You are sure to run out of this
View this email in your browser (|ARCHIVE|) This issue of CreativeBoost starts off with something personal.
But I promise you, there’s a point to it.
I’m going to start off by telling you a bit about my father.
He has been on my mind a lot lately even though he’s been gone for 16 years.
My dad had the gift of being outstanding at just about everything he did. I don’t just say that because I am his son. He was just one of those people that had a way of making creativity look easy.
But he also was a deeply unhappy person.
He never seemed to figure out how to just enjoy life. Instead, he lived—as best as I could tell—in a state of constant fear about money.
He grew up poor and like many who pull themselves out of hardship, he spent the rest of his life working to put as much distance as he could between a comfortable present and a difficult past.
I don’t fault him for that. But by giving in to his fears, he was eventually consumed by them.
I too was fearful of many things when I was younger. For the longest time, I thought maybe I’d wind up getting as stressed as my Dad did about things.
But I’m not him. I’m the sum of my own experiences.
Seeing someone destroy himself that way taught me that no matter who you are, you can always make more money. Your existence is not defined by its accumulation.
Even the options that money affords pales in comparison to our most important non-renewable resource: time.
And since we’re being honest here, let me tell you my biggest fear: losing the freedom to control my time as I see fit.
Sometimes I spend it working harder than I ever have before in my career. But only sometimes. As a result, I’m doing my best work in a fraction of time it used to take.
The best gift you can give yourself is time to do what scares you. Or what makes your curious. Or what makes you feel like you are way out of your depths.
John Maeda, the former president of the Rhode Island School of Design, says it best. “It’s so easy to stay within our biases. But what inspires creativity is exposing yourself to what might make you feel uncomfortable or different.”
Your best work and most meaningful experiences come from valuing your time above all else.
Don’t spend your life being afraid of running out of the wrong things.
Very best, Patrick http://twitter.com/intent/tweet?text=|URL:MC_SUBJECT|: |URL:ARCHIVE_LINK_SHORT| Tweet (http://twitter.com/intent/tweet?text=|URL:MC_SUBJECT|: |URL:ARCHIVE_LINK_SHORT|) http://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=|URL:ARCHIVE_LINK_SHORT| Share (http://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=|URL:ARCHIVE_LINK_SHORT|)
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