Chip Conley

Change is situational. Transition is psychological. If all you have to show from the trainwreck we refer to as 2020 is a desire for change, you may not be turning this past year’s crises into an opportunity. You can change a spouse, a boss, a friend, but - if you carry your baggage with you - you may find that you’re living “Groundhog Day” as your next spouse, boss, or friend just triggers you in all the same ways.

When something becomes “second nature,” it’s instinctive and natural. And, to “nurture” is the process of caring for and encouraging the growth or development of someone or something.

I remember lots of tears that spring. Surprising for a guy who doesn’t cry much. My world was crashing down on me in 2008. As a hotel entrepreneur, we were a canary in the coal mine as we experienced the early punishment of the coming Great Recession.

As a follow-up to yesterday’s post on how to meet more interesting people, I wanted to highlight New York Times columnist David Brooks’ recent article with nine tips for creating deeper conversations. If I didn’t know better, I might have assumed David had spent a week with us at MEA.

This is a question I’ve heard dozens of times in the past three years at MEA. People arrive at our beachfront campus on a dirt street with no name. They’re in a foreign country, and they’re a little cautious, like turtles whose heads recoil in their shell at the first sign of danger.

Our mindset is the self-perception we hold about ourselves and the world. The mindset we adopt for ourselves can profoundly affect the way we live our lives. As many of you know, Carol Dweck popularized the idea of fixed and growth mindsets.

Oh, how I wish I could be a BuSu: a Buddhist Surfer. One basic tenet of Buddhism is that comparison equals suffering. I realized this is why I took to meditation in my twenties, but yoga eluded me. I meditate with my eyes closed so I don’t compare how I’m doing with everyone else, but put me in a yoga class with a bunch of able, limber bodies and I become “Conley, the critic”...not of them, of me.

Change is good, right? Rather than offer you a book review each Friday as I’ve done since Wisdom Well began more than a year ago, I’m going to offer you a book a month post twice a year. Here’s my list for the first half of 2021.

I love the title of Roman Krznaric’s book (which is also the title of this post) and his seven-minute TED talk, both of which are as inspiring as they are illuminating. Roman helps us see that we’ve been colonizing the future with those generations powerless over our mistakes.

Many of you may have seen this recent New York Times magazine feature on the social life of forests. “Resources tend to flow from the oldest and biggest trees to the youngest and smallest. Chemical alarm signals generated by one tree prepare nearby trees for danger. Seedlings severed from the forest’s underground lifelines are much more likely to die than their networked counterparts.