DTH-X-0071
“I said yes to something that scared me and it cracked my life open.”
Fear was the only thing standing between you and this, and you walked through it, and on the other side was more life, not less. The safe, narrow road feels like protection but it is really just a slow way of not living. A man who keeps death in view stops auditioning for a longer life and starts living a fuller one.
Your Practice
- Name what you almost let stop you. Notice it was smaller than it felt.
- Find the next thing you want but fear, and take the first irreversible step toward it.
- Ask: 'On my deathbed, would I regret the risk or the retreat?' You know the answer.
- Make 'scared but alive' your default over 'safe but shrinking.'
The Architects
“What is the most important thing you could be working on in the world right now? And if you're not working on that, why aren't you?”
Aaron Swartz, Question Swartz habitually asked, as recalled by his partner Taren Stinebrickner-Kauffman in her 2013 eulogy and in The Internet's Own Boy (2014)