I’m a good tipper. Not because I’m a particularly good person. I’m not. But, because I spent a season as a waiter at a Tex-Mex restaurant in Southern Indiana. Before getting into advertising, I worked a handful of odd jobs. I can say, with complete certainty, I would rather tear out piss-soaked, shit-caked, moth-eaten carpet than serve canned refried beans, microwaved rice and soggy enchiladas to the American public any day of the week. There are great servers, good servers and bad servers. Then, there is this separate category of servers—on the far end of the spectrum—that one might label: criminal. These are individuals so outrageously incompetent at the craft of waiting tables that they should do time in a state penitentiary simply for entering within a one-mile radius of a serving tray. I fell into this latter category.

By the way, if you’ve ever hated a job, you’re in good company. I wrote a thread about extraordinary writers, artists and entrepreneurs who once worked very ordinary gigs to make ends meet.

Like writing advertising, fixing busted pipes, laying concrete and hanging drywall, waiting tables is a craft. It requires a unique set of skills. At any given moment, you’re responsible for tending to as many as six tables. Seated at each of these tables is a unique set of individuals with colorful personalities, bizarre dietary restrictions, lofty expectations and challenging temperaments. Ask anyone involved in a serious romantic relationship. It’s hard enough to keep just one person happy. Attempting to keep two dozen people happy—who are all hungry, tipsy and soon to be unreasonably angry if they aren’t fed in an appropriate amount of time—deserves the culinary equivalent of the Medal of Honor. You have to be a better small talker than a Walmart greeter. You have to develop the short-term memory of a telephone operator. You have to be as nimble on your feet as a Russian ballerina. And you have to possess the wrist strength of an amateur powerlifter.

I recall watching in awe as a veteran waitress, weighing no more than 95 pounds soaking wet, would tango through the trenches of the restaurant’s closely packed tables with a 50-pound tray of piping-hot cast-iron skillets held above her head, a folding tray stand sandwiched underneath her armpit and an enormous pitcher of frozen margaritas clutched in her left hand. Once she arrived at her destination, she would somehow manage to drop the tray stand, kick out one of its legs like a TSA agent conducting a cavity search, set the tray down atop it and then distribute the fajitas to drunk, beet-red patrons while topping off their glasses and asking them about their children, by name.

I was nineteen years old. I was sheltered. I was a virgin. Although, I’d spend my twenties making up for lost time. I had never seen nor touched a drug. I had tasted alcohol on a handful of occasions. I was as innocent as a sloth standing trial for homicide. It would be another four or five years before I would read Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential. Having seen the inner workings of the restaurant business, I can assure you he wasn’t spinning fables. Cooks would spill frozen fries on the ground, shrug, scoop them up in their ungloved hands and toss them into bubbling grease. Servers would take bumps of cocaine while shivering in the walk-in freezer. Dishwashers would finish “untouched” quesadillas while hosing down leaning towers of plates in the sinks. Servers would fuck other servers in the back of beat-to-hell Honda Civics and lifted Chevrolet Silverados on lunch breaks. I recall one of the line cooks getting so atrociously drunk after a particularly busy shift, that he ran his Ford Explorer into a train. When the officer showed up to the scene and stuck him in the back of the patrol car, it’s rumored he said something to the tune of, “Son, I’ve been doing this a long time. I’ve never taken someone in for running into a parked locomotive.” His SUV was totaled, the train was unscathed and he was left with a broken wrist, which didn’t prevent him from being back on the line the following week making chimichangas.

For a kid that would one day become a writer, the vulgarities I would hear in the kitchen were like an MFA in grease poetry. The head chef was a man in his sixties who had a mouth so vulgar it’d make the cast of The Sopranos squirm. He would sexually harass the male servers under his breath as he plated the hundreds of dishes the restaurant would serve each day. He would say things like, “After you run this order, why don’t you come back and jerk me off into the queso?” It would be such an astonishing remark that you wouldn’t believe your ears. You would say ‘Huh?’, certain you’d heard him wrong. Then, the entire kitchen would cackle like a pack of jackals and you’d walk out of the kitchen with an overloaded tray hoisted over your shoulder and your tail tucked between your legs.

I made it just under a year. My manager was a wonderful woman with rosy cheeks who—with her wife—had adopted three children from East Asia. Within a week of me tying on my apron, she knew I wasn’t cut out for this kind of work. But, she didn’t have the heart to tell me. She would assign me to the least busy sections of the restaurant and cheer me on like a supportive mother, giving me pointers when she saw that I was struggling to keep my head above water.

Which, speaking of water, on my last day I was serving a booth of four well-dressed women who had just left church. They were wearing high heels and knee-high skirts that—when seated—exposed the entirety of their legs. They each ordered ice water. Because it’s America and there is no such thing as big enough, the plastic cups were 24 ounces. I rounded the corner with my tray of 96 ounces of water, caught a glimpse of their eight bare legs underneath the table, tripped over my own feet and dropped the tray. I watched the tragedy happen in slow motion. Somehow, all four cups fell from my tray at such a precise angle, that they managed to ricochet off the tile floor and rifle into the belly of the booth. As the oversized cups unleashed their contents, it looked like a mini tidal wave. In seconds, their exposed legs were covered in ice-cold water as they screamed in impressive synchronicity. Their screaming caused me to scream and, before I knew it, everybody in my section was screaming as if someone had pulled out a gun. My manager came running over to our section, certain a customer was choking on a tortilla chip. I was so overwhelmed, I ran to the back of the restaurant, tore off my apron and held my face in my hands. She hunted me down not longer after, handed me a dozen or so towels and told me to go back out there and offer to pat down those poor women’s legs. After my shift, we both agreed I was in the wrong business.

Waiting tables was a tremendous education, though. It not only blessed me with a vernacular that would later inform my writing—although I try not to make sexual passes at my clients, as it’s considered bad practice—but it also taught me how to context switch. It’s a skill I use every day running Honey. At 9 a.m., I might be writing an essay about working as a server in a Tex-Mex restaurant in Southern Indiana. At 10 a.m., I might be reviewing a series of ads for an organic hydration brand. At 11 a.m., I might be selling a prospect on why she should work with my agency rather than the other 114,000 agencies in the United States. At 11:30 a.m., I might be offering a previously contracted designer a full-time job (hoping he will be better equipped for agency life than I was for waiting tables). People think context switching is about jumping in and out of a hundred open tabs on your laptop without missing a beat—and I suppose, to a degree, it is—but context switching is really about keeping your cool as a chef is demanding you jerk him off into a bubbling cauldron of queso, while scraping off the melted cheese atop a taco salad for a woman at Table 7 who had mentioned—on three separate occasions—that she was lactose intolerant.

we stayed up 
all night long,
until we heard 
the bird song

and we talked
of the time,
you saw that ufo
in mexico

and you played me
all the greats:
john prine, 
jim croce
and george strait

and i introduced you
to my god:
leonard cohen

and i gave you 
all sorts of shit
for your 
silk pajama set,
the kind 
with the pinstripes
that the rich suburban 
moms wear 

and you asked me 
about my grandmother,
and it burned my eyes,
when you said 
you wished
you could’ve met her

and i wrote 
on your back
with my fingertips,
as you tried
to guess
the things
i was too scared
to say aloud

and we decided 
not to fuck 
that night,
i can’t remember 
why

and in the morning
when i left,
a lightning bolt
struck the sycamore
out back,
severed a limb,
left the nub black

we forever loved 
thunderstorms
after that

and i didn’t tell you
enough, babe

but you were
as pretty as
a train wreck,

i couldn’t 
take my eyes
off of you

everything 
you did
left me
speechless

everything
you did
gave me 
the feeling
of watching jesus
walk on water

i don’t know how 
a love like that 
can last

and you remember
how it was
towards the
beginning

mornings bled
into afternoons
like the 
blurred edges
of a rothko painting

the days evaporated
like fallen rain 
atop the hot face 
of tennessee asphalt

and sleep hurt 
the way 
a good book hurts
when you end a chapter
and turn the page

and one day i might 
turn our story
into a screenplay 

pull a hemingway

and rewrite the end 

64x

until i 
drive myself mad

until i
finally get it right.

P.S. This poem is part of an album I wrote and produced called Pink House. If you’d like to listen to the spoken word version, you can do so here.

Pretend someone were to sculpt a Mount Rushmore of warriors.

Miyamoto Musashi would be on it. Musashi might even take the number one spot, replacing George Washington's brooding mug.

Before we continue.

This is a fairly long piece: 2,305 words.

If you appreciate long-form, please, settle in. However, if you’d prefer to read something a bit more bite-sized, I’ve created a thread here.

Each rule is a single tweet paired with a Japanese Wood Block print pulled from a passion project of mine I created a while back called Daily Ukiyo.

Now, back to Musashi.

Musashi fought his first duel at 13. He fought 59 more over the course of his lifetime. He never lost. Not once.

He pioneered a sword-fighting technique poetically called Two Heavens as One. Most samurai carried two swords: a katana, and a shorter blade for close-quarters combat called a wakizashi. Musashi was the first samurai to fight with both—at the same time.

His most famous duel is worthy of a motion picture.

It took place against a samurai named Sasaki Kojirō on Ganryū Island. Kojirō was no chump. He was graceful. He was disciplined. He was technically sound. Kojirō's sword was legendary. It was nicknamed The Laundry-Drying Pole for its unusual length. His signature move, the Turning Swallow Cut, was said to be so swift it mimicked the flight of a swallow.

This fateful duel was scheduled for the morning.

But, Musashi didn't show.

Instead, he kept Kojirō waiting. And waiting. Finally, Musashi's boat could be seen bobbing on the horizon. Legend has it that Musashi had carved a wooden sword from one of the spare oars on the boat ride over.

It was slightly longer than Kojirō's enormous blade.

Kojirō was irate.

As Musashi stepped ashore, he said with a smile...

"You have already lost."

Kojirō lunged. Musashi sidestepped, bringing the wooden sword down on his opponent’s skull. He collapsed, dying shortly after.

Near the end of his life, Musashi traded out his swords for pen and paper. He became a philosopher, a strategist and a writer.

Just before his death, he shared 21 rules he lived by. I’ve recited them down below, adding some of my own thoughts where I felt it would be helpful.

1. Accept everything just the way it is.

Live without bias. See everything as it is, not as you wish it to be. For no amount of wishful thinking will change the truth. You know the truth. Deep down, you know the truth. Yet, you choose to ignore it. This ignorance might delay your suffering. But, it will not prevent it. Instead, accept everything just the way it is.

2. Do not seek pleasure for its own sake.

Pleasure and pain are two sides of the same coin. Do not live a life devoid of pleasure. However, do not seek pleasure for its own sake. For pain trails pleasure like a hungry hound. Remorse follows reckless spending. Headache follows careless drinking. Anxiety follows senseless fucking. You are not a monk. You need not behave like one. But, live like the tiger. The tiger feasts only after it hunts.

3. Think lightly of yourself and deeply of the world.

Take your work seriously. Yourself, less so. Ego is to judgment what fog is to vision. Live, work and love with confidence. But, understand the line between confidence and hubris is as fine as a strand of silk. Finer, even. Psychotherapist Esther Perel defines confidence as…

“The ability to see yourself as an imperfect, flawed individual while still holding yourself in high regard.”

Hubris is being blind to your imperfections, ignorant of your flaws. Confidence is seeing them fully, completely.

4. Never be jealous.

Jealousy shrinks your mind. It narrows your thinking. You obsess over what you do not have, rather than cherish what you do. When you believe in scarcity, you experience scarcity. When you believe in abundance, you experience abundance. Furthermore, fight jealousy with rationality. To be envious of something someone else possesses, you must be envious of what they paid to possess it. For no possession comes without tremendous cost. You are jealous of the house. But, are you jealous of the long nights and weekends that achieved the house but caused the divorce?

5. Be detached from desire your whole life long.

Desire is felt on the tongue and in the groin. Calling is felt in the heart. When someone or something commands your attention, notice where the feeling resides. Learn to delineate between obsession and ambition, lust and love—desire and calling. If you choose to act on the basis of obsession, lust and desire do not shame yourself. But, at the same time, respect yourself enough not to play the fool. Remember you are the easiest person to fool. If you pursue desire, do so with the awareness that it will never leave you full.

6. Do not regret what you have done.

There are no such things as mistakes. Only lessons. The lessons are repeated until they are learned. You either learn now or you learn later. But, you cannot learn and regret at the same time. Regret will only prolong the learning, as drought prolongs the cultivation of a crop. This does not free you from responsibility nor accountability. When you hurt someone, apologize. However, see to it that you forgive yourself in time (whether or not they are in a place to forgive you).

7. Never let yourself be saddened by a separation.

Those who are meant to stay, will stay. Those who are meant to leave, will leave. Those who are meant to return, will return. Do not beg anyone to stay. Do not push anyone to leave. Do not coax anyone to return. Instead, remain still. Remain solid. Remain honest. Remain forthright. All the while, allowing others to do as they please.

8. Do not, under any circumstances, depend on a partial feeling.

Acting on the basis of a partial feeling is gambling. If you choose to gamble, do not be surprised if you lose. For the odds are in the house’s favor. Investing is not the same as gambling. You will never have complete certainty in anything. In fact, courage is acting in the absence of certainty. But, there is such a thing as idiocy, stupidity and outright lunacy. If you choose to be a lunatic, at least smile as you carry your handbasket to hell.

9. Resentment and complaint are appropriate neither for oneself nor others.

Resentment is a sword that cuts both ways. It causes pain to the recipient of the blade and the individual wielding it. You do not have to forgive every trespass made against you. But, you must accept it. In fact, you must accept the trespass swiftly. For in the absence of acceptance, resentment blooms. You cannot accept and resent at the same time. Furthermore, do not complain. If you must complain, present a solution along with the complaint. Spend 10% of the time on the complaint, 90% of the time on seeing to it the complaint is solved.

10. Do not let yourself be guided by the feeling of lust or love.

While I’m in agreement with Musashi that lust is a fickle guide, love is the greatest, purest guide you can ever know. If you believe that to feel love is to know God, to ignore love is to turn your face away from your creator. Be wary of following lust—although there are many lessons lust can teach—but follow love with complete devotion.

11. In all things have no preferences.

Expect nothing. For even if your expectations are met, you will find yourself happy for only a short while. Soon, any joy that you feel will be replaced with more expectations. They are like lily pads in this way, expectations. Beautiful. Yet, capricious. They’re unable to support the weight of anything substantial. Instead, expect nothing. Live in a constant state of wonder. No—wonder isn’t the word. Surprise. Live in a constant state of surprise. Live moment to moment, unsure of what strange fruit the next moment might bear. Sometimes, you will bite into the fruit and become sick. Other times, you will bite into the fruit and feel the sweetness drip down your chin. Regardless, devour the fruit with no preconceived notion.

12. Be indifferent to where you live.

If you aren’t happy where you are, you will not be happy where you go. Ben Cake, a writer I very much admire, once said…

“I can be content anywhere, as long as I have a cup of coffee to drink and a book to read.”

Travel can expand the mind. But, at the same time, it can become a form of escapism. Be where you are. For wherever you go, there you are.

13. Do not pursue the taste of good food.

Bourdain would disagree wholeheartedly. Perhaps there is a middle ground? There is as much to be enjoyed in times of feast, as there is to be learned in times of fast. Do not feast at every meal. It thickens your waistline and loosens your resolve. However, if you must eat to stay alive, you might decide there is nothing wrong with the food you consume being both nutritious and pleasant on the palate.

14. Do not hold on to possessions you no longer need.

May your hands be a constant reminder that there is a limit to what you can carry. If you are like many, you might mistake possessions for wealth. But, possessions can become a form of imprisonment. Acquisition should come with sacrifice. If you bring something new into your home, something old must go.

15. Do not act following customary beliefs.

If you take a customary action, you will get a customary result. Belief is the genesis of action. Be wary of what you choose to believe. Perhaps it’s advantageous to believe that fortune favors the bold. So, be bold. Be courageous. Be tenacious. It was Napoleon Bonaparte who said…

“Audacity. Audacity. Always audacity.”

When in doubt, be audacious.

16. Do not collect weapons or practice with weapons beyond what is useful.

This is a bit hypocritical coming from a samurai who wielded not one sword but two. However, it is doubtful Musashi enjoyed the same prowess with the bow and arrow as he did the katana and wakizashi. It is not wrong to crave competence in a number of skills, but mastery is achieved through expertise in a single skill. Bruce Lee once said…

“I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times.”

Choose a weapon—maybe two—and swing it until the blade is dull.

Sharpen it, then swing it some more.

17. Do not fear death.

Fear sloth. Fear greed. Fear hatred. Fear never reaching your full potential. But, do not fear death. 117 billion people have been born on Earth. Not a single one has managed to escape death. It’s inevitable. It’s beautiful. And, if you believe in a higher power, it’s only the beginning.

18. Do not seek to possess either goods or fiefs for your old age.

Hoarding wealth for the future costs you enjoyment for the present. It is cliché to say, but tomorrow is not promised. So, devour the present. Devour the moment. Devour the hour. Devour the day. Understand that wealth is not strictly financial. It is spiritual. It is mental. It is emotional. If you are an artist, do not sit on your hands and wait for another day to make your masterpiece. Delay is lethal to the artist. In the words of Annie Dillard…

“Spend it all, shoot it, play it, lose it, all, right away, every time. Do not hoard what seems good for a later place in the book or for another book; give it, give it all, give it now. The impulse to save something good for a better place later is the signal to spend it now. Something more will arise for later, something better. These things fill from behind, from beneath, like well water. Similarly, the impulse to keep to yourself what you have learned is not only shameful, it is destructive. Anything you do not give freely and abundantly becomes lost to you. You open your safe and find ashes.”

Spend it all.

19. Respect Buddha and the gods without counting on their help.

Believe in God. Respect him. Love him. Thank him. Cherish him. But, do not count on him to save you. He gave you lungs so you can breathe. He gave you legs so you can run. He gave you hands so you can create. He gave you fortitude so you can save yourself. I’ve read of many acts of divine intervention in holy texts. But, I have yet to witness one with my own eyes. This is not proof that God does not exist—be him Buddha, Allah or whatever it is you choose to call him—but he is a silent partner. His silence requires the presence of faith.

20. You may abandon your own body but you must preserve your honor.

Samurai committed Seppuku. To the modern Western mind, this ritual form of suicide is impossible to wrap one’s head around. Samurai committed Seppuku for a number of reasons. To avoid capture, torture or execution. To accept responsibility for failure. To protest a lord’s decision. To demonstrate moral conviction. To follow a deceased lord into death. Yet, regardless of the intention, the act revolved around one central idea. To preserve their honor. For maintaining one’s honor was considered more valuable than continued life.

21. Never stray from The Way.

The Way is different for each of us. For Musashi, it was these 21 principles. For you, it might be Jung, Jesus, Kant, Woolf or Plath. Once you’ve found The Way, remain faithful to The Way—especially in moments when your faith is tested. As an adman myself, I would be remiss if I did not mention an adman at least once in this essay. Bill Bernbach once said…

“A principle is not a principle until it costs you money.”

This is how you know you’ve arrived at The Way. You’ve stood by your beliefs, rules and principles when it has cost you, when it has inconvenienced you, when it has left your heart broken but your soul intact.

It’s the early 1920s. A boy named Ludwig moves to America. He gets a job as a busboy at The Ritz in New York City.

Ludwig is paired with a veteran waiter who becomes something of a mentor to him. One day, a very important-looking gentleman is enjoying dinner in the dining room.

After a bit of reconnaissance, the waiter discovers the gentleman is a famous cartoonist. He’s made a fortune drawing pictures of a big man hitting a little man on the head.

Riches in the niches.

The cartoonist lives at The Ritz, drives a Rolls-Royce, throws elaborate parties, eats grouse out of season, drinks vintage champagne before noon, is married to a drop-dead gorgeous countess and spends half the year in the South of France.

Hearing how wealthy the cartoonist is, the old waiter advises the boy to take up drawing. He buys the boy some art supplies and tells him to try drawing some of the hotel guests.

Read more

Charles Dickens was a notorious nightwalker.

He’d take to the streets of Victorian London after dark and explore every nook and cranny the city had to offer.

Read more

Stanley Kubrick was a lifelong recluse. So much so, he would often dress in disguises when answering his own door.

If you were a crazed fan paying an unsolicited visit to Stanley Kubrick’s English manor during the height of his fame in the ‘80s and ‘90s, you may have conversed with him without ever realizing it.

Kubrick had a habit of answering the door dressed as his butler, regrettably informing adoring fans that Mr. Kubrick was away, working on his next film.

Over the course of five decades, Kubrick directed commercial blockbusters like Spartacus, The Shining and Full Metal Jacket, as well as critically acclaimed films like 2001: A Space Odyssey, A Clockwork Orange and Eyes Wide Shut.

Kubrick was a creative genius by every definition of the word. Yet, despite his brilliance, he somehow managed to maintain an air of anonymity throughout his storied career.

To such an extent that there was a brief time when a British conman—ironically named Alan Conway—impersonated the famed director to gain access to restaurants and high-society parties around London.

It’s rumored that Kubrick wasn’t upset by the impersonation but intrigued.

Catch me if you can.

There’s a fascinating correlation between introversion and creativity.

It doesn’t end with Stanley Kubrick.

Cormac McCarthy refused interviews, declined speaking engagements and once no-showed at a literary banquet held in his honor.

Emily Dickinson lived much of her life in her parents’ home with the vast majority of her time spent in her room, writing. When circumstances demanded she communicate with visitors, she did so through her closed front door. After Dickinson died at the age of fifty-five, her sister found a dusty trunk filled with 1,800 unpublished poems.

Harper Lee practically vanished after the release of To Kill a Mockingbird, only to resurface again, decades later, with the sequel, Go Set a Watchman.

J.D. Salinger—perhaps the most notorious creative recluse of all time—lived out the rest of his days in Cornish, New Hampshire, after publishing The Catcher in the Rye. Viewing publishing as a “damn interruption”, Salinger worked steadily in a detached room he called The Bunker, writing strictly for himself and his own pleasure.

These creatives could easily be shrugged off as socially awkward kooks. But, it might have been their social awkwardness—or introversion, rather—that fed their creativity.

Let’s talk to Jung.

Believe it or not, the concepts of “introversion” and “extroversion” weren’t really much of a thing until the turn of the 20th century.

A psychologist by the name of Carl Jung wrote and published a book called Psychological Types, in which he first popularized the terms “introvert” and “extrovert.” He described the former as…

“An introverted consciousness can be well aware of external conditions, but is not motivated by them. The extreme introvert responds primarily to internal impressions.”

Years later, a writer by the name of Susan Cain would take Jung’s theories on introverts and amplify them considerably in a book titled, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking.

One of Cain’s observations on introverts reads…

“The highly sensitive tend to be philosophical or spiritual in their orientation, rather than materialistic or hedonistic. They dislike small talk. They often describe themselves as creative or intuitive. They dream vividly, and can often recall their dreams the next day. They love music, nature, art, physical beauty. They feel exceptionally strong emotions—sometimes acute bouts of joy, but also sorrow, melancholy, and fear. Highly sensitive people also process information about their environments—both physical and emotional—unusually deeply. They tend to notice subtleties that others miss—another person’s shift in mood, say, or a lightbulb burning a touch too brightly.”

As an introvert myself, I can confidently say that introversion is a katana that cuts both ways. We witness both extremes when gazing upon the works and lives of Stanley Kubrick, Cormac McCarthy, Emily Dickinson, Harper Lee and J.D. Salinger.

In the case of Emily Dickinson, it is not at all normal for a person to be so cripplingly introverted that they insist on talking to visitors behind a closed door.

However, it’s also quite unusual for a person to write 1,800 poems (some of which would go on to land among poetry’s greatest works) over the course of a relatively short life.

What introversion can teach us about creativity.

The same sensitivity that makes it difficult for introverts to function in a world that demands we talk to others is, at the same time, the essence that allows creatives to produce the kind of works we can’t take our eyes off of.

Introverts make for extraordinary creatives because creative work requires long bouts of solitude and deep focus. By contrast, an extrovert who feels most energized surrounded by people might find it more difficult to carve out time to be entirely themselves.

Because of this, there are plenty of lessons to be gleaned from introverted creatives, particularly when it comes to solitude and focus.

The great crime novelist Raymond Chandler set aside four hours, each day, when he forced himself to be entirely alone. During his solitude, he gave himself permission not to write if he wasn’t feeling inspired. However, if he chose not to write, he had to sit in his writing chair and do nothing.

Eventually, Chandler would grow so bored doing nothing, he’d write.

For introverts, the possibility of doing nothing—or creating something when faced with doing nothing—is as titillating as a tightly packed basement bar at 3 a.m., drinks flowing, bodies moving and music pumping sound waves into the ear canals and chest cavities of its lively inhabitants.

Once upon a time, there was a British adman who held prestigious positions at agencies all over the world. The problem was the adman hated advertising and had ambitions of making it as a novelist.

To put his money where his dream was, the adman dedicated himself to writing a novel. He then submitted the novel to every literary agent he could find, only to have it jammed right back in his face.

Read more

I woke up Saturday morning mildly hungover, looking for answers.

The day was hot and humid.

It was as if a tremendous fire raged beneath the city and officials had kicked over an enormous vat of water in hopes of cooling the asphalt underfoot.

I had just picked up a collection of David Lynch’s visual work titled Someone Is in My House. It was sealed in a piece of translucent plastic to keep tire-kickers from creasing the pages. I declined the clerk’s offer of a tote and instead tucked the book under my arm. As sweat colored my shirt from gray to black on the walk back to my flat, I was thankful for the added layer of protection.

Two, maybe three blocks from my building, I nearly tripped over an A-frame sign on the sidewalk advertising palm readings by a woman named Madam Faye.

I’m a believer in Carl Jung’s theory of synchronicity—the idea that you should pay attention to the things you pay attention to, as they function like little signal fires from your subconscious.

I decided to go in.

There was a stenciled hand on the sign pointing to an entrance on my right.

As I entered, I thought back to a field trip I took to Mammoth Cave as a child. The guide leading me and my classmates into the belly of the cave wanted to show us what true darkness looked like—and so he asked us to hold hands and stand still before killing the lights

It was terrifying.

The stairs were covered in a hideous, moth-eaten shag carpet that I would have felt tempted to remove in a past life. Once I had reached the top, I found myself face to face with a man quietly enjoying a cigarette. He looked less like a palm reader and more like someone you’d score an eight-ball off of.

He took a long drag from his cigarette, stubbed it out and added it to the bent-over bodies in the ashtray. “Don’t worry,” he said. “I’m not the palm reader. I’m just the quarterback.” He stood up and knocked on the heavy metal door beside him.

Soon, Madam Faye appeared.

While Madam Faye looked more like a palm reader than the man whom I assumed to be her boyfriend, her appearance didn’t instill an overwhelming sense of confidence.

Wearing a bright blue jumper, a red lip, a pair of cream-colored VEJA sneakers and a Michael Kors handbag, she was far from bohemian.

She told me to take a seat and turn over my palms. I obeyed. Madam Faye gazed at them—for what felt like an extraordinarily long time—with furrowed brows.

For a moment, I wondered if she had fallen asleep.

When she finally spoke, she recited a line that so many palm readers say to their customers: “In your last relationship, you felt like you gave more than you received.”

This is called a Barnum statement.

It’s named after the showman and politician P.T. Barnum.

While running the P.T. Barnum's Grand Traveling Museum, Menagerie, Caravan & Hippodrome, the showman boasted of a program that “offered something for everyone.”

P.T. Barnum recognized that universality is achieved through specificity.

He would often make statements—before teeing up his shows—that felt specific to the individual but, in actuality, were universal to everyone in the audience.

Statements like “Your generosity is often taken for granted” or “You believe you’re capable of more than you’re achieving now” made the hundreds of thousands of people who attended his countless shows feel as though P.T. Barnum was speaking directly to them.

Believe it or not, they aren’t bullshit.

Well, they are bullshit. But, they work.

Back in 1948, a psychologist by the name of Bertram Forer ran an experiment. He gave his students a personality test. Afterward, each student received what they believed was a personality assessment specific to them.

They rated its accuracy astonishingly high—roughly 4.3 out of 5.

But, what these students didn’t know, was that they each received exactly the same assessment as their peers, regardless of the answers they provided on the test.

The assessment contained Barnum statements like “You have considerable unused capacity” and “At times you have serious doubts about whether you made the right decision.”

I don’t need to impress upon you just how universal these statements are.

Everybody feels like they are capable of doing and achieving more, just like everybody finds themselves doubting the decisions they’ve made. But, we make these statements specific because we attach our own experiences to them.

This is what keeps palm readers in business.

Palm readers recognize the vast majority of people who visit them are doing so because they’re experiencing some degree of romantic turmoil.

More often than not, a relationship has ended—or is fraying at the ends—and the individual sitting across from them is searching for an answer.

A Barnum statement like “In your last relationship, you felt like you gave more than you received” has a high likelihood of resonating. More importantly, it feels specific to the individual, despite being universal to just about everyone.

Deep down, each of us knows that if someone possessed the psychic ability to actually read our palms and determine our future, they wouldn’t be charging just $15 per palm (or $25 for two).

But, people don’t visit palm readers for rational reasons. They visit palm readers because they are desperate for certainty—even if it’s a false sense of certainty—even if it requires them to travel up the staircase of some dark, dingy apartment building at the risk of being mugged or murdered or both.

I don’t look down upon palm readers. If they didn’t provide some degree of value for the human race, they wouldn’t be hawking their services on every street corner in Manhattan—the market simply wouldn’t support them.

We tell ourselves stories in order to live.

People pay palm readers not because palm readers can predict the future, but because they provide stories that offer a sense of certainty.

We live in a world that is incredibly strange, confusing and scary. To get by, we do precisely what Joan Didion once wrote…

“We tell ourselves stories in order to live.”

Palm readers give us stories we can live with—as do self-help authors, cults, life coaches, tarot card readers, astrology applications like Co-Star and the many self-assured writers (like myself) you will find on platforms like Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and Substack.

At the end of Madam Faye’s reading, she attempted to upsell me.

She said, “I’m sensing a blockage with you. I don’t know what it is. But, it’s standing in the way of everything you want in life, love and work. For $325, I can clear this blockage.”

I politely declined, wiped the sweat from my brow, handed her $25, picked up my book and left. Madam Faye didn’t realize it, but she had given me what I came for.

This essay.

Running an advertising agency is the hardest thing I’ve ever done.

I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.

This is the very reason it’s such a tremendous opportunity. If you can survive long enough, your competitors will take care of themselves.

I’d liken it to rowing a boat while wearing a pair of noise-cancelling headphones.

Your back is facing the direction you’re rowing. You can only see where you’ve been. Not where you’re heading. You can peer over your shoulder to get a rough sense of what is directly ahead of you.

But, for the most part, you’re flying rowing blind.

You don’t know if you’re rowing into a calm stretch of river running through a tunnel of freshly blooming jasmine—or straight into the jaws of a 800-pound grizzly.

Many days, you get mauled.

To survive—and hopefully thrive—you must become comfortable with uncertainty.

If you don’t, you will eventually pull off to the side of the bank, get out of the boat, hurl your oars into the river, hitchhike to the nearest gas station, purchase a gallon of gasoline along with a Zippo lighter, return to your little rickety vessel and light the entire goddamn thing on fire.

Most agencies die from suicide, not homicide.

As a founder—be it of an agency or a company—this is the temptation you’re constantly reconciling with.

At any moment, you can stop sliding quarters into the ass kicking machine.

If you’re anything like me, it’s not the ass-kicking itself that is painful. It’s the uncertainty of not knowing when the next ass-kicking is coming.

In many ways, uncertainty is an asset. It keeps you on the edge of your seat. Without it, you become complacent. But, too much of it will cave your head in. It will drive you mad—madder than a coyote on speed.

In Hell’s Angels, Hunter S. Thompson writes of The Edge…

“The Edge... There is no honest way to explain it because the only people who really know where it is are the ones who have gone over. The others—the living—are those who pushed their control as far as they felt they could handle it, and then pulled back, or slowed down, or did whatever they had to when it came time to choose between now and later. But the edge is still out there.”

For Thompson, The Edge was the wrong concoction of hallucinogens. For me, The Edge is uncertainty. It’s what separates sanity from madness.

When running an agency—or any company for that matter—you must become comfortable with navigating The Edge without going over.

Like most things in life, this is easier said than done.

The line of no return.

If you’ve ever been to Niagara Falls, you’ve been warned of the line of no return.

It’s the moment where the Niagara River becomes a death sentence. It’s the point where the current becomes so strong it carries everything to the brink. Once you cross this line in the river, you’re fucked six ways to Sunday.

You can’t row your way out of it. Unless there is a Black Hawk helicopter stationed nearby, you’re done for.

What makes things interesting about the line of no return, is that it’s invisible. Folks only have a rough idea of where it starts. Those who know—truly—went over The Edge. Unfortunately, they’re no longer around to mark the precise location of the guillotine.

Any last words?

In business, art and advertising, the highest returns happen within inches of The Edge. Or, in the case of the Niagara River, the line of no return.

If you can ride this line—without crossing it—you’ll make out like a king, with a ransom to boot.

Contrary to common belief, keeping your wits about you when faced with constant uncertainty requires you to forfeit control. Not exhibit more of it.

In Alcoholics Anonymous, they recite the Serenity Prayer. You neither have to be religious nor a recovering alcoholic to see the beauty in it…

“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”

I say this prayer often as I build Honey.

It keeps me sane. It keeps me calm. It keeps me grounded. It keeps me tenacious. It keeps me from constantly looking over my shoulder. It keeps me focused on what I can control. It keeps me from worrying about what I can’t. It keeps me wise enough to know the difference. It keeps me glued to my seat.

It keeps me rowing, rowing, rowing—until I see God or the finish line.

Most people don’t lack creativity. They lack taste.

This was certainly true for Quentin Tarantino.

Before Tarantino became a director, he worked behind the counter at a video store. It was far from glamorous, especially for an aspiring filmmaker who had his sights set on being among the greats.

However, Tarantino treated the job like a paid MFA in filmmaking.

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Pablo Picasso was prolific. He produced 150,000 paintings, drawings, sculptures and prints over the course of his storied career.

Art critics attribute Picasso’s bounteous output to his nocturnal work schedule.

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Unless you’re balls deep in the world of advertising, you’ve likely never heard of the adman Tom McElligott.

He was a Midwestern boy. He was the son of a preacher man. It’s difficult not to read that in the voice of Dusty Springfield. He was tack-sharp, despicably shy and as nervous as those bug-eyed whippets that shake uncontrollably if you raise your voice above a whisper.

He was no Don Draper.

While McElligott could sell a creative vision with the prowess of David Ogilvy—and had the creative chops to back it up—it was rumored he’d fill a waste bin with vomit before stepping into client presentations.

Unlike others of his time—who were motivated by corner offices, six-figure salaries, meaningless awards, grab-assing with the good old boys and the occasional afternoon shag—McElligott cared only about producing great work.

This dedication to craftsmanship is what led him to create some of the most compelling advertising the world has ever seen.

Words of wisdom.

After McElligott retired, he did an interview with an ad student, sharing a piece of advice I think everyone should read (whether you work in advertising or not)...

“Don’t be distracted by anything. The work is what counts. There are a lot of things that can get in your way, that take up your time and your emotional and intellectual energy; none of them account for anything. They mean nothing. The only thing, in the final analysis, at this stage of the game, that really counts, is the work. The work is everything.”

He continues, reflecting on his own career…

“The years that I spent in advertising I saw an awful lot of people who had the potential to be good lose a lot of their ability to distraction, to politics, to fear, and to who has the bigger office. You’ll get the bigger office; you’ll make the money. Anything you want will happen, but sometimes it’s hard for people to see that when they’re in the middle of it.”

Finally, he ends his counsel with a bit of flair…

“It looks like it’s incredibly complicated. Well, it’s not complicated at all. In fact, it’s so uncomplicated it’s amazing. All it is about is the work. Finally, if you do the work people will notice and you will get what you want. That’s it. It’s as simple as that.”

When your hands are in the dirt and you’re doing good work that’s receiving little to no attention, you’d be forgiven for shrugging off McElligott’s advice.

But, it’s worth remembering these words came from a man who wasn’t nearly as celebrated as his contemporaries: David Ogilvy, Leo Burnett and Bill Bernbach.

Yet, despite his lack of notoriety, McElligott was able to make a handsome living doing work he loved for a handful of clients who believed in him.

So, in closing…

Do the work. Do the work. Do the work.

If you do the work, you might not get famous, but you will be known well enough by the right people that, eventually, you will get by.

F. Scott Fitzgerald was married to a woman named Zelda Sayre.

They were a power couple during the Roaring Twenties, known throughout Europe for their larger-than-life personalities and lavish parties.

However, their relationship was riddled with infidelity, jealousy, alcoholism, mental illness, manipulation—gaslighting, stonewalling, bread-crumbing, etc—and a never-ending flurry of knock-down, drag-out fights.

During one of their bouts, Zelda hit Fitzgerald below the belt.

Zelda said he had a small penis.

Fitzgerald confided in his friend, Ernest Hemingway.

No. I’m not making this up.

In A Moveable Feast, Hemingway writes of the encounter in great detail.

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Two centuries ago, Mount Tambora in Indonesia erupted. This ignited a chain reaction that sent ripples across every corner of the globe. It was chaos.

Debris spilled into the stratosphere, creating a vast aerosol shield. It blotted out sunlight and lowered global temperatures by roughly one degree Fahrenheit.

Goodbye, summer.

What followed was the The Year Without Summer.

Crops dropped like flies across Europe and North America. Grain and oat prices swelled. Rains drowned entire farmlands in Ireland. Cholera killed millions in India. Hundreds of thousands of people died of starvation.

Meanwhile, during this dark and depressing year, a novelist by the name of Mary Shelley holed up in a villa outside of Geneva, Switzerland. She wasn’t alone. Her beloved Percy and her son William accompanied her, as did her friends.

Shelley and her party stayed inside, weathering the year without summer by discussing philosophy, literature and art.

Story time.

Nearby was the English poet Lord Byron. Shelley and company would often visit him in the Villa Diodati. To pass the time, Lord Byron would challenge his guests to write—and later recite—their scariest ghost story.

It was after one of these retellings that Shelley suffered a nightmare that spawned one of the greatest novels of the 19th century.

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Salvador Dalí wasn’t an artist. He was a capitalist whose business was art.

Before Dalí, artists saw business as something beneath them. Dalí was different. He approached business with the same seriousness that he approached art.

Dalí collaborated with brands, designed advertisements, created logos (like Chupa Chups) and licensed his name.

Furthermore, he understood the power of a personal brand—before there was such a thing. To garner massive amounts of attention for both himself and his work, Dalí appeared on television talk shows, carried out publicity stunts and wore a ridiculous (but unforgettable) mustache.

Dalí was also thrifty.

He was a man of extraordinarily expensive taste. Yet, despite his affection for the finer things, Dalí managed to live much of his luxurious lifestyle entirely for free.

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You’ve likely never heard of Alexandre Dumas.

But, you’ve certainly heard of his work. He is the author behind the masterpieces The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers.

But, here’s what’s fascinating...

Dumas had help.

In 19th-century France, newspapers took a fascinating approach to publishing novels. They released them in series. Readers would get a single chapter at a time.

Think of it like a television show before the days of streaming. Back when you had to wait each week for the next episode.

Dumas understood the model and capitalized on it. He ended each chapter with a cliffhanger to keep his readers hungry for the next. Newspapers adored Dumas. He was sought after by every publication in France.

To meet the commercial demand, Dumas built a content machine.

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SpongeBob SquarePants never did it for me. However, there is one episode I will never forget—as it informs so much of the work I do at Honey.

Let’s set the scene.

Anyone who has been within earshot of an episode of SpongeBob SquarePants knows Squidward loathes SpongeBob and, his best friend, Patrick Star.

One day, SpongeBob and Patrick’s childish antics push Squidward too far.

While fooling around with a pair of Reef Blowers, they discover the contraptions not only blow but suck. Get your head out of the gutter. Soon, they’re sucking up everything in sight—including the windows and front door off Squidward’s home.

To make things right, they attempt to blow them back on the house.

This inevitably destroys it.

Squidward—madder than a hornet in a Mountain Dew can—packs his bags and gets the hell out of Dodge. He moves into Tentacle Acres, a gated community for squids. If you are a crotchety squid, it’s a dream come true. More importantly, it provides a level of security that rivals the Pentagon, ensuring its resident mollusks are completely insulation from any troublesome sea sponges and starfish.

Welcome to Squidville.

At first, Squidward is happier than a hog in shit. He gets to ride his propeller bike, take interpretive dance lessons and play his clarinet to his heart’s delight.

With time, however, something changes within Squidward. As each day drags into the next, he becomes increasingly discontent with his life in Tentacle Acres.

While perceived perfection initially draws Squidward to Tentacle Acres, it soon becomes the bane of his existence.

As a viewer, we see Squidward’s crash-out from a mile away (more on this later). All the houses look the same. All the canned bread tastes the same. All the squids dress the same. All the clarinets sound the same.

Squidward is drowning in a sea of sameness.

Humanity is drowning, too.

Over the last decade, everything has begun to look exactly the same.

Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed.

Coffee shops with white oak floors, exposed brick walls, Edison light bulbs and tatted baristas wearing heavy burlap aprons pouring rosewater oat milk lattes.

Apartment buildings with gray façades, black-rimmed windows, ivory quartz countertops and names like The Lofts (despite not technically being lofts).

FinTech companies with neon-blue gradients and AI-generated cartoon illustrations all claiming to “democratize” money and “revolutionize” banking.

Wellness brands housed inside dusty pink or beige bottles—with rounded edges and clinical typography—backed by glowing celebrities whispering about rituals.

Oh, and don’t get me started on dating profiles.

As a single man in his early thirties, it’s astonishing to me how many women have traveled to Machu Picchu, drink Aperol Spritzes like it’s the blood of Christ and are looking for an ambitious man—with a healthy work-life balance—who must first be pre-approved by their French bulldog.

Our psychology is partially to blame.

Each of us suffers from something psychologists call the chameleon effect.

We subconsciously mirror behaviors, mannerisms, language and aesthetic preferences of those around us in order to learn, belong, build trust, make friends and gain status.

In other words, we’re chameleons.

I used the word “suffer” earlier. But, the chameleon effect isn’t all bad. It has allowed us to survive. If we hadn’t learned to copy one another thousands of years ago, we’d have gone extinct.

Imagine what would happen if we were unable to imitate behaviors like washing our hands, properly preparing meat, avoiding murky bodies of water that might be inhabited by crocodiles and distinguishing between death cap and paddy straw mushrooms?

We’d all be dead.

However, mimicry can also lead to homogeneity.

Brands behave much like people because they’re run by people.

When an organization is considering creating something new, what’s the first thing they do? They create a mood board.

Many times, the inspiration on this mood board is pulled directly from the most successful brand(s) in their industry.

If you’re a consumer tech product wanting to open a flagship store, you’re probably going to peruse Apple. If you’re an airline trying to improve your customer experience, you’re probably going to book a flight on Delta. If you’re an AI brand hoping to launch a slick-looking website, you’re probably going to visit Palantir.

Take a stroll through the grocery store.

We see this most glaringly in the supermarket. Walk the aisles of Kroger, Trader Joe’s or Walmart. Everything looks the same. All the toothpastes look the same—as do the spices, sauces, sodas, snacks, garbage bags and detergents.

This doesn’t mean brands should stop looking for inspiration. It means they should stop looking for inspiration exclusively within their own industry.

If you’re building a bank, don’t study banks. Study museums. If you’re building an airline, don’t study airlines. Study boutique hotels. If you’re building an AI company, don’t study AI companies. Study Japanese packaging.

Again, I don’t fault these brands. Choosing to be on the side of the majority is safer, after all. However, if you want to create a brand that is like nothing your industry has ever seen before, you must go where nobody in your industry will go.

Otherwise, you risk looking like everyone else—which is to say you risk extinction.

Brands who remain leaders in their space for decades constantly reinvent themselves. They have to. Every couple of years, they look up to find their competitors are sporting the same fucking haircut. So, they head to the barber. No pun intended.

This was the case with The Beatles.

The Beatles understood something that most brands (and people) don’t.

Originality has an expiration date.

Once everyone mimics what makes you different, you’re no longer different. Hence why The Beatles were constantly reinventing themselves.

While The Beatles weren’t the godfathers of the mop-top, they brought it to the masses in the early 1960s. Beatlemania became shorthand for not only this hairdo, but collarless suits and ridiculous boots.

Soon, every competing band—and every young man for that matter—started looking like The Beatles.

So, what did The Beatles do?

They cut their hair.

Or, grew out their hair, rather.

They’ve been going in and out of style.

Consider the cover of Sgt. Pepper.

You see the band garbed in elaborate psychedelic military costumes. Beside them stand wax figures—borrowed from Madame Tussauds—of their former selves. All are mop-topped, clean-shaven and dressed in matching suits. The difference is so jarring, it’s as if the new Beatles are attending the old Beatles’ funeral.

When the world began resembling The Beatles, The Beatles stopped resembling themselves. This cycle continued until they eventually parted ways in 1970.

Brands must undergo the same reinvention.

Is it exhausting?

Yes.

But, it’s exhausting to be the best.

Originality isn’t just good for business. It’s good for humanity.

It creates a world that is more exciting to live in. Part of what makes the human experience so extraordinary, is that no experience is exactly the same.

I fear many of us are sharing in Squidward’s unhappiness. Perceived perfection has come at the cost of variety, distinction and originality.

At the end of the aforementioned SpongeBob episode, Squidward goes nuclear.

He finds a Reef Blower—the same contraption SpongeBob and Patrick used to destroy his house—and turns into a full-blown menace. Again, no pun intended.

Squidward rearranges the other squids’ faces. He sucks up the other squids’ belongings. He disrupts the peace of the perfect world that is Tentacle Acres.

As a viewer, you end the episode realizing that Squidward didn’t lose his mind. He reclaimed his sanity. He swam into the sea of sameness, then grabbed a towel and got the fuck out.