rush to get to your campsite by sunset. You’ve got a long way to go.

The stone rubs against your heel. It’s painful, but not unbearable.

So you press on.

But over time, the stone makes itself at home. A blister forms, and your raw, red heel has paid the price for you not sitting down to sort the problem out when it first emerged.

We encounter many small stones in our daily lives. And despite the inconvenience, we’re often better off getting rid of them the moment they arise.

If you haven’t seen Richard Linklater’s 2014 film, Boyhood, I highly recommend it.

It’s a coming of age story, but it was filmed over a 12 year period, following the same actor as he grew from 6 to 18 years of age.

Linklater started production without a script, and only wrote the next year’s plot after reviewing the previous year’s footage. He adapted the script based on the changes he saw in the actors, too.

I marvelled at the seamless transitions between the years, and I imagined the commitment required from the producers, actors, and the production team to bring this story to the screen.

If you end up watching it, let me know what you thought of it. I think there is a lesson we can all find in Linklater’s Tenacity.

Following on from yesterday’s post, I’ve been impressed by this quote from Henry David Thoreau:

“The cost of a thing is the amount of … life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run.”

Many of us likely believe time is our most valuable possession. Yet, I’ve never considered the trade-off as boldly as Thoreau.

But instead of getting lost in the abstract, this may just be my way of admitting I’d like a Roomba.

There’s a hidden cost when you buy something: the cost of selling or disposing of it when it’s no longer needed.

I’m really feeling the hidden cost this week, because we’re selling a bunch of things before our home move.

I feel like Newton’s third law is a fitting metaphor here: For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

Buying the item is easy and straightforward. Using it is much the same. But a lot of energy has been spent in the past few weeks trying to sell them. I’ve been listing items, messaging and meeting potential buyers, and posting items, too.

This process has got me thinking: going forward, I want to be more conscious about the things I buy and bring into home, because at some point, we’ll have to figure out where they go next.

Is there anything you’re avoiding just because the answer is painful?

When we answer that question honestly, we often stumble upon ways forward not previously considered.

And maybe it’s not the pain itself, but the anticipation of pain—the fear of, the dread of—that’s really holding us back.

Last week, I received my New Zealand Election voter information pack.

I love how easy it’s going to be to vote in this year’s general election.

When the voting window opens in early October, I will simply download and print my voting papers, fill them in, and upload a photo of them to the Electoral Commission’s website.

Done.

The risk of voter fraud is minimised because I had to 1) verify my electoral enrolment earlier this month via instructions in my voter information pack, and 2) my identify was authenticated through the New Zealand Government’s Real Me online identity platform.

I paused this morning to be grateful for democracy, and the ability to vote in a secure and trusted way from abroad.

I was sad to hear of Ken Robinson’s recent passing.

Like many, I first heard about Ken through his off-the-cuff, extraordinary TED Talk from 2006 titled ‘Do schools kill creativity?’

His message resonated: children don’t become creative, their creativity is beaten out of them by a broken school system. And that we need to rethink the first principles of education to ensure this natural creativity isn’t lost.

And after reading his book, The Element, I felt validated. The “bored in class” feeling I had experienced suddenly made sense. The embarrassment I felt for asking too many questions in the classroom fell away. He helped me connect some of the disparate dots in my own educational journey, and these learnings will likely have a big impact on the way I raise my future (in a while!) kids.

Here’s to you, Ken!

I’ve been reflecting on this quote by novelist and playwright, Edith Wharton, “There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.”

We’re not one or the other. We can play a different role when it’s needed most.

We’re all part candle and part mirror.

I’m currently watching this lecture on songwriting by famed writer, Ralph Murphy.

When Ralph was writing songs full time, he’d write 100 songs per year. From that 100, he’d demo 40, properly produce 6, and would get a hit every 3 years.

Meaning he had a 1 in 300 “hit” margin.

How often is a person willing to accept those odds for anything, let alone their career?

I love this story and its lesson.

There is nothing stopping us from walking up to the plate each day and swinging at the ball. We may miss often. We may try 299 times before we get a hit. But at least were on the pitch swinging, and not settling in the stands.

We’re moving house in a couple weeks, and I’m selling a few things on Marketplace to declutter.

One of those things is my Nintendo Switch. I bought it in 2017, and have barely played it in the past 2 years.

Within 3 hours of posting, I had 7 offers to buy it. I even had someone offer to drive to my house at midnight to pick it up.

I raised my eyebrows. I’d listed 4 other items, and I hadn’t received a single message for any of them.

I realised I’d asked for below average market price for the Switch.

I sat with multiple chat screens open, pondering the question: should I go back and edit the price, or should I honour the original offer?

I decided upon the latter. I felt honouring my original offer was 1) the right thing to do, and 2) a helpful lesson to make sure I do more thorough research next time.

A good decision may go unrewarded for a long time.

The seed may choose to sprout after the gardener has lost hope and thrown away their tools.

How long will you keep at it? How long are you willing to wait? How patient are you prepared to be?

The age of Netflix has brought with it a gravitational pull towards long-form content.

We’re watching fewer movies, and instead diving into shows that need many seasons to tell their story.

The characters are deeper, the plots more nuanced, and the experience more immersive.

This isn’t limited to fiction either.

A surprising number of long-form documentaries have sprung up, and I’ve been completely drawn into the ones about sport.

I don’t follow basketball, but the story of Michael Jordan in The Last Dance is a stunning depiction of one sport’s G.O.A.T., and his path to greatness.

I don’t follow Formula 1, but the Drive to Survive series gave me an insight into the complexity, competition, and danger of the world’s fastest sport. After watching it, I’m half convinced the drivers are not human.

Finally, I don’t follow any football team, but the story of Sunderland Football Club in Sunderland ’til I Die is an amazing tale of how the history and identity of a city can be so tightly tied to the journey of its sports team.

Yes, these documentaries are about sport, but they’re also vignettes into how top performing athletes respond to the immense pressure of being—and staying—on top of the world.

At the beginning of this year, I shared some articles and thoughts about what 2020 and the next decade could look like.

Let’s just say, none of them predicted a global pandemic.

No matter how hard we think, analyse, or anticipate, accurately predicting the future is nigh on impossible.

Although we still try and figure out what is to come, perhaps we should also spend time readying our minds for what may come.

“Imagine a mountain of sand, a million miles high, reaching from the earth to the farthest heavens, and a million miles broad, extending to remotest space, and a million miles in thickness, and imagine such an enormous mass of countless particles of sand multiplied as often as there are leaves in the forest, drops of water in the mighty ocean, feathers on birds, scales on fish, hairs on animals, atoms in the vast expanse of air. And imagine that at the end of every million years a little bird came to that mountain and carried away in its beak a tiny grain of that sand. How many millions upon millions of centuries would pass before that bird had carried away even a square foot of that mountain, how many eons upon eons of ages before it had carried away all. Yet at the end of that immense stretch time not even one instant of eternity could be said to have ended.” – James Joyce

But, we get today. This moment. This precious opportunity.

And that’s something.

Some scratches heal on their own.

Others need work to be fixed.

Knowing the difference—especially in cases when work is required—can be the difference between success and failure.