Author: Dylan Brooks

My life is guided by three attributes: Humility, Grace and Passion. I’m continually driven to help make the world a better place, but I also know the importance of putting others first; the success and happiness of those around me gives me fulfillment.

Attention or Desire?

Do I want to be an object of attention or desire?

This is a decision we all must make in our lives.

Sure, it sounds like a dilemma that a Victoria’s Secret model might have, but let’s be clear. Attention and desire are words with expansive power and meaning; the sexual realms of our lives shouldn’t have a monopoly over them.

For when it comes to our lives, the choice between attention and desire can make all the difference.

All too often, we set our sights on attention. Attention is what gets us noticed, what gets us famous. Attention is what builds our legion of followers on social media and what keeps us relevant in a culture that moves faster than whitewater rapids. Attention builds relevance and brand awareness, for both or professional ventures and our personal brand. (This Kmart ad is a great example.)

Heck, attention might be what drew you to this article.

Attention seems like a good way forward. It’s easy, it’s productive and it helps us grow our egos. In the increasingly individualistic world we live in, it can seem to have everything we would ever want.

But, attention is a smoke screen. It’s just noise — a lot of noise. He or she who shouts the loudest, who makes the biggest disruption — that’s the person who gets noticed. This is the reason our election season seems like reality TV, why Kardashians and Hiltons hog the actual reality TV limelight and why Nike shoes are now bright yellow.

It’s all part of the show.

And when the show’s over, when it packs up and leaves town, we don’t remember much of it. We’re on to the next big thing, the next attraction.

This is not a sustainable way to build our lives, either personally or professionally. Attention might get us a date, a job interview, a client. But that’s only part of the story.

Attention can get you to the door, desire will get you through it.

Desire is what makes us memorable, what makes us irresistible. It builds a unique, personal connection — one that’s often mutually beneficial. While attention may draw our eye, desire tugs at our heart.

But desire is difficult to attain. To achieve it, we must be consistently display authenticity, aptitude, confidence, empathy and uniqueness. We must stay true to ourselves while being aware of the message we portray to those around us. We must be aware of the needs of others, and how our qualities align with those needs. We must be collectivist, yet individualistic.

It’s a complicated equation — one that’s nearly impossible to fake.

As a search marketer, I think about the challenge of desirability often. Traditionally, my industry has been full of people trying to help their clients gain attention from search engines by whatever means necessary — as visibility meant revenue. However, Google and Bing have gradually made gaming the system nearly impossible. Today, a company or brand must prove itself to be desirable — both to web users and search engines — in order to be visible online. It’s a steep challenge, but one that can pay lasting dividends for everyone if it’s pulled off right.

If desire can make such a big difference in the world of search, shouldn’t we be expanding it to the world at large? Shouldn’t we focus our efforts on evolving, caring, being selfless? Shouldn’t we focus on sharing a conversation with others, instead of shouting through a bullhorn? Shouldn’t we take some time to consider how we fit in, instead of solely perfecting ways to stand out?

Of course we should. And some of us — myself included — have already set our sights on these goals. Some, but not enough of us.

It’s time for that to change.

Let’s focus on what’s tangible over what’s shiny. Let’s focus on forming a personal connection instead of attaining widespread notoriety.

Let’s choose desire over attention. Our continued success relies on it.

Avoiding the Mob

I am no trendsetter.

It took me 4 years to get my first iPhone. I still don’t willingly take selfies. And the next Uber ride I take will be my first.

Yes, I’m old school — a fact that makes my life difficult when I’m trying to buy Nike sneakers that don’t look like a Smurf vomited all over them or a t-shirt that doesn’t belong on Jersey Shore. I choose text messaging over Snapchat, cable over cord-cutting and the gym over a Gluten-free diet.

Why do I live according to the way it was, instead of the way it is? It ain’t for the money; if I’d cut out cable, I might have actually saved me quite a few bucks. It ain’t in honor of Scrooge; it’s too warm to be going around yelling “Bah, Humbug.”

No, it’s because I want to avoid the mob.

Not the Corleone family. The throngs of people losing their minds over the next big trend.

Trendhopping is the national pastime of Millennials — a group I grudgingly am lumped in with by age association alone. It’s how we ended up with Snapchat, Tinder and nonsensical analogies like “Netflix and Chill” (c’mon y’all, it’s barely got anything to do with either one).

Now, trendiness is nothing new. It’s how culture has moved forward over the years (or, in some cases, backward). But it’s a whole new ballgame today. The Internet now allows trends to go viral almost instantaneously, with a vocal Millennial core ready and willing to aggressively usher society into compliance with it.

Look at the recent Pokemon Go craze. In a matter of days, it went from being something outside the realm of our wildest imagination to an activity seemingly everyone was doing.

Much like Evangelicals, Pokemon Go fans boisterously extolled the virtues of the game (“Now the Pokemon craze can cross the generation gap!” “Now we have an excuse to be active and play outside again!.”) while drowning out any concerns raised by the few not playing (including a massive drain on phone battery life and the negative repercussions of continually burying one’s head in a screen while in a public forum).

As a marketer, I find Pokemon Go appealing, even though I’ve never played any form of Pokemon. The combination of a universally accessible product, generation-gapping nostalgia and instant superfans was a home run for Nintendo.

That said, I find mob mentality around the game to be gravely concerning. For even though a fired up fan base obsessed over the next big thing might see no harm in trying to spread the word to the masses like religious zealots, this type of aggressive peer pressure threatens our diversity of thoughts, actions and beliefs. It makes our society homogeneous, and not far removed from our enemies.

“Preposterous!” these evangelical fans might say. “For the platforms, games and technologies we’re pushing are for good, not for evil.”

But the notions of good and evil are subjective. Most God-fearing people have a good grasp as to which actions belong to each quality, but that perspective can be easily manipulated. And if twisted ideals are indoctrinated into a zealous mob of supporters, unspeakable horrors can commence.

Now, I’m not suggesting that the rise of trends like Pokemon Go will turn America into another Axis of Evil, but I can see some unsettling parallels. The continuous rally to get people to join in the craze because “it’s what everyone’s doing” and the lack of regard given to conscientious objectors within the game’s considerably large path are frighteningly similar to the behaviors of authoritarian societies.

I bring this up because the issues the mob of Pokemon Go supporters drown out are actually quite significant — particularly since the game is played in the realm of the real world. There are already multiple reports of people gathering in public parks at dusk to “go hunting,” kids walking through busy neighborhood streets looking for Pokemon and teenagers blindly following their phones into private property — all ill-advised, dangerous ideas. I’ve venheard of an armed robbery facilitated by the game, as well as a serious car-pedestrian crash.

Yet, even in the face of such significant imperfections, supporters of the Pokemon Go trend are all too willing to sweep these issues under the rug — which only serves to lead countless other players into the path of danger. The mob mentality strikes again.

This behavior must end.

We must respect the voices of those who spend their days avoiding the mob. Whether we’re discussing politics, sports or Pokemon Go, we must leave a place for opposing viewpoints. Dissent is not insubordination in a democracy; if anything, it builds tools that can vastly improve the cause the majority is trumpeting. If Pokemon Go fanatics had listened to dissent, we wouldn’t have people falling off ledges trying to “Catch Em All.” The game would be better, and far safer.

So hop on that latest trend. Play Pokemon Go. Buy that new smartphone. Watch the show everyone’s talking about.

But be respectful of dissent. Don’t join the mob.

The Trials of Our Time

About a week ago, I wrote a blog article that was meant to be shared here. The article was about Dallas — how it is so often misunderstood, how what makes it special is hidden behind the stereotypical perceptions held by outsiders and whether all of this even matters.

I believe in every word of that article. But it will have to wait for another time.

As I was reading over my completed draft of that article, a nightmare was unfolding less than 20 miles away, in the heart of downtown Dallas. A peaceful protest against police brutality was suddenly ambushed by a barrage of bullets, aimed by a sniper at the officers on duty in the area. Five officers lost their lives in the attack, while seven others — plus two civilians — sustained injuries. It was quite possibly the most heinous incident in Dallas since President Kennedy was gunned down at Dealey Plaza — a mere two blocks from the most recent atrocity — more than 50 years ago.

The past few days have, admittedly, been difficult for me. I reckon they’ve been difficult for all North Texans. And while I’m no stranger to the emptiness left by senseless tragedy — having been in New York City on 9/11 and having covered some awful stories during my news media career — the pain I feel is different this time, in part because the situation is so much more complex.

You’ve probably heard commentary from countless angles over the violent events of the first week of July 2016 by now. This is not another piece of angled commentary. It’s a narrative I hope is shared by so many who are deeply disturbed by these recent events, but are also weighed down by the balance of perspective.

Given the perilous state of our society, I feel it’s my duty to share this narrative here.

***

“Dallas is a city that loves.”

Those words from Dallas Police Chief David Brown the day after the city’s most heinous attack in decades.

He’s right.

Despite the bad rap Dallas gets elsewhere — including the derogatory “New York of Texas” moniker given by the folks down I-35 apiece — this is one of the friendliest places I’ve ever called home. Strangers are genuinely kind and respectful, and friends have treated me like family.

While Dallas’ official tourism slogan is “Big Things Happen Here,” I’ve long thought it should read “Your Life Matters Here.” Aside from New York, I’ve rarely seen a more diverse and inclusive region; in fact, I personally feel Dallas is more openly diverse than Miami — a city that considers itself “The Gateway to the Americas”.

Of course, “Your Life Matters Here” brings us to the heart of the recent tragedies.

There is a define trend of African American men losing their lives at the hands of law enforcement in this country. It is real, it is disturbing and it must be properly addressed.

But the Dallas Police Department, by and large, has not been a part of this trend. Serving a city that, despite its welcoming attitude, is far from perfect — a city that still features its share of bad neighborhoods and violent crime — the department has made great strides to fulfill their duties without creating a culture of racial prejudice displayed in Ferguson, Saint Paul, Baton Rouge and even New York.

But that didn’t matter to one former member of the U.S. Army, a man who looked down at white and Hispanic men in badges and saw red.

He didn’t just take the lives of five men who were doing their job by protecting a group of people who were protesting atrocities committed by their own profession, he took the lives of five North Texans. Men who had families. Men who made plenty of sacrifices just to join the police force. Men who truly cared about the community they served. Men who would stop pro athletes to take a photo with them, just as other North Texans would.

Heck, some of the men and women he targeted had stopped to pose for pictures with the protesters momentsearlier. But that didn’t matter to this sniper, who had categorically picked them for extermination.

And that is why I take this incident so personally.

I am not black. I am not in law enforcement. So I don’t know what it’s like to have a continual target on my back. But the thought of being systematically categorized and eliminated based off something as basic as my skin tone or line of work is unconscionable. It’s a risk all my friends with darker skin tones face continually, and one that all my friends and acquaintances in law enforcement must be aware of as well. And it’s a situation that cost five officers — five of my extended neighbors — their lives.

We cannot let this continue. For if we do, we’re heading for a path of self-destruction. Coast to coast, the racial divide is as bad right now as I’ve ever seen it in my life. Distrust is high and violent confrontation has taken hold. We’re on the brink of a total meltdown that would annihilate everything good our society has ever stood for.

These are the trials of our time, and we must deal with them.

We must take the steps to come together and save ourselves. The angry voices on the edge need not take the lead; that’s the responsibility of those in the middle — the ones who care about fair treatment for all, but have done little to speak up so far.

We must put aside our differences and unite against hate, against prejudice and against this horrific violence.

***

As I turned onto the Woodall Rodgers Freeway the other night, I noticed the iconic Dallas skyline, decked out in blue in honor of the fallen officers. It was a beautiful, captivating sight — but also a melancholy one. Our city is certainly hurting right now, but we will endure.

Our society must make the changes needed to do the same.

The Power of Being Present

Growing up, I watched a fair amount of college football games on fall Saturdays. Each season, my beloved Miami Hurricanes would face off against the Virginia Tech Hokies, and the broadcasters would invariably talk about The Lunch Pail — a symbol the vaunted Hokie defense rallied around time and again.

The Lunch Pail was nothing flashy — a small hard-case container painted in the signature maroon and orange colors of Virginia Tech. But that was the point. It was there, every day — a tangible symbol of persistence. Likewise, the Hokies would always be a tough opponent — what they lacked in world-class athleticism, they made up for with pure effort and heart.

While I consistently pulled for my eventual alma mater in these matchups, I gained a great deal of respect for the Virginia Tech Hokies over the years, and learned a lot about the blue collar work ethic in the process. Funny as it sounds, watching football games on ABC on weekends gave me valuable insight I couldn’t get in the classroom.

Skills are important, but so is the fortitude to be present. The will to persistently devote your time and effort to something you believe in.

Along the winding road to adulthood, my vocation, home address and interests have all changed — multiple times. But one thing has stayed consistent — my devotion to all that I pursue. This persistence has allowed me to thrive in my various career positions over the years, and to build a life.

It didn’t take magic or luck for me to get where I am now; it took the proverbial blood, sweat and tears.

That said, sometimes, I feel as if I’m a relic from the past.

Lifehacking has become a central part of Millennial culture these days — a societal quest to cut the chaff and make everything from cooking dinner to completing your job responsibilities faster and more efficient. The corporate world has embraced this mantra with open arms (ostensibly for the promise of leaner payrolls and overhead), with one search marketing superagency even adopting the mantra “Work Smarter, Not Harder.”

In a matter of years, we’ve developed an extreme allergy to the grind.

Look, I get it. If only 20 percent of our work time is productive, it makes sense to focus on our money moments. If we can cut tedium and monotony out of our personal lives, we’ll enjoy ourselves that much more.

But at what point does cutting the chaff turn into cutting corners?

Wholesome success can’t be achieved in the time it takes to order a Big Mac. It requires persistent vigilance. It requires long-term focus. It requires being there, time and again.

We can’t hack our future with one swing of the chisel. We must strategically and consistently knock away small pieces of the stone to sculpt our destiny.

Make no mistake, there is substance in that Lunch Pail. There is power in being present.

The key is not to get started, but to keep going.

Will you?

Strength in Adversity

There are many qualities we look at when classifying others. Social skills, personality, smarts, looks — these come to mind instantly. A far more uncommon consideration — at least outside the niche of job interviews — is resilience.

Yet, it just might be our ultimate defining quality.

Think about it.

When things are going well, we’re in control of our lifestyle. We get into our comfort zone, things work out for us, and we have the ability to project those good vibes towards others. This is the warm, fuzzy zone where the theory of Being Our Best Self comes from.

But life is more than just sunshine and rainbows. It’s storm clouds too.

There are times in all of our lives when we find ourselves in adverse situations, when things don’t go our way. And it brings up questions.

How do we respond? Which vibes do we project in these moments? What do we take from the experience?

The answers can be telling.

This is why I pay close attention to how the people I’m acquainted with handle adversity — and why I’m sure others pay close attention to how I handle tough times.

***

It takes internal fortitude to get through adversity. I recognize this much better now than I did earlier in life.

Growing up, I was resistant to change, and I didn’t respond well when things didn’t go my way. I wasn’t much of a risk-taker, and I planned things out in my mind well ahead of time; that way, life could be predictable and within my comfort zone as much as possible.

But then, things changed.

In the past decade, I’ve moved to a new city three times — each time, hardly knowing a soul in the place God had led me to. The first move was a comfortable one — I was on a college campus with a bunch of other freshmen, and I made friends quickly.

The second move was far different — out to the West Texas desert, and the real world. A world where being simply being new in the neighborhood built no bridges to the surrounding community.

I remember the afternoon my dad left town after getting me settled. I went back to my new apartment, lay down on my new futon in the living room — and slept for 10 hours. Then, I went to my bedroom and slept for 8 more.

I was so lonely and scared, I didn’t want to wake up.

In that moment of extreme adversity, I gave myself a mental pep talk.

This is not who you are. Go out and be yourself.

Those words got me out of my apartment that day. No matter how apprehensive I felt inside, I was going to prove to the world — and myself —that I was exactly the same person I always had been.

I learned a lot from that experience, which is why I keep it in the back of my mind. Those lessons have come in handy many times, including during my move to the Dallas area and subsequent career change.

***

While I don’t expect others to face so many adverse situations in their lives — or to willingly put themselves in those situations, as I did — I would advise those who come across adversity to stay consistent and true to themselves. It’s also important to use the lessons from that experience productively moving forward.

For there will always be more moments of adversity down the road. Moments when it pays to heed the following words.

Show me adversity. I’ll show you strength.

A Foundation of Trust

What’s the most precious thing in life?

Some might say life itself, or love. And they’re right, in a way.

But I think there’s one clear answer, that stands tall among the rest.

Trust.

You see, trust is one of the most difficult sensations to describe, yet one of the most encompassing. It provides us with a sense of security, and its absence can literally destroy our health.

Trust is one of the most difficult things to attain. (Heck, we often don’t trust ourselves, or our ability to trust others.) And if trust is earned and broken, it’s nearly impossible to regain.

Trust allows us to share secrets, to step on the roller coaster, to pay attention to our teachers. Lack of trust is why we lock our doors at night, why we scour Web MD every time we have a slight headache, why the thought of someone else driving our car for the first time gives us angst.

Trust is what draws us to our routine, or allows us to stray from our routine.

If you’re looking for a common theme in all this, well — there are two.

Trust is about protection, but also about control.

These feelings are at the heart of human nature, which is why trust is the Holy Grail of all commodities.

So yes, trust is precious — and increasingly scarce.

As bad things happen in our increasingly connected society, we become inherently suspicious. Trust erodes, tensions flare — and more bad things happen as a result.

But there’s an alternate ending to this narrative. One that — surprise, surprise — relies on our collective ability to trust.

If we get to know our neighbors, or at least give them the benefit of the doubt, we can set a common foundation. A foundation of trust.

With this foundation in place, we can more productively respond to the crises our society faces with one voice. A voice of multiple perspectives, but of unified purpose. A voice free of the divisive seeds of deceit.

Now, this process ain’t easy; the important ones hardly ever are. But it is necessary.

For while we may never leave our doors unlocked, we should be able to unlock our hearts.

Why I Abolished Hate

There was a time when I used the word hate.

It was generally in the context of a sports nemesis or a food I didn’t particularly care for. At times, hate would describe a thoroughly miserable activity, or my feelings about history’s most twisted despots.

Hate was a brief, yet definitive word — four letters with the bold power of a Chuck Norris roundhouse. It aroused emotion, displayed conviction, and demonstrated an uncommon strength of descriptive purpose.

It was the perfect word to describe, say, the Florida State Seminoles — the archrivals of my beloved Miami Hurricanes. Every time their fans celebrated a touchdown during my time in college — regardless of the opponent — I would feel sick to my stomach.

Hate remained in my lexicon into adulthood. If something really upset me, that four letter word became my go-to descriptor as I rehashed the incident over late night drinks with friends.

But recently, I realized the error of my ways, and I decided to make a change.

Now, hate is no longer in my vocabulary.

***

You see, hate is like gasoline. It boldly fuels any discussion it’s injected into — and it can quickly burn out of control.

When we say we hate something, we wish ill will upon it. Worse still, we wish pain and suffering upon it. The more we fixate our mind on these desires, the more dangerous they become.

Eventually hate can consume us, to the point where we become unbalanced and irrational. It’s at this point that those blinded by hate can cross the line from desiring the suffering of others to actually delivering it — causing shock, horror, pain and even more hate.

It’s a devastating, destructive cycle.

***

In the wake of the deadliest shooting in our nation’s history —one where someone used his contempt to deprive dozens of people of the most fundamental and precious thing they had — it’s time we think about the ramifications of hate.

The aggression, the senseless tragedy hate brings about — it’s simply unacceptable.

And it’s something we can prevent — by ridding ourselves of the sentiment in the first place.

We may not always identify with each other — I don’t personally identify with the LGBT community, the black community or the community of Florida State Seminole fans, for example — but we can still accept each other through our differences. We can at least find common ground there. We can, and we must.

This is why I abolished hate. This is why I sternly remind others that hate is a strong word whenever I hear them using it.

But it can’t start and end with just me. Everyone needs to pitch in.

We must abolish hate. Our future depends on it.

Slowing the Pace

“Time…why you punish me?”

Those lyrics from Hootie & the Blowfish hit the radio about two decades ago, but it seems they were far ahead of their time.

We live our lives at a breakneck pace today — the result of both innovation and the shifting of cultural norms. With the Internet in our pockets and with TV screens we can control with our voice, our days are now made up of hundreds of moments — Micromoments, as Google calls them. Attention is a precious commodity that mass media, marketing and entertainment professionals work tirelessly to capture; Attention Deficit Disorder has gone from a diagnosable problem to an acceptable condition.

To paraphrase Queen, “We want it all, and we want it now.”

But in the race to jam pack our lives with as much as we can, we’re leaving something valuable in the dust.

Meaningfulness.

Our development, both individually and as a society, depends on our ability to interpret meaning in what we do. This important process is a deliberate one, one that can’t be squeezed into the 24/7 circus we put ourselves through these days.

Simply put, the last viral thing we watched, the last rapid-fire experience we took on — it won’t resonate with us for long. Heck, we might not even remember it tomorrow.

So, while the modern-day lifestyle habits satiate our childish needs for “more, more, more” — and keep us away from the cultural stigma of FOMO — they also suffocate our ability to unpack what we expose ourselves to and use that newfound knowledge in a productive manner.

Without meaningfulness, we’re less balanced, less empowered, less smart. The race to the bottom intensifies.

But we can end this self-deprecating cycle.

It’s time we slow down the pace.

It’s time we take a moment to think, to fully digest all that we experience.

It’s time we consider the impact of what we do, and whether there is one in the first place.

It’s time we embrace moments of silent thought, enjoying the life unplugged the way we did in the days when the Macarena was a hit.

It’s time we commit ourselves to the pursuits that matter.

Only after we find this balance of pace and infotainment access will the world truly be at our fingertips.

The Moments That Matter

The glass stood on the kitchen counter, filled with Ovaltine chocolate milk. I watched with wide eyes as my father stood next to it, dressed to in his suit and tie.

I looked up at him, with a hopeful expression on my face.

“Could I have some too, daddy?”

Moments later, we were downing our glasses of Ovaltine together, the master and his three-year old apprentice.

***

The milk ritual was special to me. Maybe even sacred. It was the only time I could spend each day with the man I idolized so much, before he headed off to his advertising job in the big city. So I busted tail to the kitchen every morning, hoping to catch him before the glass was empty and my hopes were shattered.

But this day was different. Our time together would not be limited to a glass of milk, because I was going my father to that mystical job, the one that kept him from me so much.

I felt like a kid at Disney World. We got to take the train into the big city, then we walked down a street full of tall buildings until we got to one that looked like it touched the sky. We rode an elevator to the 32nd floor, and my father opened a glass door in a glass wall, entering an office suite that overlooked much of the city.

My father got me M&Ms and a Diet Coke from the vending machine, opened up Microsoft Word on his computer and left for a meeting. I stared mesmerizingly at the blank page before me on the computer screen, then hit hit the “g” key repeatedly, until the entire page was filled with it. When my father returned, I proudly showed him the “work” I’d done, and he laughed. Then, we went down the street to McDonalds for lunch.

***

By the time we got home that evening, I was convinced that my father had the coolest job ever — an occupation that made up for all the time we had to spend apart. But even though he tried to hide it, I had a feeling that he didn’t feel the way about his job that I did.

Truth is, my father was miserable — so miserable, in fact, that my mother felt compelled to utter the seven-word ultimatum that would come to define our family’s future: “Change your life or change your wife.”

My father made the wise decision, and soon that job in the fancy high-rise office was no more. He went to grad school and our lives changed. Even at a young age, this wasn’t lost on me; I remarked, “Now we can finally eat out again,” on the day he graduated.

Soon enough, my father was back on his feet as a teacher — a career he continues today, more than 20 years later. It was all strange to me, as I was in the early years of school myself at the time. But it was certainly nice to see him more each day, and to have summers off together.

***

Draw what you don’t want to be.

It’s an odd request, particularly when you’re 12 years old and those words are coming from a psychologist. But it didn’t take me more than a second to put pen to paper.

A few artistically-challenged moments later, I showed off my completed “masterpiece.” It was a photo of a sad-looking man, wearing a suit and holding a briefcase, waiting on a train platform.

The moment was jarring; I’d drawn my father from my early years.

It was clear that the normal 9 to 5 was a trap to me at that time. I’d felt the prison bars up close, and I was determined to avoid them. In the decade that followed, I charted a course far away from the traditional business field, ending up as a TV news producer in West Texas after I graduated college.

At the age of 25, I pivoted.

I moved back to a big city — Dallas in this case — and transitioned into a 9 to 5 career in the same marketing and advertising sector my father had left so many years before.

It had all come full circle.

***

In the early days of my second career, I spoke often about finishing what my father started. It didn’t matter that I was cutting my teeth in Internet marketing — a beast that didn’t exist 20 years earlier, when he was in the industry; to me, the symbiotic nature of our career journeys was too compelling to ignore, and it was a powerful motivator.

But then, I remembered the picture I’d drawn years before. I wasn’t becoming the man on the train platform, was I?

Thankfully, the answer was a resounding no.

I realized in that moment that despite the shared career field, my father and I were worlds apart. While my father started in the industry fresh out of college, I had already experienced burnout in another career by the time I joined the marketing world — and I had taken the lessons from both my father’s prior experience and my own to heart while building a necessary sense of perspective.

Forget legacy or overarching purpose. At the end of the day, my job was simply an occupation, and it needed to stay that way.

***

I’ve since grown more comfortable with the routines of the business world — even dressing somewhat formally despite my employer’s lack of a strict dress code — but I still refuse to let my job take over my life. While I continue to work at becoming a better marketer, if I ever feel that my career is trapping me in a cycle of misery — as my father did — I will follow his lead (and my precedent) and start anew.

For there’s one lesson my father taught me that rings truer than the rest.

Building a career is a worthy investment. But the moments that matter the most are the ones shared while downing that glass of Ovaltine.

The Everyday Evolution

I don’t like change.

That’s a bit of an odd statement from someone who relocated three times in a seven-year span, but one filled with truth.

Some people get a rush from a constant stream of new adventures; I’m more comfortable with the tried-and-true routine.

But life doesn’t care about my comfort zone. My own biology doesn’t care about my comfort zone. And, to a certain extent, my mind doesn’t care about my comfort zone.

So I’ve made some big changes. My address, time zone, employer, career, sleep schedule and hobbies have all transformed in the past decade. To a certain degree, my temperament has too — I’ve come to embrace my introverted nature without becoming a hermit, come to embrace the serenity of silence at certain points during the week and come to find a balance between the times when I’m locked in and kicking back.

But most of these changes have been reactive. I had to adapt in order to play the hand I’d been dealt, regardless of how I ended up at the table in the first place. And a reactional change is more about self-preservation than self-improvement.

There ain’t much shame in survival, according to Darwin. (The Donner Party notwithstanding.) But there’s little to be gained from it.

So in the past year, I’ve pivoted. I’ve decided to make change a proactive part of my life.

It started with a reactive decision. Noticing that my wallet was empty but my fridge was full of beer one evening, I decided to cut beer from my grocery list — for good. Suddenly, another thought popped in my head, unprovoked: While I’m at it, why don’t I also commit to eating out less often?

Soon, I was bringing my lunch to work 4 days a week, and preparing meals at home every weeknight. Not coincidentally, I gradually stopped eating all fast food.

Next up was Dr Pepper. I quit that — and all other soft drinks — cold turkey about 8 months ago, followed by other sugary drinks like sweet tea, protein shakes and Gatorade. Eventually, I purged sugar itself — aside from the occasional donut at the office or slice of pecan pie at a restaurant.

At the same time, I increased my workout load, committed to taking multi-mile walks on weekends and even added fruit and vegetables to my diet.

And food wasn’t the only part of my life that changed. I cut back on traveling, going to sporting events, shopping and other thrill-seeking events — committing much of that time and energy toward initiatives like Words of the West, fitness, cooking and self-education.

A lot of wholesale change, all inspired by one choice to stop buying beer.

Now, you might think that replacing so many things I like with those that I was once ambivalent to would be a soul-crushing experience. But you would be dead wrong.

I feel better than I ever have. I’m lighter, stronger and more energized.

Why? Because I haven’t changed. I’ve evolved.

The changes I’ve made have rekindled old interests — such as the art of cooking — and inspired new ones, like an active lifestyle. Swapping out old habits for new ones allows me to continue my drive for self-improvement, while maintaining the balance of routine.

This evolution is ongoing. I’m sure as the weeks, months and years go by, I will keep proactively finding ways to make my life healthier, more productive and more efficient.

You can do this too. If you’re on the fence about making changes in your life, get at it!

Evolution is an everyday process. Grab the bull by the horns and let it ride!