there's a saying
the Navy SEALs have.
under pressure
you don't rise
to the occasion.
you sink
to the level
of your training.
I think about that
every day.
because it means
the small moments
are everything.
how you act
when the waiter
gets your order wrong.
when you're tired
and someone asks you
for something.
when a small lie
would be so much easier
than the truth.
you think
those moments don't count.
you're wrong.
every time you quit
when you're tired,
you're doing a rep.
a rep of quitting.
every time you give in
to the easy thing,
you're building
that pathway
in your brain.
and when the real pressure comes,
when the stakes are high
and your conscious mind
shuts down,
your autopilot takes over.
and your autopilot
is just the sum
of every small decision
you've made
when no one was watching.
the crucifixion.
I think about it
all the time.
not what the priests say.
nor what the churches teach.
I think about what it means
for me.
a man.
climbing a hill.
with a cross on his back.
heavy.
splintered.
digging into flesh.
surrounded by people
who hate him.
knowing what's coming.
knowing it won't end well.
and climbing anyway.
for something bigger
than himself.
there's nothing more beautiful
than that.
a man persisting
when persistence
makes no sense.
carrying the weight
because the weight
is his to carry.
for the salvation
of man kind.
thats what it means
to be a man.
not the absence of suffering.
the willingness
to suffer
for something that matters.
this is good men live.
I don't believe in motivation.
motivation is a stripper
who takes your money
and leaves you alone
at closing time.
she shows up
when she wants to.
she doesn't care
about your schedule.
she doesn't care
about your deadlines.
you can't rely on her.
discipline is different.
discipline is the woman
you've been married to
for thirty years.
she's not exciting.
she doesn't make your heart race.
but she shows up.
every single morning.
even when you're an asshole.
even when you don't deserve it.
thats what keeps you alive.
I sat down to write this
and I didn't want to.
I wanted to watch something.
I wanted to eat something.
I wanted to do
anything else.
my brain was throwing
every excuse at me.
you're tired.
you're not in the mood.
you don't have anything to say.
nobody cares anyway.
what's the point.
and maybe all of that
is true.
maybe I am tired.
maybe nobody does care.
maybe there is no point.
but I sat down anyway.
I put my fingers on the keys
and I started.
and that's the whole thing.
that's the entire game.
just starting.
there's a crack
in my window.
been there for two winters now.
I put tape over it
to keep the cold out.
I look at that crack
and I think
that's me.
cracked.
patched up.
not fixed.
just
holding together
enough to function.
and maybe that's okay.
maybe you don't have to be
whole
to do the work.
maybe you just have to
show up
broken
and do it anyway.
I knew a man once
who had more talent
than anyone I ever met.
he could write
sentences
that made you stop breathing.
he could see things
that other people missed.
but he never finished anything.
he was always going to
start tomorrow.
he was always waiting
for the right moment.
the right inspiration.
the right situation.
he died at fifty three.
heart attack.
alone in an apartment
full of notebooks.
all of them
half finished.
I think about him
when I don't want to work.
I think about all those
half finished notebooks.
and I sit my ass
back in the chair.
the truth is
I'm scared most of the time.
scared it won't work.
scared I'm wasting my time.
scared that everyone
who ever doubted me
was right.
I carry that fear
every day.
it sits in my stomach
and it whispers.
but I've learned
to work with the fear.
not around it.
not through it.
with it.
it sits next to me
while I type.
it's there in the morning
when I wake up.
it's there at night
when I go to bed.
I just don't let it
drive anymore.
the sun is coming up now.
I can see it
through the cracked window.
orange and red
bleeding into the gray.
another day.
I don't know
what it will bring.
dunno
if anything I do
will matter.
but I'll sit here.
at this scratched desk.
with these hurting hands.
and I'll do the work.
not because I'm certain.
nor because I'm confident.
because its the only thing
that feels real.
the only thing
thats mine.
you forgot about the big bang, and the woods, and the god of a universe
picture a man
in complete darkness.
no light.
no moon.
no stars.
just black
stretching out forever
in every direction.
and he's stacking wood.
piece by piece.
day after day.
year after year.
FOR DECADES
his hands are raw.
splinters buried deep
under the nails.
back bent
from the constant lifting.
he can't see what he's building.
can't tell if the pile
is growing
or if he's just
moving the same pieces
around in circles.
no feedback.
no progress.
nothing.
everyone else has gone home.
found warm rooms
and easy light.
they're sleeping now
while he stacks
in the black.
and he keeps going.
an ant
carrying crumbs
toward something
it will never see finished.
and then.
when the pile is high enough.
when the years have dried the timber
and the suffering has stripped the bark.
you reach into your pocket.
you pull out a match.
a single
small
match.
you strike it against your boot.
hiss.
a tiny yellow flair.
the first light in a thousand years.
you drop it on the pile.
it doesn't just burn.
it detonates.
the big bang.
the birth of a galaxy.
the wood catches
and the air screams.
a supernova of heat and light
exploding outward
tearing through the darkness
shattering the night.
suddenly
everything is illuminated.
the fire is a wildfire.
it eats the sky.
it turns the mud into gold.
it pulls the money and the glory
and the life
into its orbit.
gravity shifts.
the universe rearranges itself
around the heat you created.
watching a cosmos
pour out of your suffering.
you stand there.
face scorching.
eyes wide.
watching the flames lick the stars.
and you realize the truth.
the terrifying, simple truth.
you didn't find this universe.
you didn't inherit it.
you didn't ask for it.
you built it.
out of the nothing.
out of the quiet, boring terror
of the daily repetition.
you look at your hands.
burned.
scarred.
dirty.
these are not the hands of a man.
these are the hands of a creator.
you are god.
god of the wood.
god of the fire.
god of the big bang.
everyone will see the fire.
everyone will want to know
how it started.
what the secret was.
they'll write books about it.
give speeches.
make it sound
clean and inevitable.
but you
you'll remember the dark.
the years when nothing happened.
the mornings you woke up
and couldn't see
a single reason to continue.
the pile was invisible then.
even to you
but you stacked anyway.
and now
a universe exists
that wasn't there before.
because you refused
to stop stacking
before the match arrived.
