Not only did I enjoy the journey of your work, but the expressed feelings along the way…this all resonated so much. I thought I could never be unhappy again after I finally found a literary agent, then an editor, and then wow - a published book! And then slowly, the goal post moved. We are enough before and after everything, it’s just so easy to forget. Thank you 🙏
Oh Amy. Thank you. GOAL POSTS MOVED is a perfect descriptor! Yes. I'm so bad (or good?) at doing this to myself. Encouraged to know I'm not alone and so happy this post found you and meant something. Thanks for the kind lift.
"My identity is not wrapped in what I accomplish, but who I am. I will not mistake my goals or roles for my soul." Beautiful, timely, important. Thank you Brad!
I so needed this Brad. In fact, I need it as my ringtone, my screensaver, printed on the back of cereal boxes!
I have accomplished more than I ever thought possible in one lifetime. I am living a life that surpasses the dreams I held for myself in so many ways so it’s utterly confusing (and humbling and disorienting and frustrating) to wake up and realize, wait, I’m still not satisfied? I’m still not “done”? I’m still yearning and longing and wanting and wondering will I ever reach the point where I feel like THERE, I did the thing that mattered and now I can sit back and enjoy my life. But it seems that the “there” I’m looking for is a mirage. Thanks to consumerism and materialism I think we’ve all been brainwashed into thinking that when X happens I’ll finally feel content, but I’m learning (slowly?!) that contentment is something I need to foster with every miracle moment I have on this earth.
I do think our end products matter but I think HOW we create them matters even more. Everything you’ve made is brimming with heart and humor, integrity and boundless creativity. I know firsthand how you effortlessly ensure that those you work alongside feel seen and special. There may be no “awards” for that (yet) in our culture, no Cannes for kindness, but if we are gonna feel satisfied about anything let it be the WAY we lived, not just our portfolios.
dearest golriz!!!!!!!! what a gift to find this comment from my light of a sister in New Zealand! Missing you and your family so much. Missing our adventures and feeling all these same feelings as you! Your inclusion of the word 'mirage' is so spot on. We ache for what's real and mistake so many other things for it ... only to find disappointment and despair. These kind words from you are so meaningful, because I know you, your heart, and that it's all *real*. Truly. You've been a source of so many loving and nourishing words in my life over time. Holding this sentence close: "if we are gonna feel satisfied about anything let it be the WAY we lived, not just our portfolios." You're living with a lot of love, friend. Love on!
Reading this with my morning coffee in a cafe in Bangkok. Tears! It's been 5 years since we've moved here from Copenhagen and 5 years since I've had a "real job". I can't work with how our life is at the moment and I miss working. I miss having an identity in a title. I miss achieving. I miss having a career. I thought I would get work here, I didn't, but I get to be here! I get to love on the people I meet. I get to volunteer and I get to sit with people I meet, listen and see them. I did a session on the topic loneliness with some High Schoolers and we hung up your cat poster at the school. It was amazing! "I thought it would work out this way, but then it worked out that way." Thank you for always pointing us to what matters, Brad. The point is what we are being and it really is enough.
Ruth, thank you. I am so moved by your honesty and heart. Thank *you* for being who you are right where you are. It matters oh so much. Holding your kind words close today.
It’s easy to see the outward reality of others and think - they’re successful and happy, they ‘made’ it, without seeing the context, inner and ‘real’ reality that you share here. I loved reading this, as with all your writing, thank you for your words. It reminds me a little of the book ‘The Happiness Advantage’ by Shawn Achor where he talks about how we all think that happiness is on the other side of success, instead of realising that being happy first, inherently means we are and can be more successful
Emily, wonderful note. We so quickly take our brains to a place of comparison and it takes us off the path of contentment! Thank you for your presence, your joy, and your commitment to caring deeply.
Feeling this so deeply! Really thought going to grad school would change everything, but alas, I just graduated and... it did not. 🫠 Thank for you being you.
Maryn! You used my new favorite emoji. It captures so much of the emotion I was trying to write about. haha. 🫠 Congrats on graduation. You're allowed to celebrate this and allowed to be disappointed. Someone else commented here about how much they move the goalposts for themselves in an unhealthy way. May you find healthy ways to celebrate what is and engage with what could be... all while knowing... who you are? That's the good stuff.
🫠 is easily in my top 5 most used emojis since it's how I feel most of the time 🫠
Gahhh. Thank you so much. As always, you expressed it beautifully and it's just what I needed to hear/read. That is the good stuff indeed (but why must it be so hard?!). Here's to knowing ourselves and to healthy goalposts! 🌟
“I thought it would work out this way but then it worked out that way” applies not only to the relative success or happiness of an individual but also to their views of a better life for others.
Aside from that inevitability - money - every well meaning intention of individuals, whether it be a guaranteed hourly wage, ‘sensible’ education, space voyages, mask mandates or the quest for more oil leads to unexpected and deleterious results.
Higher wages, rather than resulting in better living standards, contributes to higher costs. “Sensible” education leads to censorship and mistrust. Space voyages often become more vanity projects than actual discoveries, leading to ever higher cost overruns. Mask mandates encourage the already disassociative aspects of interpersonal relationships begun with phones. The quest for more oil stampedes into increased environmental degradation.
WHAT a mind (and voice). Just saw he had a novel come out recently! I'm hoping he reads the audiobook. Would be impossible to experience in someone else's voice.
He was on Joe Rogan recently talking about how he started forming his comedy out of expecting one thing to happen and tying it to another unexpected thing
Oh that's fascinating. I've actually heard Steve Martin express something similar. Got me wanting to dive into some Steven Wright interviews. Thanks DEE!
This part made me literally laugh out loud: When the show ended, so did my desire to be on camera. I was deeply embarrassed. It felt like a failure (and a public one at that). Loved ones would remind me the show was not a public failure as it’d really just been seen by only dozens of people. This did not help.
But really I relate to this on so many levels. Thank you for sharing! I believe that you MAKE JESUS HAPPY. And that is enough. :)
Not only did I enjoy the journey of your work, but the expressed feelings along the way…this all resonated so much. I thought I could never be unhappy again after I finally found a literary agent, then an editor, and then wow - a published book! And then slowly, the goal post moved. We are enough before and after everything, it’s just so easy to forget. Thank you 🙏
Oh Amy. Thank you. GOAL POSTS MOVED is a perfect descriptor! Yes. I'm so bad (or good?) at doing this to myself. Encouraged to know I'm not alone and so happy this post found you and meant something. Thanks for the kind lift.
"My identity is not wrapped in what I accomplish, but who I am. I will not mistake my goals or roles for my soul." Beautiful, timely, important. Thank you Brad!
Diana, thank you for the many ways you creatively express hope and life in this world!!
I so needed this Brad. In fact, I need it as my ringtone, my screensaver, printed on the back of cereal boxes!
I have accomplished more than I ever thought possible in one lifetime. I am living a life that surpasses the dreams I held for myself in so many ways so it’s utterly confusing (and humbling and disorienting and frustrating) to wake up and realize, wait, I’m still not satisfied? I’m still not “done”? I’m still yearning and longing and wanting and wondering will I ever reach the point where I feel like THERE, I did the thing that mattered and now I can sit back and enjoy my life. But it seems that the “there” I’m looking for is a mirage. Thanks to consumerism and materialism I think we’ve all been brainwashed into thinking that when X happens I’ll finally feel content, but I’m learning (slowly?!) that contentment is something I need to foster with every miracle moment I have on this earth.
I do think our end products matter but I think HOW we create them matters even more. Everything you’ve made is brimming with heart and humor, integrity and boundless creativity. I know firsthand how you effortlessly ensure that those you work alongside feel seen and special. There may be no “awards” for that (yet) in our culture, no Cannes for kindness, but if we are gonna feel satisfied about anything let it be the WAY we lived, not just our portfolios.
❤️❤️❤️
dearest golriz!!!!!!!! what a gift to find this comment from my light of a sister in New Zealand! Missing you and your family so much. Missing our adventures and feeling all these same feelings as you! Your inclusion of the word 'mirage' is so spot on. We ache for what's real and mistake so many other things for it ... only to find disappointment and despair. These kind words from you are so meaningful, because I know you, your heart, and that it's all *real*. Truly. You've been a source of so many loving and nourishing words in my life over time. Holding this sentence close: "if we are gonna feel satisfied about anything let it be the WAY we lived, not just our portfolios." You're living with a lot of love, friend. Love on!
"Because then I would be enough."
Wow. I feel that.
Good news for you, friend. YOU ARE! Truly. Call me if you ever doubt it.
Me too…
Reading this with my morning coffee in a cafe in Bangkok. Tears! It's been 5 years since we've moved here from Copenhagen and 5 years since I've had a "real job". I can't work with how our life is at the moment and I miss working. I miss having an identity in a title. I miss achieving. I miss having a career. I thought I would get work here, I didn't, but I get to be here! I get to love on the people I meet. I get to volunteer and I get to sit with people I meet, listen and see them. I did a session on the topic loneliness with some High Schoolers and we hung up your cat poster at the school. It was amazing! "I thought it would work out this way, but then it worked out that way." Thank you for always pointing us to what matters, Brad. The point is what we are being and it really is enough.
Ruth, thank you. I am so moved by your honesty and heart. Thank *you* for being who you are right where you are. It matters oh so much. Holding your kind words close today.
It’s easy to see the outward reality of others and think - they’re successful and happy, they ‘made’ it, without seeing the context, inner and ‘real’ reality that you share here. I loved reading this, as with all your writing, thank you for your words. It reminds me a little of the book ‘The Happiness Advantage’ by Shawn Achor where he talks about how we all think that happiness is on the other side of success, instead of realising that being happy first, inherently means we are and can be more successful
Emily, wonderful note. We so quickly take our brains to a place of comparison and it takes us off the path of contentment! Thank you for your presence, your joy, and your commitment to caring deeply.
Feeling this so deeply! Really thought going to grad school would change everything, but alas, I just graduated and... it did not. 🫠 Thank for you being you.
Maryn! You used my new favorite emoji. It captures so much of the emotion I was trying to write about. haha. 🫠 Congrats on graduation. You're allowed to celebrate this and allowed to be disappointed. Someone else commented here about how much they move the goalposts for themselves in an unhealthy way. May you find healthy ways to celebrate what is and engage with what could be... all while knowing... who you are? That's the good stuff.
🫠 is easily in my top 5 most used emojis since it's how I feel most of the time 🫠
Gahhh. Thank you so much. As always, you expressed it beautifully and it's just what I needed to hear/read. That is the good stuff indeed (but why must it be so hard?!). Here's to knowing ourselves and to healthy goalposts! 🌟
Great read. Thank you for that.
Love everything you are doing - such a beautiful thing! Also - excited to see the show <3
Daphne!!! Thank you SO much. This means a ton.
❤️
Thanks a ton for being here, Wens. Truly.
I needed this today, friend ❤️
You are forever one of my favorite people, pal. An incredible dad and dreamer. Thanks for being you. It's enough.
“I thought it would work out this way but then it worked out that way” applies not only to the relative success or happiness of an individual but also to their views of a better life for others.
Aside from that inevitability - money - every well meaning intention of individuals, whether it be a guaranteed hourly wage, ‘sensible’ education, space voyages, mask mandates or the quest for more oil leads to unexpected and deleterious results.
Higher wages, rather than resulting in better living standards, contributes to higher costs. “Sensible” education leads to censorship and mistrust. Space voyages often become more vanity projects than actual discoveries, leading to ever higher cost overruns. Mask mandates encourage the already disassociative aspects of interpersonal relationships begun with phones. The quest for more oil stampedes into increased environmental degradation.
I adore this essay. You’re also good at essays. 😊❤️
You do know you're one of my heroes, right? This is gonna make me cry. Love you all so much.
I thoroughly enjoyed this piece. It resonated with me strongly. Thank you
You are enough. And I’m so glad you exist at the same time I do. You’re a huge inspiration for me.
Not for nothing, comedian Steven Wright built a career on non-sequitors.
WHAT a mind (and voice). Just saw he had a novel come out recently! I'm hoping he reads the audiobook. Would be impossible to experience in someone else's voice.
He was on Joe Rogan recently talking about how he started forming his comedy out of expecting one thing to happen and tying it to another unexpected thing
Oh that's fascinating. I've actually heard Steve Martin express something similar. Got me wanting to dive into some Steven Wright interviews. Thanks DEE!
This part made me literally laugh out loud: When the show ended, so did my desire to be on camera. I was deeply embarrassed. It felt like a failure (and a public one at that). Loved ones would remind me the show was not a public failure as it’d really just been seen by only dozens of people. This did not help.
But really I relate to this on so many levels. Thank you for sharing! I believe that you MAKE JESUS HAPPY. And that is enough. :)
So much love to you and Kristi and your kids!