Risk

If Shipping Is An Event

Garth Beyer

If shipping is an event for you, you’re not doing it like an artist.

Events are for gatherings, huge interactions, and personal conversations with someone willing to contribute as much, if not more than you.

Events are for seminars and being the star of a publicized interview about your latest art.

Events have less to do with consistency, and more to do with the spontaneity of acknowledgment.

The actual shipping of your art is a habit, not an event. It’s meant to be a constant and predictably unpredictable action. Risk, over and over and over again leads to success. Risk once in a while just keeps you alive while you stand still.

 

Stay Positive & Make Your Art Into Your Sweet Disposition

Garth E. Beyer

Writing On The Wall

Garth Beyer

My friend Michelle inspired me to write this post.

When I was growing up, my first AIM (AOL instant messenger) username was Writing0nTh3WaLL. My favorite song was “The Writing On The Wall.” And oddly enough, I liked to write on walls. – Still do –

Today, I read a post of Michelle’s which said, “You may never see the writing on the wall.”

In NYC, there’s a thing called the Underbelly Project. It’s where you can find all the writing on the wall. But it’s a different kind of writing, the most passionate kind; the kind that those writing it knew it may not work.

When you wait and look for the writing on the wall you aren’t only playing it safe, you’re regressing.

With your art, nothing is certain even in your most certain moments. When you are waiting for the guarantee of success or failure, when you rehearse through every failure or success, when you try to  steady your hand before you take a whack at the nail, you’ll never follow through. Doing is about risking.

When you use the writing on the wall idiom, you’re also insinuating that there are people who don’t see it. (If everyone could see it, there would be no need for the idiom.)

Leave it to other people to see the writing on the wall.

 

Stay Positive & More People Are Wrong About The Writing On The Wall Than They Are Right

Garth E. Beyer

“Keep Calm & Carry On?” So Passe

Garth Beyer

Keep calm?

Screw that. Calm is for the banal, for the overrated, for those who unfortunately associate calm with being safe and comfortable.

When I hear “Keep Calm,” I want to say, “Go try surfing. Go to a concert. Go rock climbing. Go ship your art. Go talk to that girl. Go try something for the first time. Go get criticized.” The list goes on. And this list is a remarkable one; it can’t be completed if you wish to keep calm.

(Nor is it any fun whatsoever if the water is calm, if the crowd is calm, if the audience thinks you don’t care, if the girl doesn’t sense your nervousness and think it’s cute, if you don’t take a risk, and if you don’t care. To get anywhere (and to have fun doing so), the further away from calm, the better.)

“Keep Calm & Carry On” The motto is a bit… bucolic on the first part.

Better yet, instead of “Keep Calm,” here are some alternatives,

  • Get weird
  • Be uncomfortable
  • Be impeccable
  • Stay positive

On the latter end, to “Carry on,” I couldn’t agree with more. In fact, I’ve given my own spin to elaborate on it.

Find the strength to carry on. Once completed, find the strength to carry more. Repeat.

 

Stay Positive & As You Are, Not As People Urge You To Be

Garth E. Beyer

We Want…

Garth Beyer

We want what when we want it. The real trouble is that it’s extremely hard to convince ourselves that we really want it now when it’s so easy (and illusively harmless) to put it off till later.

People think the problem is choosing what you want. It’s not. We can always find somethign we want. The real insight and issue lies in that there’s never as much risk in wanting something than in wanting it now.

Which is supposed to be a good enough reason to want it at a later time.

It’s not.

 

Stay Positive & Hold Yourself To The Now, Not The Later, Soon, Or Sometime

Garth E. Beyer

Are You Up For It? (A Bit About The Lizard Brain)

Garth Beyer

When you consider taking a risk, taking an action for something you want, you have twenty seconds to act before the lizard brain fires up. Once the lizard brain realizes you’re about to take a risk, it will make you think of every reason not to take it, not to do what you want.

If you don’t know already, it’s referred to as the twenty second theory: you have twenty seconds to act on your thought before the lizard brain kicks in. After the twenty seconds, it only gets more and more difficult to make the leap, to take the risk.

I’ve recently wondered if it’s better to – after the twenty seconds and the lizard brain is going – to just completely forget about the action you want to take. Why fight the lizard brain? There will be more opportunities, right? Or is it better to fight the lizard brain and see if you can beat it. From experience, I would say that you will win 1 out of 10 battles against the lizard brain. But is the stress of having to go through the other 9 battles worth it?

By not fighting the lizard brain, you feel a sense of relief. There’s no stress, no nervousness, no adrenaline rush, no anxiety, and most importantly, no regret that you considered something so deeply but never followed through.

But what if you end up challenging and beating the lizard brain; wouldn’t the success of whatever you were risking be glorious and euphoric enough to counter any of the hardships you have had to face in the past?

What if I had a solution for you? I do. (HT Keegan Morgan)

After the twenty seconds are up and you don’t act, ask yourself this important question,

are you up for it? Up for the battle with the lizard brain, up to the risks, up to the possibility of still being rejected after following through? The lizard brain can’t infiltrate this thought process; the beauty of knowing exactly what you want (and making the conscious decision to go after it) will make the lizard brain back off. The lizard brain is strong, but it has nothing on will power.

The next time you miss your twenty second window, the next time you catch yourself getting anxious, thinking of dozens of reasons not to send the email, make the phone call, ask that someone for their number, or make that committment, ask yourself, are you up for it?

 

Stay Positive & It’s Alright If You’re Not! But… Keep Track

Garth E. Beyer

Once You Leave

Garth Beyer

Once you leave your cubicle, your apartment, your comfort zone, your box, you expose yourself. You risk at all levels. Most people stay in their zone because of that risk, because of their fear. Nothing can throw you out of wack if you stay put in your structure. The interesting revelation is this:

Once you leave your cubicle, your apartment, your comfort zone, your box, you expose yourself. But what you expose yourself to is never what you think and worry about. Once you leave your zone, everything that you dreamed of, craved, and desired in your zone, comes to you.

Want to find love? How can you do that when you stay in your room all day? Forget it. Anyway, love will find you….once you leave your room.

Want to see something truly beautiful? Even more beautiful than what you can Google on the internet or see out your window? You have to leave your space.

Want to laugh unexpectedly? Once you leave your box, something will happen that makes you crack up.

Just getting out of the place you confine yourself to, that you are comfortable with, is all it takes to get what you want. You don’t have to go after it, you don’t have to jump 50 hurdles to get it, all you need to do is get out!

Go to the park. Find a place to see the sunset. Walk to the grocery store. Don’t worry about how you dress, what you carry, or if you wear any shoes. Just leave.

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This post was inspired by the experience I just had. I’ve been in my apartment all day (got off work early) and wasn’t planning on leaving it. I was comfortable, I was safe with my books, my notepads, sticky notes, pens and laptop. I was content, even happy with the breeze and the sound of the water (how could I not be?). Then I decided to do something off Michelle Welsch’s Manual For Daily Adventure. I got up, grabbed a favorite book (Keri Smith’s How To Be An Explorer Of The World) and went to the park. The following things are what I got to experience because I left my apartment.

  • See a runner giving it her all.
  • Laugh and shake my head after watching two black basketball players almost get in a fight and one repeating to the other “you’re not gangsta!”
  • Three girls checking me out.
  • Laugh at a women on the phone only talking about getting drunk, hammered, plastered. Quote: “We will get drunk Sunday, that’s what labor day is for”
  • Pinpointed where an odd noise I kept hearing was coming from to a woman practicing opera.
  • Felt soft grass.
  • Got to observe more things, people, animals, sounds, sights, etc., than I would have in my apartment.
  • On my way back, had a good conversation with the three girls. If they didn’t smoke, I would have asked one for her number. Oh well.
  • Got to feel the ground. (Went barefoot)

That list sure beats the hell out of a list of what I would have experienced if I stayed in my apartment. The same goes for your cubicle at work, your comfort zone at school, your chair in the meeting room, your spot on the bus, your way you walk to work, your seat in class, and any “square” that you feel comfortable in.

 

Stay Positive & Experience Life

Garth E. Beyer

Die Early On To Live A Full Life

Garth Beyer

Death is meant to be superfluous, but it’s not. It’s important, it’s vital, I may even go so far as to say that it’s the meat-and-potatoes of your mom’s cooking – no meal is complete without meat-and-potatoes.

Death is an angel in disguise, a miracle worker’s shadow, god’s secret power, the greatest treasure in all the world, it is a stronger truth bearer than the greek mythological messenger, Iris.

Death has a message of its own. This message is one that should never need to be delivered but must. This message, once delivered, forces you to challenge every theory you have, it makes analyze your worldview, and it eliminates your perception of risk which is made by the amygdala.

Hundreds of thousands of cancer patients get this message every week. The message is that they only have three months to live. Or six weeks. Or twenty days. And just like that, life begins for them. Honestly. Passionately. Truthfully begins.

Jim Rohn says the following in his book The Seasons Of Life,

“It’s when a human, with sufficient disgust, desire, and determination to change his life finally steps up to the bar of human justice and shouts for all the world to hear, ‘I have had it with defeat and humiliation, and I will tolerate it not longer.’ That is when time, fate and circumstances call a hasty conference, and all three wearily agree, ‘We had best step aside, because we are powerless to stop that kind of resolve.'”

Must you die early on to live a full life? A life which uses your muse, passion, and creativity as the foundation. A life absent of fear, regret, self-degradation and hate. A life that remains intolerant to failure, set-backs, or humiliation. Must we die early on to live that life?

This is not a rhetorical question. The answer is yes. We really must die early on to live a full life.

Contrary to belief, terminal cancer patients are not the only ones who are lucky enough to die early on and live a full life. A rare headcount of people are lucky enough to die early. For some people it takes half of their lives to die and that only leaves half a life left to live, really live. For most, people never die until they are much too old to live. That is the death of death.

You’re likely confused, so let me elaborate. The death in which I write about is the death of the ego. When a person is diagnosed with terminal cancer, or hits rock bottom in life from drugs and alcohol, or gives so much love to one person and then that person leaves them, there is a shift in the psyche of that person. That shift is the death of their ego.

Upon their death, they question everything: tradition, their fears, their relationships, their work, their ethic, their personality… to discover what truly matters and to live a full passionate life.

The only thing I don’t know then is whether the miracle is being told you will die soon or the fact that after you are told, the cancer goes into remission, the addict never touches a drug again, the alcoholic never drinks, and the lover begins to love themself as much as they loved the other?

 

Stay Positive & Diagnose Yourself

Garth E. Beyer