All he wants to do is sail back home to England, but, as John Blackthorne learns the hard way, 16th-century-Japan isn’t exactly a place you can enter and leave at will. Surrounded by samurai and the cunning Lord Yoshii Toranaga, who aspires to become Shogun, John is glad to keep his head longer than a week.

As time wears on, however, he manages to prove himself useful to Toranaga. Among other things, he teaches the Lord’s cannon regiment how to actually aim their devices. For his services and intel, John receives not only comfortable shelter and home support but also, at one point, a pheasant the Lord hunted down himself.

As he carries the bird back to his house, Toranaga, all excited, explains to his staff that now, for a few days, the bird must hang outside to preserve it. After all, it should become “the best pheasant this village has ever prepared,” and cleaning game this way is an old English tradition. He tells everyone to listen up and that no one should touch the animal for a while. Due to the language barrier, however, most of what he says falls on deaf ears. So, in hopes of making himself clear, he proceeds in broken Japanese: “Forbidden, yes? If touch, die!”

John’s staff is aghast. In Japan’s warm climate, all the pheasant will do is rot and smell. But for lack of communication, they put up with his request. Over the next week, John goes about his days. He smiles at Fuji, his maid. He laughs with Uejiro, his gardener. And he keeps training Toranaga’s soldiers. One rainy day, however, as Blackthorne returns home, something in town seems to be amiss.

When he enters his yard, John can see the pheasant missing from its hook near the bungalow’s roof. Meanwhile, his staff are shuffling about, looking at their feet, no one daring to meet his eyes. “What is it? What’s the matter with everyone?” Shakily, Fuji points at the place where the bird used to be. “Oh, the pheasant? Who took it?” “Uejiro,” Fuji responds. “Our gardener? It’s fine. It’d been up there long enough anyway. Old bastard should get a medal just for being able to climb up there.” But when he tells Fuji to fetch the friendly face, she only has bad news: “Uejiro is dead.” John’s jaw drops to the floor, but as she bows her head, fully expecting him to take her life as well, Fuji reminds him of his own words: “If touch, die.”

The next day, John, with the help of his translator Mariko, requests to leave Japan immediately. But Lord Toranaga still has plans for him, and so, for better or for worse, John must explain his worries. “He asks what troubles you,” Mariko interprets. “I’m troubled by your whole damned country,” John responds. “Life has no value to you. Only the meaningless rituals you are trapped in. Like Uejirou. Who died for nothing.” Why didn’t anyone consult John about the pheasant? How could they just put an old man to death without a second thought? John is deeply scarred by everyone’s behavior, and yet…

“It is my understanding that you ordered no one to touch that bird,” Mariko remarks. “And by law, your house could not disobey that order. Nor could they allow the rotting pheasant to ruin the peace of the village.” To deal with the conundrum, John’s staff asked the village headman, but he considered it to be a homemade issue, and, therefore, the home had to resolve it. In the end, Mariko explains, Uejiro volunteered. He stole the stinking pheasant, buried it, and took his punishment with pride.

“The bird meant nothing to me,” John says, still incredulous of what has occurred. But, like Fuji, Mariko reminds him—this time in his own language: “Your words gave it meaning.” It is only here that it finally dawns on John that, even in a foreign country and in a foreign language, his words still have consequences: “I killed him. Lord forgive me. I killed that old man.”

Whether it’s a snide comment at work, a book which kindles emotions deep in your soul, or a few words uttered carelessly, misinterpreted to a terrible degree: In the end, it’s you who gives life meaning. No one else.

“You are the creator and the interpreter of your life in every moment,” Shannon Lee writes in Be Water, My Friend. “Even if the meaning you are using came from someone else, you still chose to adopt this meaning and use it. You are in charge.” Upon hearing the same phrase, one person chooses to be insulted. Another chooses to feel compassion. One decides the world is a terrible place, another the world is a place which deserves healing.

“Realize that you are powerful,” Shannon encourages us. “Don’t give your agency to others or to negativity or to circumstance. Don’t hinder your abilities. Your world has no meaning except for the meaning you give it, and maybe there’s no need to give it any meaning. Stepping stones or stumbling blocks—the choice is yours.”

After the incident, John weighs his words more carefully. He re-erects the rock Uejiro had placed in his garden. Following an earthquake, he offers Lord Toranaga his swords, for a samurai must never be without them. John even tells him a fake story about the origin of those swords, a story the entire village has maintained for decades in order to keep Fuji’s memory of her father intact.

True purpose or meaningless rituals? The importance of everything lies entirely in our own hands, heads, and hearts. You give life meaning. Never abandon that power.

Being a world-famous author. Selling a million books. The first time I realized these two things needn’t go hand in hand, I was listening to Tim Ferriss talk to Noah Kagan on his podcast. “The half-life of fame,” Tim said, “is going to drop precipitously as algorithm-chasing becomes more and more dominant and more and more determinant of what is surfaced.”

There used to be only a handful of cable TV networks. If they all played Oprah Winfrey’s talk show, of course everyone would know Oprah. And they did. But now, Tim said, everyone gets their own, personally curated feed. There are millions of creators and micro-influencers, and micro-bubbles of attention they inhabit. Instead of having your pick of 10 fashion bloggers, you can probably find 10 in your town alone, another 10 dominant in your country, and then another 10,000 across the globe who are also creating interesting work.

Even in your personal sphere, you can notice it, Tim explains. 15 years ago, the viral video of the week would indeed last all week. Everyone you talked to on the regular had seen it. Nowadays, most people will not recognize most of the memes you send them, and even the ones who are infinitely more popular than anything from 15 years ago used to be fizzle out after a few hours of fame.

A million people is just 0.01% of the world’s population. If I keep writing good books and selling them for a reasonable price, can I get one of my books into the hands of that many people? I don’t see why not. I start with the ones I know, and then I go from there. Fame? That’s not required, is it?

In the end, Tim finds the right questions to ask: “If what you do is less and less persistent, meaning it has less and less durability, what game are you signing up for, and what does winning that game look like?”

Fame is dying, and that’s okay. Maybe, instead of more superstars, all we need is folks doing good work in every corner of the globe.

In late February and early March, we had a remarkable stretch of sunny days. For around two weeks, the sun showed up almost without fail. Temperatures went to 10, sometimes 15 degrees Celsius, and you could walk around in a t-shirt, even sit outside for stretches at a time.

The first time the sun came out, I skipped around outside, literally jumping with joy that winter was coming to a close. On that and several subsequent days, I mentioned the weather in my gratitude journal. But one morning, I sat down on my couch, looked outside, and went: “Ah, another sunny day.” The curse of habituation had set in.

This time, however, at least I caught myself: “Wait a minute. It’s not another sunny day. It’s a sunny day. An outlier in March. A gift. A singular moment to enjoy, even if similar moments came before it in the last few weeks.” It’s funny: Once we realize we’re getting used to something good, we become extra grateful for that goodness lasting as long as it has. If we don’t, however, we not only miss out on bonus gratitude, we also stop seeing some of the original goodness to begin with.

Will you live life in monochrome or technicolor? Sometimes, the difference comes down to the smallest realization—like that today is not just “another” sunny day.

I’ve been studying Bruce Lee since 2018. If you had asked me at any point who his wife was, I would have told you with 100% certainty: Linda Lee Caldwell.

Yesterday, I looked her up again, and I noticed the list of her spouses. Her last husband’s name? Bruce Cadwell. “Hmm, Cadwell. Cadwell. Wait. Oh my god!” I glanced over to the title of her Wikipedia page, and sure enough: Her name is Linda Lee Cadwell. There is no “l” before the “d” in her last name.

How can someone misremember a name they’ve seen dozens, maybe hundreds of times? First impression–blindness. You see it once, your brain takes a picture, and swoosh, it’s filed away. “Ahh, I know this, got it. Moving on.” Except when, well, you don’t actually know this.

Every now and then, take a second look—especially at the intimately familiar.

A student said to Master Ichu, “Please write for me something of great wisdom.” Master Ichu picked up his brush and wrote one word: “Attention.”

The student said, “Is that all?” The master wrote, “Attention. Attention.” The student became irritable. “That doesn’t seem profound or subtle to me.”

In response, Master Ichu wrote simply, “Attention. Attention. Attention.” In frustration, the student demanded, “What does this word ‘attention’ mean?” Master Ichu replied, “Attention means attention.”

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We live in a world where many people seek attention without minding how they spend their own. But is attention-seeking even the behavior which most deserves your attention? Many would-be influencers never ask the question, and by the time they succeed, they realize the answer was “No,” now having to sacrifice even more attention in managing all the attention they fought so hard to attain.

But even those of us who choose not to play the public fame game can learn plenty from Master Ichu. I wake up at 7 AM every weekday morning. I start work at nine. The time in-between is earmarked for writing this blog and my next book—but that doesn’t mean a lot of writing always happens. I might read the news, get pulled into a chat on my phone, or obsess over some Pokémon card deal. The time is there, but if the attention isn’t, what does it matter?

That’s why attention management is more important than time management. Attention is where the buck stops—the most finite resource you have. “It has to be intentional, not accidental,” our attention, “and therein lies a kind of effort,” Karin Ryuku Kempe comments on the above Zen story. “It needs to be complete, not split by competing mental activity, daydreams or planning.”

Attention, real attention, is how we close the gap, Kempe says: “In awareness, we are our life. Our life is us.” There is nothing in-between.

Don’t hold back. Life is a full-contact sport. Make the time, but, more importantly, show up. Attention, attention, attention.

Beast Games is a typical reality TV competition in many ways. There are cash prizes. Players must answer quiz questions and complete physical challenges. The host, Jimmy Donaldson aka MrBeast himself, stokes the fire and hypes everyone for each next segment.

But Beast Games is also unlike any TV show you’ve ever seen. It’s bigger. The $5 million cash prize was the largest in history. So was the number of 1,000 contestants. And the show broke over 40 Guinness records along the way. The show is also better, both logistically and conceptually. With more cameras to film more angles, it feels like a movie instead of watching security camera footage. The storyline has been thought through to the end, with plot twists leading to real gut-wrenching irrespective of which contestants are eliminated.

Perhaps most importantly, however, Beast Games is actual reality TV: It is unscripted. Instead of feeding people lines to say, choosing winners in advance, and framing the results a certain way, they decided to capture real life as it occurred—and then edit accordingly. It is this, the show’s naturalness, that makes one dynamic I’ve observed particularly wholesome: When the TV is real, so is the karma. Destiny will always do her job.

Early in the games, players resort to all kinds of tactics to make it to the next round. Some challenges pit them against one another in teams, others make everyone fight as individuals. At times, bribes are an option, and so is lying to get ahead. Two brothers make generous use of the last one, teaming up where they can, saying whatever to move forward.

The further the games progress, however, the more dishonesty seems to run out as a fruitful tactic. During a quiz game, a young fellow named Akira single-handedly sends both of the cunning brothers home. “I came here with a mission, and that is to give people a shot at the prize who actually deserve it.” Wow!

Two contestants who are last to compete for an entire island decide to not play Jimmy’s game at all. Instead of trying to tempt their opponent into picking the wrong suitcase, the one without the deed to the land, they leave the winner up to chance.

Twana Barnett, a consistent force in the games all the way to the end, has impressed others with her integrity time and again. As a team captain, she declined a million dollars to keep her fellow players in the game. Whenever she had a chance to gain an unfair advantage, she didn’t take it—and thus received many votes every time it was up to all participants to pick a favorite.

And the winner? They barely stood out in the lead-up to the finale. They were kind, smart, and honest, and it is with those same traits that they ultimately took home the grand prize.

Beast Games is full of interesting lessons. For creators. Entertainers. And anyone who wants to up their social understanding. But if there’s one idea that’ll stand the test of time better than all the others, one that plenty of contestants attested to after being eliminated, it’s this: Play the game of life with integrity—because if nothing else, at least you’ll have no regrets.

Our landlord gives us a nice bottle of champagne or some other drink every year. We have yet to return the favor. Whenever we’ll do it, our timing won’t be as great as his. It won’t be Christmas, or the new year, or the anniversary of when we moved in. Most likely, it’ll be a random Tuesday—and that just might make it all the better.

It’s fun and honorable to try and do a great job when presents are in order. It’s a different yet just as noble gig to make a kind gesture when no one asked for it. Whether it’s a bar of chocolate, a postcard, or the right emoji in the chat, make it unexpected.

Here’s to Tuesday gifts!

I’m currently reviewing the designs and videos for an animated course about blockchain. There are four different reviewers, each with a different focus. Mine is around correctness and consistency. In other words: nitpicking about grammar and spelling, mostly.

“We should not capitalize this word.” “This should be one word, not two.” “Plural makes more sense here.” As in all business ventures, everything that needs changing slows down the time to market. Therefore, I’m sure not everyone involved sees the point in obsessing over such details. “Who cares if it’s capitalized here and not there?” “It’s still the same phrase even if we merge it.”

Technically, they’re right. You could ship a product that’s at 95% and most people wouldn’t bat an eye. But if I can see a lack of consistency, there must be others who can see it too. And even if my company wasn’t one that prided itself on its thoroughness and academic rigor, I would always flag every issue I’d address if the project were entirely my own. Why?

The problem with shipping a product you know has minor flaws are not the minor flaws themselves—it’s all the other mistakes, both large and small, that you’ll miss, be it organically or for lack of trying to fix the little snags. Every typo you fix could open the door to spotting a bigger problem. And even once you rectify all the typos, there’ll still be flaws in your final result. Since nothing will ever be perfect, doing your very best is just good enough. It’s the most you can do but also the least you can do—and therefore exactly right.

Don’t skip the last five percent. Go all the way, and in the end, you’ll always have gone as far as you could possibly go.

I’m part of several groups where deals are to be had on the regular. Interesting crypto coins, cheap Pokémon card products, even seed stage venture deals. The deal flow is never-ending, yet I only catch a handful of good ones every year, if that. Why? It’s too much information to assess, let alone filter. Plus: timing.

Whatever they are, the best deals always sell out fast. Didn’t you see the email? Didn’t you get the Discord notification? For anyone who has a life outside of making deals, 99% of the time, the answer will be, “No, I did not.”

I once tried to build a custom system with only relevant notifications. The result? Still too many deals, still too much irrelevant info, still sold out. But then how do good deals happen? Organically, usually.

It’s when I dawdle around in the chat anyway on a Saturday morning that I might catch wind of a pre-release dropping later that day. “Ah, now we’re talking!” I prepare for that one event, I get my order in, and I’m done. I stumble across a post from a few days ago, and I realize the coin has dropped even further in price since then. “Oh, that might be interesting.”

Making good deals takes time—you can rush as much as you want to find them, but they won’t gravitate towards you any faster. You’re much better off living your life, preparing, recharging, generating capital to invest in good deals when they come. Chasing deals too hard will only sap your energy.

You don’t have to catch every bus to get to where you want to go. The right one is enough. Trust karma to deliver, and remember to strike when the time comes.

I’m working on my next book in 20-minute increments. I don’t find the time every day, and when I do, I might only be able to write a paragraph. Of course, the next day, I might have to tweak, cut, or rewrite that paragraph. Glaciers move faster than me, and while I do sometimes worry about my progress, I also kind of love it.

Getting a full-time job came with a license to reclaim my creative freedom. Every day when I write exactly what I want the way I want, I’m redeeming that license. No more compromises. The work is the work, and it takes as long as it takes. If I need five years to write a book one paragraph at a time, so be it.

A snail’s pace is still a pace—and I’m done rushing.