Joanna | Life Reset

I write about the small rules we inherit, the ones we finally question, and the ordinary resets that follow. Author of Life Reset.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

Free pens at a fair cost nothing. The pricey giveaway is a warm 'we must do something together'. Lovely to accept, and by spring it's a project nobody scoped. Packing my tote this morning, I've sorted the day's offers in advance. Most I'll enjoy, and one I'll actually carry.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

Hotel breakfast is a test of character. It's all included, so skipping anything feels rude, and I end up with eggs I never wanted. My book fair pass works the same way. Getting into every session doesn't mean I owe each one my morning. What do you take just because it's free?

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

At a rights fair, weird mostly means hard to shelve. My book is part memoir, part manual, and I watch people pick a shelf for it. Second-half careers get the same look over drinks. Readers tend to keep the unfileable ones. What's your clumsy one-line job description now?

[Ryan Holiday @RyanHoliday]

Weird Books You Must Read

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

In the fair catalogues a book is a format, a territory and a line item. At home, mine was proof I could finish something. Both are true, and the catalogue version uses fewer adjectives. I find that oddly restful.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

Agreed, with a midlife footnote. Being a person takes admin first. By tonight's walk the evening call is booked, breakfast prep is noted and the receipts are with Mara, my AI assistant. Only then a pretzel gets my full attention. What do you clear first so a treat counts?

[Tiny Buddha @tinybuddha]

"Maybe you’ve analyzed yourself enough. Maybe you can just go outside, feel the sun on your face, buy yourself a little treat, and be a person for a while.”

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

Every stand offers a paper tote, and every tote fills with catalogues for books I'll never buy the rights to. New rule: paper comes with me only if a next step does. The rest stays on the table, admired. Yesterday the one thing I carried gladly was a very good pretzel.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

@MercurioNevio @RyanHoliday Usually the bit that needs a phone call. The calendar admin or the small repair I keep writing around instead of just doing it.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

@realJohnBlanche Same for me. By the time I said it out loud, the deciding was done. That meeting was mostly for them. What's been the oddest part of the first few weeks?

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

Someone online resigned and management is now trying to talk them round. I'd offer a proper handover and leave the staffing gap with the people paid to fill it. One kind, final line: 'I'll leave things in good shape, and my last day stays as it is.'.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

You don't fix a heavy day by being useful.

On days when the wider world feels heavy, I reach for small things that end. A chapter. A call with an old friend. Supper eaten slowly. None of it fixes anything. Each one just has an ending I can see, and today that's enough to stand on.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

@realJohnBlanche That meeting is usually more for them than for you. By the time you're sitting in it, the decision was made somewhere quieter. How's the first month been on the practical side, the days and the routines?

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

@ChrisWillx I think deciding in advance is the useful part. It goes wrong when locking in only means adding things. A hard season usually goes better if you also decide what to drop, because dark months rarely have room for more.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

Rights halls run on an idea I'm slow to apply at home. A book goes further once someone else carries it. Another publisher takes it into a language its author can't sell in, and nobody calls that giving up. I still hold the school-forms folder like it only counts if it's mine.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

Pressing a crossing button that does nothing still feels like doing something. Homes have those too. 'Someone needs to sign the trip form' gets said, everyone hears it, and the form sits by the kettle. Now I ask one person, by Friday. Which request at home never reaches anyone?

[Daniel Pink @DanielPink]

Most crosswalk buttons in New York don't do anything.

New York Times once reported that more than 2,500 of the city's 3,250 walk buttons were "mechanical placebos."

What does this say about what keeps us going? 🧵

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

Nobody carries a book alone at a rights fair. Agent, editor, translator and sales team each hold one part. When a part runs late, they move the date and nobody's character comes into it. I'm borrowing that. Name my part, say plainly which isn't mine, skip the blame.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

Breakthrough events make great films because it all happens in one room. The change I've seen turns up later, in the family calendar, when someone covers the school run so the promise made in that room can be kept. Who held things together after your last big decision?

[Tony Robbins @TonyRobbins]

This year marked 10 YEARS since TONY ROBBINS: I AM NOT YOUR GURU premiered on Netflix and gave the world a look inside Date With Destiny. 🎥🍿

I'll never forget sitting side by side with @joeberlinger in a theater, watching people see it for the very first time.

No script. No retakes. Just REAL people having REAL breakthroughs. 🙏

Joe and his team took a 6-day, 70+ hour program and somehow did it justice in under 2 hours. A decade later, I still hear from people every single day whose lives changed because of this film.

Joe, thank you for your open mind, your critical eye, and the courage to show it exactly as it happened.

Have you seen it? What was your biggest takeaway? 👇

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

I like the escalators here. Stand on one side, walk on the other, and nobody has to carry anyone else's pace. A school-run rota works the same way once it's written down. Kept in one person's head, it becomes a grudge with nobody to aim it at.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

@MercurioNevio @RyanHoliday 3pm is exactly when they find me, usually between a pickup time and an unfinished paragraph. Calling it balance is generous, but I'll take it.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

@realJohnBlanche @dailystoic The wet socks are the honest bit. Steady usually turns up halfway through a walk for me, never in the doorway while I'm deciding whether to go.

[Joanna | Life Reset @LifeResetBook]

@MercurioNevio @RyanHoliday Firmly the mundane. Mara, my AI assistant, does calendars, packing lists and reminders. The big questions stay with me, and they usually turn up around 3pm on a Tuesday, when what I actually need is a nudge to eat lunch.