Adam Callahan

Letting go of control is a big theme in Riley work. In 2022, he told the Louisiana Museum:

If you know what you’re doing in the arts, then you’re doing it wrong. That’s a pretty good maxim. If you don’t know what you’re doing, then you’re on the right track, because you’re open to the whole world of possibilities. You don’t want to already have the

... See more

The future will never provide the reassurance you seek from it . As the ancient Greek and Roman Stoics understood, much of our suffering arises from attempting to control what is not in our control. And the main thing we try but fail to control – the seasoned worriers among us, anyway – is the future. We want to know , from our vantage point in the... See more

The capacity to tolerate minor discomfort is a superpower . It’s shocking to realise how readily we set aside even our greatest ambitions in life, merely to avoid easily tolerable levels of unpleasantness. You already know it won’t kill you to endure the mild agitation of getting back to work on an important creative project; initiating a difficult... See more

When stumped by a life choice, choose “enlargement” over happiness . I’m indebted to the Jungian therapist James Hollis for the insight that major personal decisions should be made not by asking, “Will this make me happy?”, but “Will this choice enlarge me or diminish me?” We’re terrible at predicting what will make us happy: the question swiftly... See more

There will always be too much to do – and this realisation is liberating . Today more than ever, there’s just no reason to assume any fit between the demands on your time – all the things you would like to do, or feel you ought to do – and the amount of time available. Thanks to capitalism, technology and human ambition, these demands keep... See more

Instead, couples may find it more productive to focus on the future. In situations where relationships are the priority, research shows that constructive co-reflection—working toward a shared understanding and meaning—is more effective than brooding over one’s own perspective (Wenzel et al., 2023). Couples are also more likely to reach forgiveness... See more

Focus on the future to recover what was lost in the past

History can provide useful context; but using it to play the blame game can make things worse. The problem with evoking past (particularly irrelevant) offenses is that most couples will disagree on the “truth” of that history. How someone feels in a relationship is subjective, often biased in... See more

The Cult of Done Manifesto

1. There are three states of being. Not knowing, action and completion.


2. Accept that everything is a draft. It helps to get it done.


3. There is no editing stage.


4. Pretending you know what you’re doing is almost the same as knowing what you are doing, so just accept that you know what you’re doing even if you don’t and do it.


5. Banish

... See more

So it’s a good bet that when you step away from your devices, you’ll be spending more time, at least in the near term, with the emotions they were helping you avoid. Fortunately, in most cases, just knowing to expect this will enable you to resist the temptation to scurry back to the screens. (And incidentally, if you doubt that you use technology... See more