2̶9̶ 44 Observations In 29 Years

First it was 29 things, then 31, then 36, then 39, then 44. I’m making myself stop now because I could definitely keep going.

But, anyway, as of my birthday tomorrow, here are 44 things I’ve learned or just observed in 29 years, in no particular order.

1. It seems most people these days assume it’s their job to convince other people that what they believe is right by way of argument — and while that may work for some, it’s more convincing to live your convictions. And that’s not even meant to be a pithy “deeds are better than words” thing. I believe you’re likely to be a happier person if you live consistently with the convictions you say you have.
2. Go out of your way to marry your best friend. And then go out of your way to make sure you don’t cloud your most valuable friendship by overthinking the concept of “marriage.” Keep that friendship front and center.
3. Leadership is understanding how to feel powerful and powerless at the exact same time, and not let either feeling stop you.
4. Leadership is not about getting things done the way you want them done. It’s about achieving the outcomes you want, no matter how they get done (as long as the means are consistent with your values).
5. Call your mother. No, seriously, call her right now.
6. Building a company is one part understanding your market, one part making sure your product meets expectations, one part really good customer service, five parts building the right team, and ten parts really hard work with very few, if any, guarantees.
7. You can only scale a company if you’re willing to learn something new, delegate to the point of boredom, learn something new, then delegate to the point of boredom again (repeat ad infinitum).
8. I think Barack Obama will actually go down in history as one of the most effective presidents this country has ever had — that doesn’t mean you or I will agree with all of his decisions, but it does mean he will have been effective in making and implementing change.
9. The nature of change means that people who dislike change are going to push back, but that doesn’t mean it’s right to stop pushing for change.
10. Change for change’s sake also isn’t a great goal. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” is a cliché for a reason. Sometimes you need to stay steady.
11. The world is made up of habits — individual, familial, communal, societal — and they’re not easy to change. So while people tend to think that you can “just” change something by identifying it and tweaking it, it’s never that easy. The root causes of a family, company, or society’s issues are rarely the symptom you’re seeing and identifying as the solution. They’re typically just the tip of the iceberg. Beware of easy answers—like, “Hey, let’s just build a wall to stop illegal immigration,” for example.
12. To me, a perfect day starts early with a cup of coffee and reading, followed by a workout and/or walk with my wife and the pup, some time to write (and maybe read some more), and then wine and food with as many people (old friends, new friends, random folks) as possible.
13. This might be a pessimists’ outlook, but I think most people like the idea of things more than they may like the thing itself — for example, “It’s about the journey, not the destination.” I doubt most people actually like the journey because the journey is really hard and, to be honest, not even remotely enjoyable or fun when you’re in the middle of it most of the time. But we have to say that out loud in order to justify (often to ourselves) why we’re still on it. It’s a necessary psychological trick we play on ourselves so we don’t go insane.
14. I have a “bad” habit of buying books, and even though I just got a library card, it’s not going to go away (apologies to my wife, Amanda).
15. I think Donald Trump is the most dangerous political figure in modern American history (note that because this is modern, it obviously doesn’t include people like Andrew Jackson). I could’ve written an entire 36 point essay on this alone to celebrate my birthday, but I’ll spare you (and me) for now.
16. When you try to introduce order into chaos expect even more chaos for a little bit — and expect it to linger longer than you want it to. But expect it to subside and for things to eventually get better.
17. I still believe in Jesus, but I don’t believe in the way most American Evangelicals present their beliefs in him to the broader culture. Not even a little bit.
18. We should get offended a little less easily as a culture.
19. We should also probably look to be intentionally offensive a lot less often. Don’t call it political correctness… call it being a kind person.
20. I think we’re going through another 1960s right now, where the pace of change is faster than our willingness to reorient our habits around this brave new world we live in. I think ten years from now we’re going to be able to look back on this time and make sense of it, but it won’t be quick or easy.
21. You should get a puppy.
22. People will fall all over themselves in order to justify something politically just to save face — and that includes more than just the politicians, it includes us.
23. The Internet should and could have made us more empathetic by virtue of our access to more information about more people’s experiences. Instead it’s put us in the position where everybody’s constantly vying to be right.
24. Everybody’s a brand now, everybody’s a politician. I think, to some degree, that’s why we hate politics so much: as individuals, we look more like the thing we “hate” than we want to admit (see #13 again).
25. Fear is the worst possible motivator, unless you are truly in a dire circumstance. The problem is that there are so many circumstances that can be described as dire, even if they aren’t truly.
26. You should get away from your screen as often as possible, and you should probably take a walk outside.
27. Writing and working on paper is extremely underrated.
28. You have more ahead of you than behind you, and your life will change if you can convince yourself to truly, fully allow yourself to have hope.
29. There’s more that you don’t know than you know.
30. There’s more that you can learn from other people than you’d like to admit.
31. Sometimes the best way to push through things you don’t want to do is to do them with more intensity than you would otherwise do them — you don’t build a muscle unless you’re willing to break the current one a little bit.
32. Political polarization is a byproduct of political party and media manipulation, sure, but mostly, I think, a byproduct of the electorate’s willingness to go along with misdirected anger—we’re usually angry at the “optics” of a situation more than we’re angry at the situation itself; more focused on identifying problems than we are focused on collaborating and compromising to find solutions as a country.
33. You don’t have to agree with the pushback, but whenever you receive pushback for something you think is obvious, it’s usually got a real story behind it. Stop for a minute and learn the story. Even if you still disagree with it after you hear it you’ll have a better understanding of the other side and know how to discuss your point more effectively in the future.
34. Yes, racism still exists in this country. Yes, white America needs to own its past and work hard to right its wrongs.
35. Most people aren’t driven by facts and statistics, they’re driven by where their heartstrings are pulling them.
36. (But facts are still how things should be judged.)
37. The church in America today is facing the reality of having lived as a primarily political entity for the last seven-plus decades here in the U.S.
38. If you’re a business leader, you’re not leading your business unless you’re thinking through every aspect of how the different parts of your business function.
39. There are more things you don’t control than things you do.
40. Mondays are the absolute least productive day of the week for me. Tuesdays are the most productive.
41. There are certain things you wish you could take back. Stop wishing you could take them back and start thinking about what you learned from them and how they’re going to change you, your actions, and your habits.
42. Take care of your friends; treat them like family.
43. Take care of your family; treat them like friends.
44. It is absolutely possible for one person to change the world. But not alone. We really do need each other.