ZeV > Recent Status Updates

"Great passions are maladies without hope" -- Goethe

"More than purpose, we also need realism. Where do we start? What do we do first? What do we do right now? How are we sure that what we're doing is moving us forward? What are we benchmarking ourselves against?"

"Passion is *about*. (I am so passionate about __.) ... Passion is *to* and *for*. ... Actually, purpose deemphasizes the *I*. Purpose is about pursuing something outside yourself as opposed to pleasuring yourself."

"Passion is seen in those who can tell you in great detail who they intend to become and what their success will be like. ... They can tell you all the things they're going to do, or have even begun, but they cannot show you their progress. Because there rarely is any."

"Passion typically masks a weakness. Its breathlessness and impetuousness and franticness are poor substitutes for discipline, for mastery, for strength and purpose and perseverance. You need to be able to spot this in others and in yourself, because while the origins of passion may be earnest and good, its effects are comical and then monstrous."

"ego makes us so hardheaded and hostile to feedback that it drives them away or puts them beyond our reach ... It's why the old proverb says, "When student is ready, the teacher appears.""

"*You can't learn if you think you already know*. You will not find the answers if you're too conceited and self-assured to ask the questions. You cannot get better if you're convinced you are the best."

"Each fighter, to become great, he said, needs to have someone better that they can learn from, someone lesser who they can teach, and someone equal that they can challenge themselves against."

"The power of being a student is not just that it is an extended period of instruction, it also places the ego and ambition in someone else's hands."

"To be somebody or to do something. In life there is often a roll call. That's when you will have to make a decision." -- John Boyd

"Talk depletes us. Talking and doing fight for the same resources. Research shows that while goal visualization important, after a certain point our mind begins to confuse it with actual progress. The same goes for verbalization. Even talking aloud to ourselves while we work through difficult problems has been shown to significantly decrease insight and breakthroughs."

"We will learn that though we *think big*, we must act and live small in order to accomplish what we seek. Because we will be *action* and *education* focused, and forgo validation and status, our ambition will not be grandiose but iterative--one foot in front of the other, learning and growing and putting in the time."

"Our cultural values almost try to make us dependent on validation, entitled, and ruled by our emotions. For a generation, parents and teachers have focused on building up everyone's *self-esteem*. From there, the themes of our gurus and public figures have been almost exclusively aimed at inspiring, encouraging, and assuring us that we can do whatever we set our minds to.

In reality, this makes us weak."

"Humble in our aspirations, gracious in our success, resilient in our failures"

"If you start believing in your greatness, it is the death of your creativity." -- Marina Abramovic (performance artist)

"The egotist does not stumble about, knocking things off his desk. He does not stammer or drool. No, instead, he becomes more and more arrogant, and some people, not knowing what is underneath such an attitude, mistake his arrogance for a sense of power and self-confidence." -- Harold Geneen