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I’ve recently realized how greatly, to an extreme, I internalized a phrase from my youth. It goes:

“Surpass expectations. It’s the only way you’ll make a difference in this world.”

For me, this phrase has generally proven convicting, yet powerful.

Focusing on surpassing expectations—whether yours or others—can amplify your abilities and contribute to making micro-decisions that can incrementally accumulate over time into powerhouses of momentum.

When I first took on this adage, I was right around 15 or 16 years old, so when a teacher offered this reflection, I perked up and listened.

I thought I’d found a secret of the universe.

If I created projects and homework assignments that made 100%, that meant I’d “objectively” surpassed expectations, and that I was well on my way toward making some form of mark.

The principle got me to and through a cool college, yet life in the real world after graduation ushered in patterns of dysfunction.

From housework to personal appearance to professional writing to personal writing, there were suddenly too many areas of life to be able to apply the principle to all of them, or any of them. Ever since, it’s been a conscious daily struggle to decrease the arenas of dysfunction.

Then along comes a week like the one that just passed.

I’d made sacrifices to write, record, cut, and EQ a podcast episode so that it would be ready to release Wednesday.

I listened to it one last time, ready to deploy . . . and just couldn’t.

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In my revisions, I’d ended up cutting out “the point” of the episode.

I’d been “killing my darlings” as they say to do in creative writring classes, but taken it so far that it wholly missed the underlying purpose altogether.

I was therefore at a crossroads.

Upload an episode that I know, in my gut, to fall short of my expectations, and those of listeners? Or withhold the episode, and restart the next week?

I decided to withhold the episode, because surpassing expectations isn’t actually the only way to make a difference in this world.

Establishing the right expectations, at the right place, for the right reasons, at the right time, does make a difference for yourself, here, now; and yes, can have ripple effects that can continue outward, affecting whomever comes close.

In this particular context—that of a podcaster who needed to choose between “consistently” releasing on time or consistently speaking words that I, at least, feel to be reasonably purposeful at the time that I release them, I chose the second option . . . . even for a podcast presumably on finishing what your start.

Here is what I learned.

One. Offer yourself anchors.

Whether you are new to a discipline or an old pro, it’s easy to become unmoored as a raft at sea, with emotions as the winds and unrealistic expectations as the waves.

Different projects and pursuits require different types of anchors. Is the type of anchor that applies to your situation an outline? A blueprint? A to do list? A series of sticky notes on a mirror?

Whatever the trick is for you, check in on your anchor periodically throughout the project. Don’t wait for the end.

Two. Recognize when you’re on the wrong shore, and respond accordingly.

The ancient Greek hero Odysseus landed on a number of wrong shores before reaching the right one. Dallying always came with brutal penalties.

In your case, if your gut says that you must redirect your energy, don’t postpone the redirection. The sooner you confront your error, the sooner you can continue to grow.

Three. Go for the strawberry milkshake.

When a friendly waiter sees you scribbling your next script late at a Denny’s and suggests a strawberry milkshake to wash down your coffee, roll with it. A life striving for discipline and continuous creation should still permit room for serendipity and delight.

Four. Set a schedule

As the same strawberry milkshake waiter advised, set a schedule. You should do this, because:

Five. Expectations and schedules are what you make of them.

A three hour mainframe can make all the difference. Yet so can a mainframe of thirty minutes. Or three.

You are the one who is proceeding on your journey, after all.

Expectations can help you or they can harm you.

Yet with the right schedule, honorable effort, and attitude that keeps your eyes on what’s possible, you might just find that victory tastes like coffee washed down by a strawberry milkshake—unexpected, but balanced.

It will all work out, the bitter and the sweet.

And tomorrow, you’ll finish what you start just a little more easily.

Today I challenge you to reflect on:

• Your expectations.

• Your anchors.

• Your space for serendipity.

Which area do you need to lean into, to finish what you start?

Yet if you would like a new podcasting+newsletter app, here is the one to try:

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As always, your comments are welcome! It would be lovely to hear your thoughts. :)

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There is a Greek proverb which says:

“A society grows great when old men plant trees who shade, they know they shall never sit in.”

It points to the idea that we ought to be radically kind or magnanimous—especially when it requires us to step back from an immediate, short-term, high priority mission or responsibility to honor a different sort of necessity. . . the sort of necessity that you know, in your gut, could cultivate something beautiful.

There's a strip of trees that runs wild outside my home, brimming with brush just the way I like it.

On an 8–10 foot tree is an old bird's nest. I'm fairly certain that it has been there for years, even though it looks like a strong storm would just knock it over.

Yet somehow, perhaps because the canes are flexible, the nest shifts back and forth with wild abandon without ever toppling off.

Maybe there is a message here about being tempted to do good things, to prioritize, and to finish what you start.

You see, my greatest failing remains my inability to truly prioritize which priority is greatest, to really finish what I start in an efficient manner and go on to the next thing, so that by the end of the day, I can be more reliable, creative, loving, supportive, and authentic: walking the walk for living out the principle, “Finish what you start.”

Don’t we all want these things?

What's difficult, is that as an American society, we have a strong focus on linear growth.

It makes sense. Schools have their report cards. If you're progressing for an athletic activity, that growth might seem linear. A linear focus is invaluable for tracking projects at the office or at the gym.

Yet for life?

For creative endeavors you're trying to do on top of everything else?

For handling anxiety that crushes down when it's finally time to press through to your goal?

With a strictly linear understanding of progress, it's on you to carve out the vacuum from which your single-minded progress should go—until deficiencies in other areas pile up, and you have to pull back from extremes.

[Digression: All right, so for a moment we paused; my audio engineer and I just chatting about family members who have superpowers, whether to identify a note just by hearing it; or a photographic memory; or the memory to dictate and go back to earlier parts of the dictation from memory.]

In light of others’ “super powers,” it's easy to lose focus. A natural response is to try less hard than you could at the things that come easy to you, because they don’t seem to come quite easy enough; or to double down and just focus on those linear goals you know you can execute most efficiently—ignoring the fact that the reason you're efficient is probably because of effort you put in way earlier in the game. This in turn implies that the best thing you can do, may be to lean into a new learning curve now.

Right?

It goes back to the saying from the Book of Proverbs which says, “All labor benefits the laborer.”

Isn't that profoundly comforting?

If you accept that as an ultimate truth, and if you're putting in good effort in some way or another, your present area of dedicated effort is benefiting you—if you're open to it.

With that in mind, maybe it is fruitful as a thought experiment to view progress as less of a linear progression or competition between linear progressions, and more as a nest.

With a nest, you will see a bird tuck in a piece of paper or a wrapper, straw, maybe a gold chain, right?

Either way, that nest that it might be bobbing and swaying on a short tree was made up of generally things that were once straight or could have been straight. Yet by curving them and bending them together and winding them together, birds build their own shelter for themselves, for their eggs, for their chicks, for the next generation. You might even have a case of a nest that lasts.

Think of that for your own life.

I challenge you to reflect on the areas of progress you are building into your nest.

I'm not talking about your tangible home right now, though. That could be part of it if that is meaningful for you. But look at your priorities.

Look at:

• The goals you’re guilting yourself for.

• The goals you’re not guilting yourself for.

• The areas where you can clearly feel that this labor is benefiting you.

• The areas where you can’t see how the labor could possibly be benefitting you.

See how they build together into something more.

Last but not least, feel free to leave a comment! Do you experience similar struggles? What is one technique that works for you?

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Have you ever heard a speech that “got to you” in ways you didn’t expect?

For me, that went down last spring at a charter school’s ceremony celebrating the end of the school year.

Standing before a student- and family-packed gym, the charismatic leader whom the kids and most adults called “Mr. Mairano” challenged the audience to repeat a tongue-twisting word after him: “magnanimity.”

He then explained that “magnanimity” means to offer radical generosity and kindness in response to an action, word, or decision where radical kindness doesn’t logically make sense.

“Yet if we hope to be people who feel comfortable dwelling in an ongoing state of magnanimity,” he said, “we might try imagining that we are attuning ourselves to a source of beauty beyond and outside of us, which might then fuel our ability to offer even more kindness and patience to others than a situation may objectively deserve.”

Context matters for such a principle, of course.

Personally, I prefer the phrase “radical kindness” over “magnanimity,” and what “radical kindness” means in an American suburb looks very different from what might be considered “radical kindness” in a place of famine or war.

Yet regardless of the circumstance, the ability to take on such a desire, and act upon such an intention, is powerful, and takes practice.

It takes starting small. Starting soon. Practicing often.

Then it may be easier to accept the challenge of striving to be ever more radically kind; of accepting a call to an everyday adventure; of letting this concept flow through us, as Mr. Mairano described, as if an external force, tempting us from the outside in to do good.

To “give in” when goodness is possible.

To be “tempted” to take some small, kind action—or make an unexpected choice for another’s benefit—simply because you can.

Tempting . . . such an interesting use of the word, isn’t it? Especially when attempting to determine which priority should rise to the top with a brain more wired for ADD than finishing what you start.

Yet, practically speaking, how on earth does one soak in the riches of a radically kind mindset, without forgoing the improved performance one may find in a “do-or-die” point of view?

One possibility may be found in the words of the Irish playwright Sir George Bernard Shaw.

"I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work, the more I live,” he wrote, in the comedy Man and Superman.

And, in a separate quote from another piece of his work—which is often lumped together in one happy yet highly misleading singular paragraph throughout the internet, by the way—he says:

“I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no ‘brief candle’ for me. It is a sort of splendid torch, which I have got hold of for the moment; and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations” (5-6).

How does one make that torch shine more brightly?

Work. Lots of work.

Work for a purpose, motivation, or by-product you believe with every ounce of you.

Both for yourself, and ideally, those who need you—whether they know it, or you know it, or not.

Today, I challenge you to set a timer for 15 minutes of old-school, solid, goal-oriented work. Follow this with 1-5 minutes with a pen in your hand, brainstorming how you might honor or even expand your capacity for offering radical kindness— on being tempted by the good.

Know anyone who might enjoy this message, or overall podcast?

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Does the principle of pursuing radical kindness seem like a useful motivator? What about when circumstances demand that you must choose a path contrary to this principle of radical kindness, in order to achieve a purpose? In such cases, what words of wisdom might you offer those struggling to finish what they start?

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This took place a while back, but it’s one of those things that could have taken place this morning, let alone yesterday, or longer.

Of course, it was tandem skydiving. When that chute pulled open, and the wind started whipping around my goggles and helmet, nothing short of the tattooed tandem skydiving pro strapped to my back could have possibly gotten me out of that plane.

Indeed, before I even signaled a response to the question, “Are you ready?” the dude took a step back, and we were free-falling amid wisps of clouds toward a patchwork of fields below.

I could decide whether my eyes were open or shut; where your hands and legs floated within what you might call a “snow angel” range; and whether I’d pray, speak, smile, or scream.

We grownups can voluntarily put ourselves into states that are so childlike, can’t we?

“Tuck in your legs,” shouted the tandem jumper, interrupting my reverie.

“Huh?”

“For landing, you’ll need to tuck your legs to your chest.”

A lifetime of PE fails flashed before my eyes.

“I can’t,” I replied after several faltering attempt at drawing my knees up. “I’m not strong enough!”

“You’ve got to tuck in your legs, or you’re going to break them!”

Now, let’s slo-mo this story for a moment, shall we?

In life, the fundamentally human ability to discern what is within our range of control is every bit as important as recognizing when we have to make a decision that extends beyond our range of control.

It might not be as literal as the muscle memory of a pilates pose being the one thing between your and broken legs, and possibly worse for those metaphorically strapped to you—in my case, the tandem jumper literally keeping me alive.

Yet sometimes it is your responsibility to reach beyond your understanding of the broadest range of your ability, or break for your failure to try.

I was very far, at that juncture, from finding a way to try.

Back to the story.

The ground hurtled closer as the tandem jumper repeated, “TUCK IN YOUR LEGS!”

Muscle memory kicked in.

I wrapped my arms tight around my thighs, contorting into a pilates pose ironically titled “Rolling Like a Ball Prep,” and did everything possible to compensate for legs that just wouldn’t lift high enough through will power alone.

We landed.

I can’t clearly remember this part, but we were on the ground, with the bones of my legs intact.

The real hero of this story stayed around just long enough for a quick thumbs up; then he was off, running toward the next dreamer about to be overtaken by a sudden bout of sanity.

Now, here’s the thing.

You can decide you’ve finished what you started in terms of fulfilling a dream to skydive at the point you look up the price, and reject the cost as unrealistic.

You can decide, while in the musty portable building passing off as a skydive company’s “front office”—where you’re watching some sketchy pre-recorded video of a balding dude with a scraggly beard recounting all the reasons you have no business trusting him . . . you may, and perhaps even should, decide that you have quite truly gone as far as you needed to “finish” a journey you started while somewhat more naive.

And that is perfectly fine.

You can maybe even decide you’ve finished what you started at the point that a dude’s strapped to your back, the chute is open, and it’s time to draw back, and jump.

Or maybe not.

Maybe, by that point, you’re already in free fall.

Maybe by that point, you are where you are, and you know in your gut that you can’t really call your goal finished until you’ve tucked up your puny little legs, or let them be shattered beneath you.

For we all learn what is within our control, one way or another, at some point or another. Either way, you will return to earth.

Or, if you really, REALLY want to make my day, would you please consider passing this along to someone you know *gasp!* in real life? :)

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I’m friends with a motley crew of writers and creative types whose ability to maximize their day, day after day, leaves me in awe.

Finishing my never ending novel-in-progress is my obsession.

It is also work, for me.

By comparison, a podcast episode seems more like an indulgence—a quick win that is straight-forward and easy.

Yet is it just me, or does it seem like the “quick wins” with the most reward on the other side are the easiest to lose?

The hard truth is that the course of one’s life is rarely rewritten by a “quick win” that is not, beneath the surface, extremely hard won.

I’m pretty desperate, at this point in my life, to change my life’s course.

Maybe that is why, every spring since 2022, I’ve uploaded the “first episode” of this very podcast—only to fizzle out by episode 2 or 3. Again. This is therefore my THIRD attempt at executing season one.

This time will be different.

This time, I’m going to boldly seize the adage, “The third time is the charm,” as if it’s the password “Open sesame” that will rattle open the rusty, crusty entrance to Ali Baba’s cave of treasure!

Yeah, right.

Still. Backed by the knowledge from the different times you tried and failed to seize upon that “this time will be different” difference, the fundamental belief, “this time will be different” that you cannot or will not let go is a working definition of tenacity.

Of grit.

Of that not-giving-up-ness that sets you apart from those has-beens and might-have-beens and still-maybe-could-be’s who would rather bully than build.

For those who cannot conceive and create are the very people who qualify, quantify, manage, and mitigate those who do.

I have a vision, like you.

Also like you, that vision starts with mastering the ability to finish what I start—putting any tendencies toward all-encompassing panic, (or paralyzing guilt over prior instances of caving into that panic), on pause.

I suspect your vision, whatever it may be, begins at that starting point, too.

Today, I challenge you: cast your thoughts upon a potentially painful question. One that is painful because of just how many times “this time will be different” did not open closed doors for you.

If you knew for a fact that you could still live out a dream you’ve already abandoned, what dream would you choose?

With that question in mind, I’d like you to feel your hand along the cave wall feeling for a latch as you tiptoe toward my next question:

If you knew for a fact you would finish ANYTHING you started, what would you do?