Month: December 2008

First off, let’s be honest here. I’m usually hung over on January 1st. So whatever I want to ‘start’ doesn’t begin until January 2nd. But then January 2nd doesn’t feel like a good day because it’s my first day back to whatever it is I’m doing.

This year, January 2nd is on a Friday. Don’t know many people who’ve started worthwhile things on a Friday. Not a good excuse but it’s true.

So I wait. And before I ever started, my resolution has dissolved.

I don’t know many people that have actually followed through on a New Year’s resolution either. Do you? Have you ever?

Largely because most resolutions are simply wishes. Not goals. As we know, a wish is a goal without a plan of action.

But the real reason why most people never make good on their resolutions (or promises to themselves) is because we human beings constantly rationalize. That’s how we make sense of this chaotic and insane world. Thankfully, it’s innate otherwise we wouldn’t be able to function.

Every moment of every day, you’re telling yourself a story of what’s going on around you. Your boss, your friends, your job, your clients, your students and even this very blog post you’re reading!

Either you’re mentally nodding in agreement with what I’m saying (if it fits your world view or how you see things) or you’re shaking your head in disagreement (because this doesn’t fit your world view).

All day long, you’re telling yourself a story of your own actions and rationalizing it against your perceived self (which is your ego). For example, if you think you’re a very ambitious and motivated person then anything you do that doesn’t fit into ‘being ambitious and motivated’ like watching endless hours of TV, or procrastinating for days on something pressing then you’ll rationalize that.

“Well, I need a break! I don’t want to over work myself, etc., etc, etc!”

Maybe if you’re self aware and honest enough with yourself you’re able to see right through your own crap.

Or maybe not and you’re delusional. As I said in my post about ‘How to tell what someone really cares about’ some people believe that there is no relationship between what a person is and what a person does. This is bull secretion. Unless you are schizophrenic, you become your actions.

So what to do?

I think the only resolution you should make is to be brutally honest with yourself.

But of course, if you’re not, you’ll rationalize that too.

A few weeks ago, I saw the movie Slumdog Millionaire which I highly recommend. It’s a very graphic and sometimes disturbing but very powerful story about a teenager from India who became a contestant on the Indian version of “Who Wants to be a Millionaire?”

When the 18 year old is one question away from answering the final question and the show breaks for the night, the police arrest him on suspicions of cheating. They don’t understand how he knows all of the answers being that he’s an orphan from the slums of Mumbai.

The movie is about his tragic experiences and how and why he knew the answers he did.

During the movie, I kept thinking about how lucky I am! The opportunities and privileges we have are endless.

The opportunities to be or do anything you want have never been greater. I don’t care how badly you think you have it.

Yet, it seems as though more and more people feel sorry for themselves. So many people seem less than thrilled with their lives and jobs.

The tools are endless, the wealth of knowledge is staggering and the amounts of people out there that can (and want to!) help you get to where you want to be are in abundance.

There is no excuse for you not to have your dream life. Your dream relationship. Your dream job. So what if you fall short? If you aim for the stars and reach the moon that ain’t so bad.

In fact, I feel it’s an obligation for you to at least try. How can you not? How can you not go after your dreams?

But still it’s so easy to blame someone or something for how bad you have it.

Maybe we have too many opportunities? Are we too lucky? Are we too comfortable?

Is it easier for someone like Eminem to become ‘Eminem’ because he wasn’t giving up a six-figure job. He wasn’t going against the grain. There were no expectations for him to be successful.

Do people who have nothing to lose have an advantage over those who have something to lose?

I get emails constantly from people who want to switch careers. But they have endless excuses because they feel they have too much to lose. And because of that they have endless rationalizations.

So essentially, they believe they have too many opportunities and too many privileges.

No matter what you have to lose, as far as I know, you only get one shot on this Earth. I don’t remember ever being here before. You might as well make the best of it, right?

And there is only reason you won’t become the person you want to become.

Because of the limitations you set on yourself.

Limitations = excuses = rationalizations = never getting to where you truly want to be.

The question isn’t if the rationalizations will happen. The question is: are you going to be brutally honest with yourself.

Only you are holding yourself back no matter how much you think you have to lose.

Only I am holding myself back.

My favorite Apple Computer Ad campaign by far:

Here’s to the crazy ones.

The misfits.
The rebels.
The troublemakers.
The round pegs in the square holes.
The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules.

And they have no respect for the status quo. You can praise them, disagree with them, quote them, disbelieve them, glorify or vilify them.

About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things.

They invent. They imagine. They heal.
They explore. They create. They inspire.
They push the human race forward.

Maybe they have to be crazy.

How else can you stare at an empty canvas and see a work of art?

Or sit in silence and hear a song that’s never been written?

Or gaze at a red planet and see a laboratory on wheels?

We make tools for these kinds of people.

While some see them as the crazy ones, we see genius.

Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.