Let’s give ’em something to talk about Let’s give ’em something to talk about Let’s give ’em something to talk about How about love? -song, “Let’s Give Them Something To Talk About” by Bonnie Raitt
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.” -Teddy Roosevelt, excerpt from his “The Man In The Arena” speech
After the play, on the drive home, they might talk about how great the production was and how great you were in it.
Or, they might also talk about how bad it was and how bad you were in it. They may even have a good laugh at your expense. That’s their prerogative as an audience member.
Either way, just remember, you were the brave one. You were the one out there on that stage, in that arena, taking a risk, putting it all out there.
You were the one who gave them something to talk about.
“How short-lived the praiser and praised, the one who remembers and the remembered. Remembered in some corner of these parts, and even there not in the same way by all, or even by one. And the whole earth is but a mere speck.” -Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
When you seek praise, even if you get it, the praise will never live up to your imagination or expectation.
When you don’t seek praise and instead focus solely on doing the work for the work itself, you might get it anyway. And if you do, because you didn’t expect it, the praise you get will be better than you could’ve ever imagined.
“Show me the incentive, and I will show you the outcome.” -Charlie Munger
“Incentives: the most powerful force in the world. When the incentives are crazy, the behavior is crazy. People can be lead to justify and defend nearly anything.” -Morgan Housel, book Same As Ever: Timeless Lessons on Risk, Opportunity and Living a Good Life
“Incentives matter…People respond to incentives, not to mandates or regulations.” -Gary Becker
Before you “follow the money” as Deep Throat advised Bob Woodward in All The President’s Men, you should first, follow the incentive. You’ll then get to the money.
Nations, communities, companies, organizations and individuals, whether they are aware of it or not, are ruled by their incentives.
If you want to change the outcome, change the incentive.
“Dance like nobody is watching; love like you’ve never been hurt. Sing like nobody’s listening; live like it’s heaven on earth.” -Mark Twain
Consistently making deadlines that others set for you (i.e. for your job) is a very important quality. It shows you’re reliable. You can be counted on to come through.
Consistently making deadlines that only you set for yourself. When no one is watching. Where nobody cares if you do or don’t come through. Where the only person you have to answer to is you…That’s next level.
P.S. – Hat tip to my friend Robin for inspiring this post.
“Ease is a greater threat to progress than hardship.” -Denzel Washington
“A blazing fire makes flame and brightness out of everything that is thrown into it.” -Marcus Aurelius
“We don’t rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training.” -Archilochus
“A smooth sea never made a skilled sailor.” –Franklin D. Roosevelt
The trials you face today will lead to your training. Be grateful for them.
The trials you face in the future will test the level and quality of your past training. They will reveal if there’s more or different work to be done. Be grateful for them.
Most highly successful people will underestimate how hard they worked at the beginning of their careers.
Just like it takes an enormous amount of escape velocity to get a rocket to leave the earth’s atmosphere, the same holds true for any passion project, let alone building a career.
Putting luck and circumstances aside, it takes a monumental amount of effort, you will make a ton of mistakes, have a lot of self doubt, and there is no guarantee you will make it to your intended destination.
It’s hard to remember that when you’re now floating in orbit.
“If you do need to do research because parts of your story deal with things about which you know little or nothing, remember that word “back.” That’s where research belongs: as far in the background and the back story as you can get it. You may be entranced with what you’re learning about the flesh-eating bacteria, the sewer system of New York, or the I.Q. potential of collie pups, but your readers are probably going to care a lot more about your characters and your story.” -Stephen King, On Writing
“Exposition is the easiest thing to write badly and the hardest thing to write well.” -John Yorke
“People always use words to not say what they mean. They constantly use language to avoid saying the things that are true. In Lady Bird when her mom is yelling at her about the room, what she wants to say is ‘I’m scared.’ And she can’t say that. So she says, ‘Why do you never clean up your room?’ -Greta Gerwig
The best writers excise as much exposition as possible. Whatever’s left, they then hide and structure in creative ways. They fully trust the intelligence and imagination of their audience.
The best actors find a way to make expositional dialogue compelling. Usually this is achieved through some sort of inner conflict. They fight against the line. “I don’t really want to have to tell you this, but…” Watch some procedurals. Notice how the stars do it.
“The opening night of Waiting For Lefty was one of the historical nights in the American theater. What happened was you were seeing theater at its most primitive. You were seeing it at its grandest, and most meaningful. After each scene the audience stopped the show, they got up, they began to cheer and weep. For the first time theatre was a cultural force, as perhaps it has not been since. There have been many great opening nights in the American theater, but not where the stage and the theater were a cultural unit functioning—back and forth so the identity was complete. There was such an at-oneness with the audience and actors that the actors didn’t know whether they were acting and the audience didn’t know whether they were sitting and watching, or had changed positions.” -Clifford Odets
I love hearing people’s stories about what made them decide to pursue a life in the theatre. Often it’s a memory of a high school production that lit them on fire. Gary Sinise, actor and founder of Steppenwolf Theatre Company, talks about being in a high school production of West Side Story. His character spoke two words in total. Didn’t matter. It was the communal experience, the sheer joy, the aliveness, that did it for him. This is an excerpt from his memoir, “Grateful American: A Journey From Self To Service“…
We presented four shows only—and we hit every line on Thursday and Friday nights, nailed it completely on Saturday, and on Sunday night blew the house wide open. And then it was all over. The show. My new community. Me.
The lights came down. The audience burst into applause. As one of the Sharks, I was part of the gang that carried Tony’s dead body offstage. We Sharks set down the body behind the curtain, and Tony came to life again as just good old Jeff Perry, a high school kid who was quickly becoming one of my best friends. Jeff gave me a huge hug, and I burst into tears, and in glorious pandemonium offstage everybody was hugging and slapping each other on the back, with no chance to blow away the snot because it was time for the curtain call.
Out in the auditorium, the audience continued their applause, cheering, shouting, whistling their congratulations, and all the supporting players and chorus members came out onstage in a pack. Including me. As a member of the chorus, I stood far in the back of all the people on stage, and we all took our bows while the audience continued to pound their applause. And then the leads each came out one by one and bowed. They stood at the front of the pack. Tony. Maria. Bernardo. Riff. Chino. Anita. The decibel level in the auditorium notched higher with each lead. Everybody stood to their feet. A standing ovation. The leads all took their bows together. I still hung far in the back. Sobbing harder than ever. My eyes scrunched tight against the tears. Then, in the midst of all the commotion, I felt a hand on my shoulder. Opened my eyes.
The hand was Jeff Melvoin’s. Jeff the senior. Bernardo the Shark. He reached back, grabbed me. Pulled me up toward the front of the pack where the six leads stood. He shouted in my ear to take a bow with all the leads. So I did. Me, this sophomore screwup. Still bawling my eyes out. I stood at the front of the pack, and the audience was still standing, still applauding. Cheering for all of us. I took one long, glorious look around, trying to wipe my nose with my sleeve, and we all bowed again, all together, and I suddenly realized I’d fallen in love with this new community of students. With this new life of theater. It was almost too much to take in.
Later that night, back in the quiet of my room, I flopped on my bed and wondered if maybe Jeff Melvoin had seen far off into the future, to the person I had the potential to become. Because he’d grabbed me on impulse, I was pretty sure, and I doubted if the audience ever knew the fuller story of why he’d pulled this crying sophomore up to the front of the pack. In the last couple of schools where I’d been enrolled—including this one—if I was known by anyone, I was known as a kid who smoked a lot of pot and struggled to find his way in school. But in the past five weeks this play had morphed into a tent revival of sorts. Theater had pointed me toward redemption. The performers in the play had drawn me toward the river, plunged me under, pulled me up, and pushed me forward. Dripping and new. I’d been handed a fresh start, and I felt hopeful.
Grateful.
I realized theater had become my second chance at life, and this second chance caused me to understand I had a lot to be thankful for. A wide-open future. Boundless opportunity. My newfound buoyancy made me want to do something far more with my life than I’d been doing.
Sometimes you try and you fail. Good. You learned something. Trust that was what was supposed to happen. Go help someone else with what you learned.
Sometimes you try and you succeed. Good. You learned something. Trust that was what was supposed to happen. Go help someone else with what you learned.
Notice the two above statements are exactly the same. Except for one word. Can you find the difference?
Spring Moon At Ninomiya Beach by Hasui KawasePerspective by Maria Popova. (Available as a print, benefitting The Nature Conservancy.)
“And the boy loved the tree…….very much. And the tree was happy.” -Shel Silverstein, The Giving Tree
“And…and you know what, maybe I’m crazy. But when I walk through a forest that I saved, when I hear the sound of wind rustling in young trees, trees that I planted myself, I realize that I have my own little bit of control over the climate. And if after thousands of years one person is happier because of it, well then…I can’t tell you the feeling I get when I plant a birch tree and I see it grow up and sprout leaves, I…I mean, I fill up with pride, I…” -Astrov in Uncle Vanya by Anton Chekhov (Annie Baker adaptation)
“The best time to plant a tree is twenty years ago. The second best time is now.” -Chinese Proverb
Very slowly burning, the big forest tree stands in the slight hollow of the snow melted around it by the mild, long heat of its being and its will to be root, trunk, branch, leaf, and know earth dark, sun light, wind touch, bird song. Rootless and restless and warmblooded, we blaze in the flare that blinds us to that slow, tall, fraternal fire of life as strong now as in the seedling two centuries ago. -“Kinship”, a poem by Ursula K. Le Guin
It’s summertime. Get outside. Get some fresh air. Look at the beauty and fullness of the trees and appreciate them for all their majesty.
I’ll leave you with this gorgeous love letter to trees by Herman Hesse… (Courtesy of Susan Cain and Maria Popova. Check out their work here and here.)
For me, trees have always been the most penetrating preachers. I revere them when they live in tribes and families, in forests and groves. And even more I revere them when they stand alone. They are like lonely persons. Not like hermits who have stolen away out of some weakness, but like great, solitary men, like Beethoven and Nietzsche. In their highest boughs the world rustles, their roots rest in infinity; but they do not lose themselves there, they struggle with all the force of their lives for one thing only: to fulfill themselves according to their own laws, to build up their own form, to represent themselves. Nothing is holier, nothing is more exemplary than a beautiful, strong tree. When a tree is cut down and reveals its naked death-wound to the sun, one can read its whole history in the luminous, inscribed disk of its trunk: in the rings of its years, its scars, all the struggle, all the suffering, all the sickness, all the happiness and prosperity stand truly written, the narrow years and the luxurious years, the attacks withstood, the storms endured. And every young farmboy knows that the hardest and noblest wood has the narrowest rings, that high on the mountains and in continuing danger the most indestructible, the strongest, the ideal trees grow.
Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life.
A tree says: A kernel is hidden in me, a spark, a thought, I am life from eternal life. The attempt and the risk that the eternal mother took with me is unique, unique the form and veins of my skin, unique the smallest play of leaves in my branches and the smallest scar on my bark. I was made to form and reveal the eternal in my smallest special detail.
A tree says: My strength is trust. I know nothing about my fathers, I know nothing about the thousand children that every year spring out of me. I live out the secret of my seed to the very end, and I care for nothing else. I trust that God is in me. I trust that my labor is holy. Out of this trust I live.
When we are stricken and cannot bear our lives any longer, then a tree has something to say to us: Be still! Be still! Look at me! Life is not easy, life is not difficult. Those are childish thoughts… Home is neither here nor there. Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all.
A longing to wander tears my heart when I hear trees rustling in the wind at evening. If one listens to them silently for a long time, this longing reveals its kernel, its meaning. It is not so much a matter of escaping from one’s suffering, though it may seem to be so. It is a longing for home, for a memory of the mother, for new metaphors for life. It leads home. Every path leads homeward, every step is birth, every step is death, every grave is mother.
So the tree rustles in the evening, when we stand uneasy before our own childish thoughts: Trees have long thoughts, long-breathing and restful, just as they have longer lives than ours. They are wiser than we are, as long as we do not listen to them. But when we have learned how to listen to trees, then the brevity and the quickness and the childlike hastiness of our thoughts achieve an incomparable joy. Whoever has learned how to listen to trees no longer wants to be a tree. He wants to be nothing except what he is. That is home. That is happiness.
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