Author Archives: nwfries

“The quality of the answer is directly determined by the quality of the question.”

– Gary Keller, The One Thing

“The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret to getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks and then starting on the first one.”

– Mark Twain

Lately it feels like I have had time to process everything going on in my life. I’m sitting in the middle of summer after COVID. One big event after another is being strung together..

Two Fridays ago, I was with my brothers, basking in the glory of a beautiful camping trip in the Rockies and nursing a hangover from red rocks. The next morning, I met with Brian and Katie to formalize our new partnership in Art Bloom. By Monday, Katie’s first ad campaigns were live and I was out to dinner with my Dad while he was on a layover in Denver. The next day, I caught a flight to DC for a jam packed but inspiring trip for work. Thursday night, I got home and lay in bed, exhausted but happy to be with Liz for the first time in what felt like a while. We talked about me proposing to her. The next night Justin was in town, and of course we hit the town.

Today, I process.

I’ll pay you a million dollars if you sleep for 9 hours tonight

“When everything feels urgent and important, everything seems equal. We become active and busy, but this doesn’t actually move us any closer to success. Activity is often unrelated to productivity, and busyness rarely takes care of business.”

Gary Keller, The One Thing

“Never attempt to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and irritates the pig.”

– Robert Heinlein?

“Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.”

Abe Lincoln, maybe

Take this post for what it is. There is no existential lesson I , just an observation.

Pretend you live in a beautiful utopia, with cherry blossoms and underrated Cuban sandwhiches. You’ve never seen someone homeless, or even heard of the concept.

One day, you pass a man in tattered clothes, unconscious on the street. What would you do? You’d be shocked. You’d run to them and try to help. Maybe even call 911. You’d ask: What could have possibly happened to this poor person to get in a state like this?

The next day, you see two. What has happened to these people. Is there an epidemic of some sort? What has gotten them in this shape? You would see what could be done to stop this immediately. A trend like this would feel concerning… is there a drug problem? what if it happened to me? It must be raised at our utopian raise it to your Utopian community.

2 years later, and you’re at 100. And what would you say?

“Someone should do something about this.” “I want them out of my neighborhood.”

Half of the troubles of this life can be traced to saying yes too quickly and not saying no soon enough.

– Josh Billings