Become More Serious | #222

May 13th, 2023: Greetings from Austin. Was feeling a bit fired up about something this week. Hope you like it.

I think it’s worth trying to become more serious about your life.

The most serious people I know are the most playful, the most alive, and the most inspiring.

But we think of being serious as a bad thing. “You’re too serious.”

No.

To be serious is to give a damn at a time when most people have stopped giving a damn.

I’m echoing Katherine Boyle who writes:

seriousness is no longer a trait we celebrate in people, replaced by the shield of irony that permeates every conversation, every tweet and so many interactions we have with each other. The ironic voice dominates our online discourse and media culture. Our critics and chroniclers mock the new and the bold and those who are deadly serious about their missions as though they’re relics of a bygone era.

But it is hard to be serious.

I was told by many adults when I was younger that I was cynical for questioning why so many people were wasting their time at work.

To be serious was to go along with the game.

Please stop asking questions, Paul.

But really, they were the cynical ones.

My friend Danny Miranda wrote something this week, “caring is a competitive advantage.”

He cares. I’ve seen it up close. It’s inspiring and it’s motivated me to care more.

For years with my writing, I played small. Critiques would knock me off my game for weeks.

I was scared to go inward and let it rip. Put the heart on the page.

Writing my book helped me let go of the anger I had in my body and it also helped me lean into a more sustainable and positive energy. I got serious.

People living the lives they are capable of matters.

I heard something beautiful on Aaron Alexander’s podcast with the lion tracker Boyd Varty this week. He riffed on what he thought “modern activism” should looks like:

To become someone who lives on the track of your own life. So you work out what it would mean to go inward and find your way to your gift, your purpose, your essence.

It’s incredible what happens around a person that’s found that.

At a deeper level when you’re around someone thats really in their essence, really in their mission you can feel it in them.

There’s something about their life that you look at it and you feel yourself lean forward in your chair and you feel like you can just feel the depth of it and it starts to wake you up to what’s possible

To be serious is to believe that this is true.

To be cynical is to reject it and to play a game you don’t enjoy.

Lean into what brings you alive.

Give a damn about something.

And if you don’t yet, you can find it.

Go looking.

It’s time to get serious.

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Thanks For Reading!

I am focused on building a life around exploring ideas, connecting and helping people, and writing. I’ve also recently launched a community called Find The Others. There are weekly writing sessions, monthly “find the others” (literally) meetups and general supportive vibes.

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