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    #97 Not loneliness. Solitude.

    All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone

    Blaise Pascal, https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/19682-all-of-humanity-s-problems-stem-from-man-s-inability-to-sit

    We often equate sitting quietly in a room alone with loneliness: a word with a negative emotional charge.

    But sitting quietly in a room can also bring solitude: the simple state of being by yourself, without any negative connotation.

    Solitude can give relief of the pressure to be constantly “socializing” (through social media apps or in real life).

    Relief of the pressure to socialize can make space.

    Space you can use to hear the thoughts in your head and the feelings in your body.

    Thoughts and feelings that can tell you what’s truly important to you.

    And then you realize that what’s truly important to you is nothing new.

    It’s something you already knew, before you learned not to listen.

  • #546 The easiest path to where you want to go

    The easiest path is to miss all days – you never get going in the first place so you don’t know what you’re missing.

    The second easiest is to never miss a day – you’ll get where you want to go with little detours, even if you pay the cost of discipline.

    The hardest (and most common) path is to miss a couple of days here and there – now you run the risk of getting lost.

    We all miss a day sometimes – so we all get a little lost once in a while.

    So what do we do?

    We remind ourselves why we got started.

    We remind ourselves where we’re going.

    We remind ourselves that we’ve been lost before – and that we can always get back on track.

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    #172 The pursuit of failure

    I can’t just say, “today, I’m going to be excellent at writing.”

    Excellence is an outcome: a result of focused daily actions.

    And one of the fastest ways to excellence is the pursuit of failure.

    Not just making accidental mistakes but actively seeking them out.

    Did I write nonsense today? Did I understand why I was writing nonsense? Have I learned something from writing that nonsense that will help me write something less nonsensical tomorrow?

    The pursuit of failure is painful, especially for perfectionists like me.

    But once ego, perfectionism, and the fear of failure make way for a commitment to the process, there’s much to learn from daily mistakes.

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