Alexandersmap

    Category: Personal Growth

    • Mastery is a Beacon

      “Besides, isn’t it confoundedly easy to think you’re a great man if you aren’t burdened with the slightest idea that Rembrandt, Beethoven, Dante or Napoleon ever lived?“ — Stefan Zweig, Chess Story

      My mind is still in Vienna as I write this—a city that’s had its fair share of high achievers walk her streets and contribute to humanity’s Great Conversation in their life’s work. Big names roamed those same streets, and you might feel a need to raise your game when you walk with that level of ghosts—I surely did. And shouldn’t we feel this compulsion to close the gap between the masters and where we currently reside?

      The world offers precious few brilliant shining stars. Most of us burn less brilliantly. And yet we burn just the same, and cast our own light on the darkness in the world. We may recognize that we aren’t quite at the level of a master in our field yet still have something to offer anyway. And knowing that there are more brilliant lights in human history, we may choose to stoke our fire—feed it with the fuel necessary to one day burn more brilliantly still.

      What provokes us towards greatness but comparison? We may never reach those levels, few do, but knowing there are heights we haven’t reached yet ought to inspire more. For mastery is a beacon.

    • Vividly Awake

      “Time to leave now, get out of this room, go somewhere, anywhere; sharpen this feeling of happiness and freedom, stretch your limbs, fill your eyes, be awake, wider awake, vividly awake in every sense and every pore.” — Stefan Zweig

      There were so many days during the pandemic when we told ourselves some version of Zweig’s quote. Now that the world is opening up again, we ought to stretch our limbs a bit and see what we’ve been missing while we were sheltering in place. The trick is that when we stir that vitality it’s impossible to revert back to the box we once existed in.

      Travel literally carries us to other places. Figuratively too, naturally, but always with an eye on our previous self and an underlying awareness of what comes next. We become aware of the changes we put ourselves through, as they say, even as we plot the next step.

      Joie de Vivre! We should embrace this freedom to experience the world and make the most our opportunity to squeeze joy out of the marrow of each day. For life is a gift, and so is our chance to fly. If we become what we repeatedly do, shouldn’t we choose to be vividly awake? And save the rest for eternity.

    • Courageously Memorable

      “All I insist on, and nothing else, is that you should show the whole world that you are not afraid. Be silent, if you choose; but when it is necessary, speak—and speak in such a way that people will remember it.” — Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

      Taking the train between Salzburg and Vienna I’m reminded of Salzburg’s famous son, Mozart, who made this journey himself. Doing so launched his contribution to music and humanity to a level than it would have had he stayed home—a level of mastery very few attain in their lifetime. Sure, we know that taking this trip on its own doesn’t make us memorable, we’ve got to deliver the goods when we get there. Young Wolfgang delivered.

      Maybe that’s too much pressure for now. Maybe following in the footsteps of Mozart now might stir inspiration for later. We don’t accomplish great things without a rigorous apprenticeship and the courage to raise our hand when our time comes. Knowing when to raise our hand is as essential as knowing when to keep it down. Yet too many never get around to saying it’s our time. That shouldn’t be us.

      We sense when it is necessary for us to raise our game. We know when we can do more. The world may remain indifferent, but no matter. What matters is that we summon up the courage to rise up and do our very best to make our work memorable.

    • Beyond the Same Place

      “For I assure you, without travel, at least for people from the arts and sciences, one is a miserable creature!…A man of mediocre talents always remains mediocre, may he travel or not–but a man of superior talents, which I cannot deny myself to have without being blasphemous, becomes–bad, if he always stays in the same place.” — Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

      There are forces that work on you when you’re in the middle of travel. Time flexes, and the clock you’re familiar with slips off-kilter. Truthfully, it’s us that slips off-kilter, the clock remains indifferent. Travel forces adaptation and change. Those who stubbornly hold on to their routine aren’t rewarded with the benefit of transformation. Let the world wash over you and the old ways of thinking are swept away. You’re carried to new ideas and lifted to new places.

      In one evening of wine-fueled conversation I practiced German with Austrians, French with a well-travelled Frenchman and discussed the origins of Christian names with an Irish woman. Moments like that remain locked in your mind, even as it releases you from your previous way of looking at the world. We can never stay in the same place, we must reach beyond to grow.

      We’re all on a path of becoming something more than we might otherwise be. Travel done well is a shock to the system, allowing us to get past ourselves. It can’t help but make us better at our work, for it surely transforms us as people.

    • Go, Deeply

      “Nobody ever figures out what life is all about, and it doesn’t matter. Explore the world. Nearly everything is really interesting if you go into it deeply enough.” — Richard P. Feynman

      Each day is an opportunity to discover—inching further along on our search for more insight into who we are. We may never find the true meaning of life, but why do we even dwell on such things? Meaning comes from action. We ought to live deliberately and stack the building blocks into whatever form suits us in our brief dance with the world.

      The world unfolds for us one moment at a time. What do we do with that experience? Shouldn’t we layer it into our identity, not in arrogant claims of global box-checking, but in accumulated bits of flavor and influence? What makes us interesting is our passionate interest in the complex dynamics playing out around us, be that human tendencies or the larger forces in the universe. Immersive travel, reading, listening and education are where we serve our apprenticeship in being citizens of the universe.

      So just when do we transcend apprenticeship? Can we ever, really? We reach closer to mastery when we venture more deeply into the act of living. Boldly layering experience and accumulated knowledge into a rich, meaningful life. And maybe that’s just enough.

    • Silencing Voices

      “If you hear a voice within you say ‘you cannot paint,’ then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced.” — Vincent van Gogh

      When we figure out the truth in van Gogh’s words dictates exactly how creative we’ll be at any given stage of life. He didn’t achieve “success” until he’d left this world, for us the world spends little time worrying about our feelings on the matter. The truth is we have but precious little time to silence our own voices and chase dreams. Why wait?

      The problem we have is we see what the masters do in any field, and compare our work to that. We have difficulty reconciling our incremental step towards mastery with the brilliant work of others before us, without ever considering the stumbles they took on their path. The work evolves when the mind puts aside resistance and gets to it.

      We’ve already made our mark on the world, subtle as it might seem. Our splash ripples even as we contemplate our next dive into the unknown. Knowing this, why not stretch our limits a bit on this next one? Silence our doubters one small step at a time.

    • Widening Circles


      I live my life in widening circles
      that reach out across the world.
      I may not complete this last one
      but I will give myself to it.

      I circle around God, around the primordial tower.
      I’ve been circling for thousands of years
      and I still don’t know: am I a falcon,
      a storm, or a great song?
      — Rainer Maria Rilke

      This act of giving ourselves to it—to experiencing life and being an active part in the dance, is what living is all about. You want meaning in your life? Give yourself to it. Don’t recede into the corner, for we aren’t meant to be wallflowers. Get out and mingle. Find those kindred spirits looking for a spark.

      Readers know I embrace solitude wholeheartedly for the conversation I might have with myself. I celebrate the offseason as much as anyone! Yet those closest to me observe that I actively engage with everyone around me. And why not? Aren’t we all fellow passengers on this cruise through the briefest of time? We ought to give ourselves to the mission and be fully alive in our moment together.

      Today is the beginning of another circle, reaching wider than the last, and carrying us to places previously unencountered. Give yourself to it! The world opens up for us through deliberate intent. Reach out and thrill in where it takes us.

    • The Magic in Emergent Knowledge

      “Call it what you want. Call it belief, faith… stepping out and making a commitment without necessarily knowing what the outcome is going to be. But really leaning into it in good faith. And then you’re along for this beautiful journey of emergent possibilities and learning things and deepening your knowledge of another person and being known in a deeper way than you’ve ever been known before… The fruits and the benefits have been totally different than I thought they would have been before I did it, and I only know them because I did it. So there’s emergent knowledge… that relied on a decision. How often is that the case, where we have to make one decision in order to learn the next thing, or even the benefits of that thing?” — Luke Burgis: The Power of Mimetic Desire [The Knowledge Project Ep. #138]

      This journey of transformation that we’re all on begins with a decision. We choose our path in subtle and profound ways that we don’t fully realize when we decide. Burgis’s description of a beautiful journey of emergent possibilities is a lovely way of phrasing what happens when we finally decide what to be and begin to be it.

      A decision is the cornerstone of the bridge we build to our future in an instant of resolve. That bridge crosses a gap in our knowledge that we aren’t fully aware of in the moment. Isn’t there magic in a decision, and doesn’t that set the table for all the subsequent enlightening moments that follow?

      We gain immeasurably through our decisions—the good ones and the bad. Good decisions reveal themselves in marvelous moments of discovery. Bad decisions aren’t usually so bad that we can’t pivot towards something better. Knowing this, why do we let ourselves be paralyzed about making a decision? There’s something to be said for visualizing the worst case scenario, for it places us in a position to embolden ourselves when we recognize that the worst ain’t all that bad.

      We all ought to unfold the emergent knowledge that comes with acting on bold choices. We all ought to opt for more. For the magic lies between here and there.

    • Our Lifetime Knowledge Quest

      “Knowledge does not come to us by details, but in flashes of light from heaven.” — Henry David Thoreau, Life Without Principle

      Thoreau’s Life Without Principle is a quick read, but well worth the hour or so it takes to digest it. As with anything in life, the question is, what do we want to prioritize in our brief time? The essay is itself a flash of light that opens the mind to a lot of questions we often push aside. Isn’t that what reading should do for us? Isn’t that what we aspire to in our very best writing?

      “I do not know but it is too much to read one newspaper a week. I have tried it recently, and for so long it seems to me that I have not dwelt in my native region. The sun, the clouds, the snow, the trees say not so much to me. You cannot serve two masters. It requires more than a day’s devotion to know and to possess the wealth of a day.…
      Shall the mind be a public arena, where the affairs of the street and the gossip of the tea-table chiefly are discussed? Or shall it be a quarter of heaven itself- an hypaethral temple, consecrated to the service of the gods?
      … We should treat our minds, that is, ourselves, as innocent and ingenuous children, whose guardians we are, and be careful what objects and what subjects we thrust on their attention.” — Henry David Thoreau, Life Without Principle

      Thoreau wrote this for a lecture he gave in 1855, but doesn’t it remain timeless? Why do we dwell on the gossip of our own day and defer the very best ideas for another? Most media is junk food for the mind. We snack way too much on empty calories in our information diet, leaving our souls starving for nutrition.

      We must make knowledge our quest in our short time. If the best way to learn something is to teach it, it follows that we must tackle the deepest ideas in our own writing and conversations too. To participate in the Great Conversation and aspire to enlighten others as we become enlightened ourselves.

      We become what we focus on the most. So it follows, we ought to continue to raise the bar on our own development. To realize a full and rich life, we ought to make our lives a knowledge quest. Each day offers its own wealth to mine. And an opportunity to be a philanthropist with that knowledge.

    • The Ritual Rewards

      “Men will lie on their backs, talking about the fall of man, and never make an effort to get up.” — Henry David Thoreau, Life Without Principle

      I’d recently fallen back into a cycle of drinking coffee from a K-cup. There was a lot happening in my life, and it was a fast way to caffeinate. But what I missed in the instant was the ritual of grinding my coffee beans, boiling water and sending bliss through an AeroPress into a favorite mug. Sure, the coffee tastes far better, but the ritual itself also rewards with moments of contemplation. The mind is free to consider what it will, free for a few minutes from the instant gratification of our modern world.

      When we unconsciously work our way through a ritual, the world opens up for us, or maybe it falls away altogether. A space is created in the cadence of the familiar, and in that gap we find our true voice. Think of it as a quiet conversation between friends, but the friends reside between the same set of ears. It’s as essential in our days as brushing our teeth or building something of substance with the tools available to us at this moment in our development.

      Ritual places us on auto-pilot, offering clearly-defined stepping stones in our day that carry us to a place we very much want to arrive at. We’ve all seen what happens to the days that lack ritual: they slip away into lost opportunity. Indeed, we may wonder either way; “Where did the day go?”, but with ritual we’ve at least tackled a few of the things we most needed to to make that day a success.

      At the end of the day, isn’t it fair to ask if our time was productive? And where is our most essential work but on ourselves? Ritual gives us a leg to stand on. We lift ourselves up from the our previous state and get on with the business of becoming. We’re rewarded for the rituals we fold into our lives with the delight in becoming who we’ve wanted to be. And also in those moments of profound richness the ritual itself offers.