Sublime

John Lennon once advised that if you start a song, write it through to the end in that sitting. The initial inspiration has a vitality in it that can carry you through the whole piece. Don’t be concerned if some of the parts are not yet all they can be. Get through a rough draft. A full, imperfect version is generally more helpful than a seemingly

There is no way to finish, and perhaps that shouldn’t be the goal.

rather that you should train yourself to remember that your worldly activities don’t come to an end. He is saying that you shouldn’t kid yourself into believing that at some point in this lifetime you won’t have anything else to do.

Focus on what you’ve already completed, not just on what’s left to complete. Since the quest to get everything done is interminable by definition (here), it’s easy to grow despondent and self-reproachful: you can’t feel good about yourself until it’s all finished—but it’s never finished, so you never get to feel good about yourself.

enough

The trick to finishing things when the prospect seems overwhelming is simply to redefine what counts as finished.

A last call is not a closing; it’s the beginning of an outbound ushering. A last call can be verbal, as at our dinner parties. But it doesn’t have to be. Dario Cecchini, at the end of the long beefy dinners he presides over, rings a cowbell to signal the night is winding down. I know some managers who purposefully have their assistants knock on the