Have you achieved your big goals for this year?
It’s okay if you haven’t. Everyone goes through hardships and difficulties, to say nothing of the challenges facing the wider world, much like Carol Shields writes in Unless (also available on Audible):
Happiness is the lucky pane of glass you carry in your head. It takes all your cunning just to hang on to it, and once it’s smashed you have to move to a different sort of life.
If you need more guidance, here are some of my favourite Seth Godin quotes from his 2024 blog posts, together with a recommended title from Blinkist.
Being perfect is unattainable, and seeking perfection is a trap. ~ Non-fatal errors
Learn more: Love for Imperfect Things
Emotions are often tied to events and events feel absolute. But events are rarely absolute. They’re almost always relative. ~ Compared to what?
Learn more: Attitude Is Everything
Everyone is stumbling forward in the shadows. That’s part of the deal. ~ Stumbling in the dark
Learn more: Finding Your Way
Experiencing failure in advance is only helpful if the narrative causes us to take productive action. Better is possible, paralysis isn’t useful. ~ Catastrophizing toward action
Learn more: Analysis Without Paralysis
Fixing little dents is a commitment to quality, a constant quest against entropy as we seek to deliver with consistency. And living with dents is a way to focus on what really matters, not on what can be fixed. ~ Little dents
Learn more: Shatterproof
Giving up is a waste. Quitting, on the other hand, is a fine thing to do. Because quitting gives you tomorrow back. It opens the door for the next contribution you are able to make. ~ Giving up vs. quitting
Learn more: The Way of the Champion
If a problem is vexing us, we can use that irritation as fuel, finding the energy to deal with it. We can turn the moment into curiosity and forward motion. ~ Inverting the vex
Learn more: Help Me I’m Stuck
If you don’t want to get fooled again, think about why you got fooled last time. ~ Won’t get fooled again
Learn more: Brilliant Mistakes
It doesn’t matter how hard you try, you’re not going to change the direction of the wind. That doesn’t mean you can’t get good at sailing, though. ~ The prevailing conditions
Learn more: Passport to Success
It’s easy to make bitterness worse by seeking more reasons to be bitter. ~ The bitterness loop
Learn more: How to Be a Failure and Still Live Well
It’s possible to have a useful conversation about what to do about something that’s broken or needs improvement. But first, we must acknowledge that it happened. ~ What happened vs. what we do about it
Learn more: 12 Rules For Life
Loosening the constraints always makes a problem easier to solve. ~ Other people’s problems
Learn more: Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff
Problems, by definition, can be fixed. But they might not be worth the focus and effort. ~ Broken (and not worth fixing)
Learn more: Letting Go
The end of the trail is usually difficult, but without the long and winding approach, there isn’t much of a mountain. ~ The steep part of the mountain
Learn more: Journey of Awakening
We can’t possibly control the future, but we can certainly focus on right here and right now. Any effort we spend on controlling the uncontrollable bits is wasted. ~ You’ve already failed
Learn more: Mindset
We need to look for the hard parts, not avoid them. ~ Sudare sette camicie
Learn more: No Mud, No Lotus
What’s on offer is never perfect, but what’s on offer might be exactly what we need right now. ~ Compared to perfect
Learn more: Have a Beautiful Terrible Day
When things don’t go the way we hope, one alternative is to look hard at the system that caused the problem. And another productive strategy is to figure out what to do with what we get, instead of seeking to find the villain that’s causing our problem. ~ Out to get you
Learn more: Questions Are the Answer
Whining is a symptom, it’s rarely a cure for anything. ~ What spoiled wrecks
Learn more: A Complaint Free World
