Why You Might Need an Adventure

The reason nothing has felt interesting to me, I thought, is that I’ve forgotten the most important thing for me: the path of maximal interestingness is supposed to feel like fun . Not fun as in “I feel entertained” but fun as in, “this is engrossing and self-surprising, life-affirming and a little scary.” Fun, the way Eno and Byrne are having fun ... See more

When we fixate on finding one singular purpose, we rule out the side quests that help us grow the most. Your life doesn’t need to follow predictable acts and arcs. The best stories are full of surprises, with colorful characters and unexpected plot twists. To avoid recycling old stories, we need to break free from the scripts we write for ourselves

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Whatever else happens, stay busy. (I always lean on this wise advice, from the seventeenth-century English scholar Robert Burton, on how to survive melancholy: “Be not solitary, be not idle.”) Find something to do—anything, even a different sort of creative work altogether—just to take your mind off your anxiety and pressure. Once, when I was strug

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We're not really taught how to recreate constructively. We need to do more than find diversions; we need to restore and expand ourselves. Our idea of relaxing is all too often to plop down in front of the television set and let its pandering idiocy liquefy our brains. Shutting off the thought process is not rejuvenating; the mind is like a car batt... See more