Richard Feynman kept a dozen problems in his head at all times. Not to solve them. To carry them. Whenever he encountered a new idea or technique, he tested it against each problem. Most of the time, nothing happened. Occasionally, something clicked.
I've borrowed the practice. This is the current set. Most of these live at the seam between the personal and the professional, and I've stopped trying to keep them tidy.
1. If most of the time I have with my kids under one roof is already spent, what changes about tomorrow?
Somebody ran the math on this and I haven't recovered. My oldest is ten. Most of the days I'll spend under the same roof are already behind me. The love keeps growing. What runs out is the ordinary stuff, the tucked-in bedtimes and drives to soccer practice that feel like nothing until they're gone.
I want that math to work as a filter. I keep catching myself using it as pressure instead.
I want that math to work as a filter. I keep catching myself using it as pressure instead.
2. Why do some organizations produce people who feel like themselves at work, while others produce people who feel like actors?
I've worked inside both kinds. When the pretending starts, you can hear it in the parking lot before you can prove it in the numbers. People stop talking the way they talked in the meeting.
The question I keep circling is what makes the difference small enough to design. Compensation matters less than I thought. Something else, harder to name, matters more.
The question I keep circling is what makes the difference small enough to design. Compensation matters less than I thought. Something else, harder to name, matters more.
3. Whose approval am I still chasing that I stopped needing years ago?
I spent a lot of my career treating milestones as passwords, chasing the next title or the next room like it would let me in. The pattern worked long enough to become invisible.
Now I catch myself performing for audiences that stopped watching. Some moved on years ago. Some never existed in the first place. The residue is the interesting part.
Now I catch myself performing for audiences that stopped watching. Some moved on years ago. Some never existed in the first place. The residue is the interesting part.
4. What am I refusing to enjoy today because I've quietly promised myself I'll enjoy it later?
Bill Perkins wrote a whole book about this and I still fall for it. The trip when the kids are older. The long dinners I keep filing under someday.
The future arrives. What's less certain is whether the version of me that shows up will still know how to enjoy the thing. That skill doesn't compound if you don't practice it.
The future arrives. What's less certain is whether the version of me that shows up will still know how to enjoy the thing. That skill doesn't compound if you don't practice it.
5. When does pressure produce my best work, and when does it corrode it?
I've defined my own happiness for years as calm and challenge held together. They have to stay in the right ratio, and I have a bad habit of noticing the ratio is off only after the damage is done.
The question underneath is whether I can feel the shift in real time. Most people confuse urgency with importance. The good ones learn to tell them apart before the calendar tells them, and I'm still working on that.
The question underneath is whether I can feel the shift in real time. Most people confuse urgency with importance. The good ones learn to tell them apart before the calendar tells them, and I'm still working on that.
6. Who am I quietly running out of time with and not paying attention to?
Parents and old friends. The people you assume will always be there because they always have been. Nobody schedules these relationships, which is how the calendar makes them disappear.
This needs a scheduling answer. Which relationships have an expiration date I'm not tracking, and what would a scoreboard I actually check look like?
This needs a scheduling answer. Which relationships have an expiration date I'm not tracking, and what would a scoreboard I actually check look like?
7. What motivates people who already have enough?
Most motivation frameworks assume scarcity. Money, status, security, recognition. They work until they've been solved, and then they start producing diminishing returns you can feel in the room.
I'm interested in the second act. What pulls a person forward once the basics are handled? I've seen a few good answers and a lot of expensive ones that don't work. I haven't figured this out yet.
I'm interested in the second act. What pulls a person forward once the basics are handled? I've seen a few good answers and a lot of expensive ones that don't work. I haven't figured this out yet.
8. What do I already know about myself that I've never said out loud?
Most of what I could know about myself is already sitting there. What's missing is a witness, somebody who hears me say it out loud so I can't quietly unsay it later.
There are things about how I work and where I'm afraid that I've circled for years without naming. The question I sit with is why the naming is so hard. I think the resistance is that once something is said out loud, it's harder to keep negotiating with. And I've spent a long time keeping the negotiation open.
There are things about how I work and where I'm afraid that I've circled for years without naming. The question I sit with is why the naming is so hard. I think the resistance is that once something is said out loud, it's harder to keep negotiating with. And I've spent a long time keeping the negotiation open.
9. Why do I keep treating ordinary days as rehearsals for events that never come?
Weddings, launches, milestones, promotions. I load meaning onto the big days and then feel hollow when they pass. The random Wednesday I'll never remember carried the actual life.
I'd like a working practice for treating the ordinary as the point. Something structural enough to survive a Tuesday when nothing feels meaningful. What would I do on a Tuesday if I stopped believing something bigger was coming to justify it?
I'd like a working practice for treating the ordinary as the point. Something structural enough to survive a Tuesday when nothing feels meaningful. What would I do on a Tuesday if I stopped believing something bigger was coming to justify it?
10. Where does inspiration go when I'm too busy to receive it?
Ideas don't disappear so much as fail to land. I've been in seasons where a book or a walk would have moved me a year earlier, and it slid off without a mark. That's not the book's fault.
I want to understand what makes a season porous and what makes it sealed. I suspect it has less to do with time and more to do with margin, but I'd like to know for sure before I keep giving away the wrong thing.
I want to understand what makes a season porous and what makes it sealed. I suspect it has less to do with time and more to do with margin, but I'd like to know for sure before I keep giving away the wrong thing.
11. What's the real difference between spending time with someone and being with them?
I can be in the room and not be in the room, and my kids can tell every time. So can Alyssa. So can anyone, but only children have the honesty to say it out loud.
I'm looking for a working definition of presence that isn't a mindfulness cliché. Something practical enough to install in a Tuesday night when the phone is heavy and I'm three tabs open.
I'm looking for a working definition of presence that isn't a mindfulness cliché. Something practical enough to install in a Tuesday night when the phone is heavy and I'm three tabs open.
12. Who am I when the calendar is empty?
There's a version of me that shows up under pressure, another in front of a room, another at the dinner table, another in the middle of an argument. All of them are real. But when the schedule opens up and nobody needs anything, a different person appears, and I don't know him as well as I should.
I've started guarding solo mornings. The productivity is beside the point; they're the only time I get to meet him.
I've started guarding solo mornings. The productivity is beside the point; they're the only time I get to meet him.
These aren't rhetorical. I collect notes, quotes, books, and conversations against each one. If you're thinking about any of these problems, or if you think I'm asking the wrong version of the right question, I'd like to hear from you. Pick a time to talk.