It’s the fear, man. It’s the f##kin fear.

I don’t think anyone who’s ever done anything substantial in life has done so without swimming through an ocean of fear.

Standing on one side of the Grand Canyon, looking down, looking across, seeing the other side and knowing it’s possible to arrive on the other side… is a hell of a lot different then actually going down the canyon.

‘Allllll the way down? And allll the way back up? Uhh yeah, no thanks’

Sam Altman, cofounder of ChatGPT, mentions that Determination is one of the most underrated qualities.
The CEO of NVIDIA says he wishes us all pain and suffering for the exact same reason.

‘I haven’t met any interesting people that haven’t gone through some serious adversity. I’ve met a lot of nice people. They’re very lovely. But they aren’t that interesting’

• JRE #1724 – Jewel
  
  

It’s what makes Lord of the Rings so compelling.
It’s what makes the Harry Potter series so juicy.

I don’t think you get the bucket of gold at the end of the rainbow without going through a jungle of uncertainty. But isn’t that what makes it worth it in the first place?

If we knew the outcome, all the deviations, all the twists and all the turns, would it really be that fun? We’d be playing out a script. We’d be running a pre-programmed computer program (my computer programs definitely do not guarantee outcomes)

If someone gave you total control over your life today, with full certainty, with full control, would you take it? I don’t know that I would.

I don’t want to know the exact day I die. I don’t want to live a pre-scripted life. Where’s the Free Will? Where’s the serendipity?

Some of the joy comes from the uncertainty.

“Life’s about the deviations”
My buddy Rex

As much as it sucks not having it, I don’t think I’d want that total certainty. It’d be boring. Life wouldn’t go anywhere.

The downs are what makes the ups valuable in the first place. It’s all relative.

And would you really get that if you perfectly calculated every moment of every day of Life? Part of the beauty, that challenge, is figuring out how to use the shitty parts and turning them in to something fruitful.

Arthur Brooks, a happiness professor at Harvard, talks about not wasting your suffering. Every valley, every hurdle, every turn gone wrong is just fuel for the future.

Jocko Willincks’ Good is a beautiful rendition of that idea.

It’s all an emotional journey. And where’s the journey without the Fear?

“We live a life, a series of sensory experiences, and then we die”
Chris Williamson

Where’s the fun in pre-planned, pre-coordinated? The fear is what builds the confidence… the knowledge that we’ve trained the self-reliance.

Isn’t that what we’re after anyways? Self reliance?

It’s not that we want it all certain and planned… it’s that we’re worried we won’t be able to handle the outcome otherwise. We’re just worried about our own survival (thanks brains)

We just want to know we’re capable.

“Without fear, there can be no courage”
Dustin Porier

We’d all do better to have a little fear in our lives. We could all use a little bit more Skin in the Game. No thanks, I’ll take the full spectrum of human experience.

“Everything you have ever wanted is sitting on the other side of fear”
George Addair

References

• (3 mins song) Daydream by Lily Meola
• (3 min song) Really Scared by Lil Dicky
• (3 mins song) Maybe IDK by Jon Bellion
• (2 hr podcast) JRE #1724 – Jewel
• (15 min TedTalk) 100 Days of Rejection