Tag: advice
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Be wary of advice
The fallacy of giving advice is that what works for one person rarely works for another. Advice is unique and personal, a collection of warnings we tell ourselves about how to avoid past mistakes, synthesized and abridged for a recipient. “Unsolicited advice is the junk mail of life.” Bernard Williams The best advice we can…
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Visualizing the practice
Visualize the practice, not the result. Actions have goals built into them, giving you a better chance at achieving what you want. Success happens to the idea, not at the force of aim. Because it’s all about the sustained head work and heart work it takes to get there. “Don’t aim at success-the more you…
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The World According to Garp
Below is an excerpt from John Irving’s 1978 novel The World According to Garp: Garp threw away his second novel and began a second novel. Unlike Alice, Garp was a real writer—not because he wrote more beautifully than she wrote but because he knew what every artist should know: as Garp put it, “You only…
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We need the prodding
We need the prodding, we need Mom’s extra push. If it weren’t for other people like Mom, Dad, a coach, brother, or teacher advising us what we should do, important experiences and future cues would go missing. This is not to say that following advice is a prerequisite to success. For one, instructions are subjective…
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‘Intention without action is an insult to those who expect the best from you’
Despite popular belief to the contrary, there is absolutely no power in intention. The seagull may intend to fly away, may decide to do so, may talk with the other seagulls about how wonderful it is to fly, but until the seagull flaps his wings and takes to the air, he is still on the…
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Pulitzer-prize winning novelist Jennifer Egan shares her three rules for writing
In her book Why We Write, 2011’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Jennifer Egan shares three writing tips for aspiring writers: Number two is my favorite piece of advice. Writing is like a muscle that needs to be worked out again and again, kind of like brushing your teeth. After you establish the habit, you should feel a bit empty…