In 1997, at the age of 27, Matt Damon won his first Academy Award for Best Screenplay ("Good Will Hunting").
After Damon won the Oscar, he went home, sat down on his sofa, & looked at the award.
As he looked at it, he was suddenly overwhelmed by a heartbreaking thought.
"Imagine chasing that, and not getting it, and getting it finally in your 80s or your 90s with all of life behind you and realizing what an unbelievable waste of your life...It can't fill you up. If that's a hole that you have, that won't fill it."
"My heart broke," Damon said. "I imagined another one of me [not getting that award until I was] an old man, and going like, 'oh my god. where did my life go? What have I done?' And then it's over."
Takeaway 1:
Many successful, rich, famous, etc. people talk about chasing success, money, fame, etc., getting it, and realizing that it didn't feel like they thought it would. That it didn't, as Damon said, fill the hole they had.
One of my favorite analogies for this pattern comes from Sam Hinkie.
Hinkie was asked about what he's learned from reading Robert Caro's books—about some very successful, rich, famous, etc. people.
"I think of it like the Pacific Salmon," Hinkie said. "They spend their whole life making this journey upstream to spawn in this one spot. And as soon as they do, they die. That's largely what Caro shows you."
Takeaway 2:
Before he was a big-time comedian, Hasan Minhaj was asked if he thought he was going to become a big-time comedian.
“I don’t like that question,” he said. “I fundamentally don’t like that question.”
Because that question implies that he is only doing comedy as a means to some end (success, money, fame, etc.).
“No, no, no,” he said, “The set I get to do tonight at 7:20 PM is the win. I get to do comedy—I won. It being predicated on doing X or being bigger than Y—no, no, no. To me, it’s always just been about the work."
"The work is the win," as Ryan Holiday once told me.
- - -
"It's such a gift to be able to [do] something and to love it for the sake of it...I see people with talent, with all those things. But the one thing they don't have is just that love for doing it for the sake of it...So if there's anything, just find joy in what you do for the sake of it." — Rodney Mullen
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@bwuller Hi, Pa. I was sent a photo of you this afternoon. It made me really sad. I am still struggling to look at your photos. But, one day, I will be able to, Pa.
@bwuller Hi, Papa. I read Revelation 7 : 9 after reading an article about why God created humans if He knew they would sin. I just thought of you, wearing a white robe and holding a palm branch. Until we meet again, Pa, "before the Lamb".
@bwuller Hi, Papa. I cried a lot a couple days ago because I thought of you. However, I was again reminded that He knew what was best for you. I hope you have a blessed Holy Week in heaven.
@bwuller Btw, you should have asked me about this. I would have helped you. I am sorry I did not check my Twitter account that day. I just saw this tweet the day you passed away. I could not sleep at all that night so I checked your tweets because I have already missed you so much.
@bwuller I miss you so, so much, Papa. What happened? You wrote this 3 days before you passed away. There won't be any errors now that you are in heaven with your Best Friend. Until we meet again, Papa, one day ...
Today is Narcissistic Abuse Awareness Day. May as many people as possible become aware as we live in a society that paves the way for this kind of behaviour, where people that behave this way thrive especially. Only with awareness may this change.
#NarcissisticAbuseAwarenessDay
We’re building @AmbrookAg around a philosophy of pragmatic environmentalism: if you care about the earth, you should care about the people who are stewards of the earth.
Thank you @Stripe for producing such a beautiful film about Ambrook’s mission and founding journey.
Interesting thread. He thinks working in offices suppressed variation in both productivity and income, and that the switch to remote will thus increase economic inequality.
Global analysis from BBC News reveals that days with temperatures reaching over 50C have doubled in past 40 years.
The data comes as part of a new @bbcworldservice series, Life at 50°C.
#BBCLifeAt50C
https://t.co/4NSS277Wvd
A collection of leading health and medical journals this week declared climate change "the greatest threat to global public health" and called on governments to respond with the degree of funding and urgency they used to confront the coronavirus pandemic. https://t.co/Km0UiG8TaV
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Perhaps this crisis will help people remember "that life is precious and finite, that we cannot know when the end is coming, that what is beautiful and just and true deserves our focus," writes @MargaretRenkl https://t.co/njhVyahfH5
The WHO warns that countries and regions with deep social inequalities or those lacking adequate medical infrastructure will become new #Covid19 hotbeds