akos

For us, for once, I think the answer is actually very prescriptive. Before you take on anything, you pause and ask what could be?Create the space needed to break apart that everydayness and press on it for a while. Really press on it. Go on and dream a bit. Or as Toni Morrison says it “Dream, then think.” And go to different places with your... See more

How then — when traveling, but also in our work — do we not be ‘tourists”?

Like one’s ‘passion for the road’ that motivating factor is different for different people, and therefore presents differently, outwardly. So much so that it’s almost a requirement of heartfelt intensity that it be animated by a person’s unique experiences and sensibilities. The immense pride in the work comes from the personal connection.

This makes the importance of conversation noticeable to me. Whenever we drop below a certain level of talking, friction accumulates. We get more stuck in our ways, we get stressed and don’t have time to maintain the shared context necessary to understand each other.

Having talked an ungodly amount early on, there are reserves of shared language and trust. I sit down on the edge of the bed, where Johanna lies with the sleeping toddler. And after an hour, we are in the loop.

The opposite of an unfolding is a vision. A vision springs, not from a careful understanding of a context, but from a fantasy: if you could just make it into another context your problems will go away.2

The context is smarter than you . It holds more nuance and information than you can fit in your head. Collaborate with it.

This is what I infer when I see someone who is comfortable in their unique strangeness, too. There probably exists someone who enabled that evolution of personality. A parent, a friend group, a spouse.

It is rare for people to come into themselves if no one is excited and curious about their core, their potential. We need someone who gives us space to unfold.