ChangeThis RSS

"After losing my way in life, just a bit, I re-launched a writing career—a childhood dream—and began to send work to literary magazines. I was bursting with hope for affirmation of my great skill and broad experience. Editors would be glad I sent them work. I would be a literary star. I sent out stories and essays confidently at first. Months later I would get a reply in the mail—from The Paris Review, for example (I'm a sucker for the biggest names). I would stand motionless, desperate for acceptance, floating amongst the stars with hope. I'd slip my finger under a loose corner of the flap and tear. Take the slip of paper and hold it up to my near-sighted eyes. The pain of rejection dragged me from the stars into the red-hot magma at the core of the earth. I'd get a letter from a lit magazine and cringe at the pain I was about to feel. I would try to cut off hope—it seemed easier than to be disappointed again. Then I'd hope against hope, wishing for that surge of affirmation from being accepted. But I knew at this point that it wasn't likely. I'd whip through those three stages several times. Then I would say, 'Open it. It might just be what you want to hear.' I was right twice. But hundreds of times I got a rejection, and each one floored me for days, if not weeks. But I chose each time to keep working at my craft. I may be more talented at dogged perseverance than I am at creative writing. It doesn't matter. I have to write. If I don't, Franz Kafka's quote comes true: "A non-writing writer is a monster courting insanity." ... So I've bird-dogged my goal: to keep out of the asylum and instead to benefit the world as my Higher Power wants me to do."

"When you look back on your life, what would you change? Many of you might wish you had spent more time with family and friends. Some of you might wish you had spent more time outside or doing things you love. The good news is, you can actually make a simple change that will grant you these wishes, and probably many other wishes you have. Change the way you interact with technology. What does that mean? Well, let me ask the question another way. How many of you, when looking back, wish you had spent even more time on social media? More time on Slack or answering emails? More time aimlessly surfing YouTube looking at random cat tricks or strange but useless videos? More time looking at the perfect vacation pictures of high school acquaintances you don't really care that much about? More time checking texts for work late at night? The way we use technology is, far too often, broken, brain dead and utterly dehumanizing. It is negatively impacting our happiness. And it needs to change. This is not to say we can or should pull the plug. We are past a point where we can comfortably exist in society without technology."

"Adding digital capability to a product or to an entire business may improve it and make it more profitable, but technology alone is not enough to propel the kind of sustained growth that can transform your whole enterprise. The business model that goes with that technology is absolutely key to its success or failure. This was true when Amazon sold its first book online in 1995, when Netflix shipped its first DVD in 1998, and when Apple launched its revolutionary iPod in 2001. It was true in 2011, when Uber dispatched its first car, and it is even more true today. But it is still not widely understood."