Sterling Terrell

smart ideas from books (mostly)

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In Praise of The Long Haulers

In Praise of The Long Haulers

I pondered all morning today this essay on the long-haulers by Ann Finkbeiner.

She writes of a bean seller that did his job faithfully for decades, the void it created when he died, and the people that came together to help finish his job.

These gritty and persistent long-haulers simply go about their chosen life and their chosen tasks without a wavering thought.

May I be counted among the one day…

She says:

But these long-haul people, they find a thing they want to do, that needs doing, that they do well, and they do it for the rest of their lives. We adore our flashing heroes, but these long-haulers we deeply love. I think they seem necessary to our continuance as a society, that human communities are worth the effort. I think they’re necessary to our sense of meaning as humans, that we ourselves are worth the effort. We count on these people, they’re keeping it all going, the only thing stopping them is death.

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Filed Under: Not BooksTagged With: #Grit, #Persistence

Creative Forces Converged

Creative Forces Converged

When creative forces converge on something you have done, you immediately know it.

Or at least that is what I have been told…

Sure, I have had minor hits and minor successes.

A blog post here or there that reaches the right audience or touches a nerve.

More often than not, a post will hit the most on the day it’s published.

My favorite is when a long dormant piece finds new legs somewhere and gets hundreds of views, months, even years after it was originally written.

This is the inflection point that all creatives seek, a magical time when all the work you have put forth conspires to elevate your career to a higher plane.

This is Steve Martin’s inflection point:

Forces converged. The article in Rolling Stone, my live performances, appearances on The Tonight Show, a modestly produced one-man show on the new and experimental network HBO, and intriguing reviews and press made audiences ignite. The confluence that I had doubted would ever happen through auditions for sitcoms was now happening outside of Hollywood’s control. My audience was developing more like a rock-and-roll band’s than a comedian’s: I was underground and on the road.

-Steve Martin, Born Standing Up (Amazon)

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Filed Under: Not BooksTagged With: #Creativity, #Persistence

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