“I get up every morning around 7AM…” San Diego. March 2016. I think. I was standing with a group of mimosa-sipping business owners, when someone asked about my writing schedule. “First I shower. Then I meditate. Then I sit down to write.” I described my process, and how I feel at a visceral level when …
One spring morning in 2010, I woke up, ambled over to my computer, and discovered my partners cheated me out of a business. I didn’t find out by receiving a long email. Or even an angry phone call. Instead, it was because I checked on something that seemed slightly amiss. The day before, one of …
Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. I focused on the gaps between my footfalls – when I floated through space, and my spine lengthened and aligned. Then, when my feet landed, coiling like springs… I focused on blasting off again, from my hips. It was around 8AM, just south of downtown Baltimore, at the Inner Harbor. I …
One early morning, while it was still dark outside, a friend of mine bolted awake in a cold sweat. Even though he lived under a roof with his wife and five children, he felt completely alone. Because, instead of providing for them, he was leading the entire family into a death spiral of debt. Just …
The school hallway loomed as large as an airplane hangar as I paced towards the Principal’s Office. Without the crowds of kids shuffling from class to class, or dashing out the door to busses, everything felt eerily quiet and empty. Especially to a small nine-year-old. I was in trouble for something. Most of the time, …
A couple evenings after launching Should You Date Nate, I stood in my bedroom doing a brief standing meditation. Similar to a practice called zhan zhuang. After a couple minutes, I sensed a peculiar, pleasant energy flowing to me from all directions. And from many, many different sources. As if I were standing in the …
“It’d be nice to be locked in a prison cell,” I thought. I sat in my condo in Boulder, Colorado, facing a television set. Tuned to some blaring nonsense. Papers were strewn about my floor. Outside chirped a world full of distractions. I was pondering productivity. Going deep – mastering something. “If I were locked …
Back in 2009, I remember driving from Boulder, CO to my relatives in Massachusetts for Thanksgiving. Past endless corn fields, elegant New York woods, and plenty gas stations in between. I was broke and scared Both the conscious and subconscious parts of my brain were wired for fear and panic. Creatively, I was completely shut …
Close to midnight. Thursday, October 12, 2017. Feeling melancholy. I sat on the light rail at Denver International Airport, headed downtown. Finally coming home after almost a month of straight travel. LA… Portland… Vegas… Chicago… Baltimore… Cabo… … and back. On the flight from Cabo to the layover in LA, I talked with a nice …