A gentle close to the week

And three things that made life better / Issue 1,380

Oh, hi friends! 

Alright, pals. I've got 15 minutes until I've got to be out the door to catch a B train at 5:42 to make a dinner reservation before seeing Once Upon a Mattress at New York City Center — all good things — and I was just asking myself:

Can I write this in 15 minutes?

Should I try?

Why don't I do it when I get home? 

But this is what we do to ourselves in large and small, humongous and bite-sized crumb-y ways, with so many of our "projects," creative and work and otherwise, isn’t it? 

We ask questions that have a million answers. 

Will anyone like this? Hasn't this all been done before? What if I put in all this effort and no one even lifts their head? What if I fail (again)? Isn't it too late? Aren't I too old? What if this is the wrong thing?

Rinse, repeat, record scratch.

Lots of questions, lots of possible answers. 

And you know, they're good questions. Some of them, the less-critical ones, might even have useful answers.

But oh my goodness gracious, am I tired of the questions. Aren't you? 

Because the thing is…how to say this…

The thing is: You already know what you have to do. 

That's actually the heartbeat of all my little journals, of these thousands of newsletters, of the rinse-and-repeat.

You know. You already know.

And yet you're asking, again and again, for direction or proof or reassurance that you're on the right track. 

Pretend that it's never going to arrive — no bestseller list, no "discovery" of your talent, no signposted route. 

What then?

Simple, not easy.

You show up.

You answer your own questions by showing up.

You show up for yourself and do what you need to do.

That might be it.

That might be everything?

Hope this might make sense to you. 

If it doesn't, well, it didn’t exist 10 minutes ago.

That’s a gentle close to the week. Showing up and creating a small something that didn't exist before. 

And I bet — no, I know — you can show up today, too.

3 Things That Made Life Better This Week

• OK, now I want a patty melt!!! (h/t Robby Macdonald)

• This tour of Jon Batiste & Suleika Jaouad’s Brooklyn home is just glorious.

• And here’s Liza Minnelli singing “Nowadays” — and getting surprised by the great Chita Rivera. Tears! Wonderful.

What boosted your week, friends? What’s still to come?