How to Be Here Read online

  Your ikigai may involve someone else for now.

  I know a man who has several jobs doing menial work that he doesn’t love. But he does love his son. And the money that he makes from those jobs he spends on creating a better future for his son.

  Whenever I see this man, he’s smiling. He talks about the honor of his work. He gives me updates on his son’s schooling and work and life.

  If a good portion of your energies are given to the well-being of another person, that’s okay. It’s not just okay, it’s honorable. It’s beautiful.

  That’s your ikigai for now. It may change over time. It probably will.

  The Bus Route

  One more truth about your ikigai: You may already have found it.

  Sometimes it’s as straightforward as thinking differently about what you’re already doing. Sometimes you discover your ikigai by understanding what you do in a whole new way.

  My friend Liz told me a story about a bus driver in New York City. His route takes him all over Manhattan, and at his last stop everybody gets off before he drives the bus over the bridge into Long Island where the bus is parked overnight.

  As he’s pulling the bus up to the last stop, he tells the people on the bus to give him their problems. He tells them he knows that life is difficult and many of them are taking home from a day of work all kinds of burdens and anxiety and conflict—so why not leave all that with him so they don’t take it home to the people they love the most?

  He tells them that he’ll take their burdens and drive them across the bridge so that they don’t have to carry them around anymore.

  It’s a great story.

  Strange and beautiful and moving.

  I love this story because driving a bus can easily appear like a mundane job. Like he’s just a bus driver. The power of the story is that he’s more than just a bus driver. He’s doing something far more significant than just getting people around town.

  Sometimes we discover our ikigai by dropping the word just from whatever it is we do all day, refusing to say that we are just a __________ and instead opening ourselves up to the possibility that more is going on in whatever it is that we do all day.

  Sometimes just that little shift in perspective can be all you need to get you out of bed in the morning.

  PART 4

  The Thing About Craft

  It’s always weird when I see words like “old guard” and “veteran” next to my name. . . . I feel like I’m still figuring it out.

  —Carlton Cuse

  I once had an idea for a tour.

  I’d been reading a lot of quantum physics and then I came across a fascinating analysis of the Hebrew words in the first chapter of the Bible and somehow that connected with what I’d read in a book by a Scottish schoolmaster from the 1800s and that reminded me of something that had happened with my boys and me several years before—and gradually I began to see a talk forming.

  And the more I worked on this talk, the longer it got. An hour, an hour and a half. It kept growing.

  As I continued to work on this talk, I could see that most of it was based around sketches I was doing, simple drawings that could be done on a sheet of paper or a whiteboard.

  I also had the strong sense that when it was ready, I should give this talk every night for a number of nights in a row, each night in a different city.

  It was a tour talk.

  I talked to my friend Zach who’s in a band, and he agreed to introduce me to his booking agent. So Kristen and I drove to Chicago to try to persuade TimTheBookingAgent that he should book me into small clubs and theaters around the country. It makes me laugh now to think of a pastor pitching a rock promoter on doing a club tour to talk about quantum physics and Hebrew spirituality and charging money for the tickets. But he was up for it and booked a tour. (Twenty-five U.S. cities in twenty-eight days, for the record.)

  I’ll never forget the day we put the tickets on sale, wondering whether anybody would buy them. Eventually opening night came, we got on the bus, and away we went.

  At first, it was all new, as it is when you’re starting anything. Whether it’s a tour or a charity or a child or a job or a team or a fund-raising effort, at first it’s new. Whatever it is, it runs on new fuel.

  New fuel is a particular kind of fuel. Whatever you’re doing is exciting, novel, fresh—the details sparkle and shine.

  But new fuel quickly burns out.

  Beware of new fuel.

  Any CEO or mom or dad or regional manager or middle-school teacher can tell you this—that first day, first week, first month, first year is exciting and daunting and you’re filled with the adrenaline of a new venture. And then something happens, something unavoidable, something that it’s absolutely crucial you pay attention to . . .

  You discover why you’re doing this work.

  Because whatever romance there is in writing or speaking or touring or being an executive or running an urban garden project or doing humanitarian work or being a lawyer or nurse or teacher or manager or architect or having your own store or starting a charity—when the newness wears off, you are left with the pure undiluted slog of the work.

  And you either love the work, or you don’t.

  It’s one thing to do it because you want to be known or liked or famous or respected or make lots of money. And some people do their work for those reasons.

  But those reasons get old and lose their power.

  You can run on that kind of fuel for only so long.

  And you very rarely see someone who’s motivated by those reasons thrive and endure and enjoy this work over a long period of time.

  The Corvette

  I loved giving that same tour talk night after night after night because I loved the craft of it. I loved telling those stories and trying to communicate the concepts in a certain way so that it created a particular kind of atmosphere in the room. I felt like I was working with clay, molding it and shaping it and forming it, night after night, learning new things about that talk and its contours and textures and the possibilities present in the content. It was deeply humbling, because no matter how well it went, I could always find ways to make it better.

  I found myself nine nights in, seventeen nights in, twenty-three nights in—somewhere in the Deep South or on the East Coast or in the Pacific Northwest, in a club with no air-conditioning and low ceilings and bad lighting, about to go on, so incredibly happy. Like I was born for this. I’d be standing backstage, stomach full of butterflies, saying to whoever would listen, How great is this? Can you believe it? I get to go do this again!

  I clearly remember thinking that if only eleven people showed up, I would still give it everything I had.

  There is a difference between craft and success.

  Craft is when you have a profound sense of gratitude that you even get to do this.

  Craft is when you relish the details.

  Craft is your awareness that all the hours you’re putting in are adding up to something, that they’re producing in you skill and character and substance.

  Craft is when you meet up with someone else who’s serious about her craft and you can talk for hours about the subtle nuances and acquired wisdom of the work.

  Craft is when you realize that you’re building muscles and habits that are helping you do better what you do. Craft is when you have a deep respect for the form and shape and content of what you’re doing.

  Craft is when you see yourself part of a long line of people who have done this particular work.

  Craft is when you’re humbled because you know that no matter how many years you get to do this, there will always be room to learn and grow.

  Success is different.

  When I was in high school, we lived down the street from a family with three boys. The dad was a doctor, and I often stayed with their boys when Doc and his wife went out. They’d come home at the end of the evening and we would sit up and talk late into the night. One evening I went down to their house and there was
a brand-new Corvette in the driveway. This was Okemos, Michigan, in the mid-eighties, and a Corvette was the ultimate sign that you’d made it. We stood in the driveway and stared at the car for a while. It was clear to me that Doc had arrived.

  And then a few months later I went back to their house one evening to stay with their boys and there was a For Sale sign in the window of that Corvette. Huh? I asked Doc why he was selling his Corvette and he told me,

  All my life I’ve wanted a Corvette. And then I got enough money to buy one, so I did. And then the other day I walked out into the garage and thought, “I own a Corvette.”

  That was his explanation—

  And I thought, “I own a Corvette.”

  Do you know this feeling? You work and work and work for something and then you finally get it and there is a dull thud somewhere in your spirit? The kind of thud that comes from being let down. Like it didn’t deliver. Like it isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

  This was what I was working for all those years?

  This?

  Goals and plans are fine, and they can often be effective motivators, but success promises something it can’t deliver. As soon as you reach your goal, success creates a new one, which creates new anxieties and stresses.

  Success is when you’re seduced into thinking that your joy and satisfaction are not here but there—somewhere in the future, at some moment when you accomplish X or you win Y.

  Success can never get enough.

  It makes your head spin, because you get that thing you were desperately working for, for all those years, and when you get it, you realize that it isn’t what you thought it was.

  Success says, What more can I get?

  Craft says, Can you believe I get to do this?

  Honor and Privilege

  One Monday morning at sunrise I was walking down the steps to the beach at one of my favorite surf breaks. At the bottom of the steps were two city workers in navy chinos and light blue shirts with their names stitched above the pocket. One was probably in his fifties, the other was in his twenties. They were standing over a trash can, and the older one was showing the younger one the proper way to change the plastic bag.

  Craft is noble.

  Craft is old school.

  Craft is one person showing another at 6:45 in the morning the right way to collect trash.

  Whenever you see someone taking his craft seriously, it’s inspiring, especially in work that often appears at first glance to be menial and routine.

  I see the same dignity and honor when I drop my daughter off at school in the morning and the principal of her school is standing out front, greeting the students as they arrive for another day.

  What would it look like for you to approach tomorrow with a sense of honor and privilege, believing that you have work to do in the world, that it matters, that it’s needed, that you have a path and you’re working your craft?

  Reconnected

  When you start out on your path, there’s often a purity to the work, a romantic sort of idealism that drew you to it. Being an engineer, having kids, running a clinic, owning a bakery, practicing law—we have these images in our heads of what that looks like and it sounds slightly exotic and we’re thrilled that we’re finding our place in the world.

  And then we get into it and we discover that some people can’t be trusted and we spend a tremendous number of hours on distracting details and sometimes we pour our energies into a particular project or person and it falls apart and we’re left wondering, Why is this so difficult?

  Your business partner takes the money and leaves town, the kid you raised wants distance from you, the student you’ve been teaching decides to drop out, the people you’ve been leading criticize you.

  No one gets a free pass from heartbreak, discouragement, and the dull, weary thud that comes from asking, Did I waste my time?

  Over the years, that initial energy and enthusiasm can easily dissipate as life beats you up. You find yourself growing cynical.

  You lose your passion.

  This is why craft is so vital.

  You can find the craft in whatever you do.

  It’s in there somewhere.

  If you run a gas station or you do people’s taxes or manage a call center, ask yourself what the craft is in that work.

  Too many people have a job and they get a paycheck and that’s it. Few things will inject more meaning and even, at times, joy into your work than you seeing yourself working your craft.

  Whatever it is you do all day, do you see it as a craft?

  Seeing your work as a craft rescues you. Craft centers you. Craft reconnects you to your ikigai. The joy of waking up and having something to give yourself to . . .

  that’s what matters,

  that’s where the joy is,

  that’s where the life is.

  PART 5

  The First Number

  And that’s when we began writing our own songs. . . . We knew we had something; you could feel it, the hairs stood up on your arms, it just felt so different. We didn’t know what it was, but we liked it. I just came up with this riff for “Black Sabbath.” I played “dom-dom-dommm.” And it was like: that’s it! We built the song from there. As soon as I played that first riff we went: “Oh God, that’s really great. But what is it? I don’t know!”

  —Tony Iommi

  I once had an idea for a novel.

  The idea came from a strange, surreal story someone had told me that was true. And it involved me. Somehow hearing that story sparked something in me and suddenly I had one scene and one line of dialogue.

  That was it.

  Once I realized I had that one scene with that one line, I realized I also had a character. And then another. And these characters had names, like Yves and Faruq. And then another character came out of nowhere who for some reason always wore sandals with odd-colored socks, and another character emerged who drove a gold Ford F–150 pickup truck with mud flaps.

  Somewhere in there another character emerged named Rooster. He was the one who says the first line of the book, which I had as well.

  So I wrote all of this down.

  And then I thought of the ending. And then a twist that would come before the ending. Within a year I had pages and pages of scenes and dialogue and names of people and places. I knew that in that one particular conversation in that one scene toward the end that one character needed to be wearing a T-shirt that had this one particular phrase written on it.

  This continued for years. Literally. Years.

  I kept thinking to myself, Is this a novel?

  Followed by, How does a person write a novel?

  I did not know how to write a novel.

  But I did know the first line.

  So one day in the fall of 2008 I sat down at my laptop, stared at that blinking line, and then wrote the first line of that novel.

  Far too often, we don’t start because we can’t get our minds around the entire thing. We don’t take the first step because we can’t figure out the seventeenth step.

  But you don’t have to know the seventeenth step. You only have to know the first step. Because the first number is always 1.

  Start with 1.

  Step 1

  That’s where you start. With 1.

  It’s too overwhelming otherwise. It’s too easy to be caught up in endless ruminations: What if Step 4 doesn’t work? or What if there isn’t money for Step 11 or What if people don’t like the results of Step 6?

  You have no idea what the answers are to any of those questions. The only thing that wondering and speculating will do is separate you from the present moment.

  When you begin, the seventeenth step is sixteen steps away.

  You don’t have to know how to do it,

  or what it is,

  or even when it is.

  Because the first number is always 1.

  It’s not 5, then 8, then 24, then 62.7.

  It’s 1, then 2, then 3.

  You
r 1 may be a making a phone call or an appointment or filling out a form—it may be a fairly simple task and yet it may seem like the biggest, most impossibly massive task in the world.

  This is very normal, and it’s only natural that it will feel at times like your shoes are made of cement and dialing that number takes more strength than lifting a house.

  To do anything new—to do the 1—requires tremendous mental fortitude to not think about 2 or 3 yet.

  That time will come. And it is not now.

  Now is the time for 1.

  You start with 1. And you work on that. Just 1. And when 1 is done, you move to 2.

  You break it down into the next step and only the next step—

  the next sentence

  the next phone call

  the next meeting

  the next word.

  Some people are stuck.

  And they remain stuck.

  And they don’t get unstuck, because they can’t get their minds around the whole thing.

  But you don’t have to get your mind around the whole thing, you only have to get your mind around the 1.

  This is true when you’re starting out, taking on new work, doing something you haven’t done before; it’s true at 2:37 on a Tuesday afternoon in October, and it’s true for whatever it is you have in front of you during the next few hours.

  What is your 1?

  At any moment in the day, you can do only one thing at a time. And the more intentional you are about knowing what your 1 is, the more present you will be.

  Overthinking

  I have a friend named Eddie. Over the past few years we’ve spent countless hours surfing together because we both love the same break near where we live. Eddie has long curly hair and usually surfs in a trucker hat so his hair sticks out the sides and he’s always smiling.

  I have a friend named Greg who surfs that same break Eddie and I surf. Greg works in finance. His area of expertise is in analyzing massive amounts of data in the global commodities market. That last sentence is about the extent of my comprehension of what he does. He is, obviously, very intelligent.