johnmaconline

When the iPhone first came out, it was remarkable. 

But not everybody wanted one. Price. AT&T. And most importantly, “What will I do with this thing?” The culture was set up against it. It was remarkable. 

Then, over time, the culture flipped. 

Now, the iPhone, plus the equally remarkable Android phones, are mainstream. 

New model releases don’t impress us much. Using them is just part of our daily existence. Oh crap, I dropped mine. I’ll just get another. 

Apple, Samsung, Google, and all of the others spend just as much, actually more, engineering time and effort to make the next version as they did the first one. It doesn’t cost them any less. It’s not easier.

Who benefits when the remarkable becomes mainstream? 

It’s a bit of a paradox — the work is hardest when no one cares, but the payoff is biggest when everyone does.

Here are some ideas for you to do today:

• Take a walk
• Make a list
• Knock items off the list
• Call a friend
• Call your mother
• Call your son
• Dream about the future
• Read a chapter
• Write a page
• Tell someone “Thank You”
• Say “Hi” to a stranger
• Hold the door for someone
• Have coffee or tea at the coffee shop
• Clean out a drawer
• Organize your desk
• Stretch your back
• Drink an extra glass of water
• Cook a meal 
• Try a new recipe
• Donate something
• Read a poem
• Sit outside and watch the people, cars, or birds
• Watch the sunset or sunrise
• Play a song you loved in high school
• Find a new song
• Pray
• Write down five things you’re grateful for
• Write down five things you want to let go of
• Plan your next trip (the big, exciting one)
• Learn one new word
• Forgive someone (in your head or out loud)
• Forgive yourself
• Plant something
• Water your plants
• Weed your garden
• Cut the grass
• Take a cold shower
• Take a hot bath
• Organize the garage or basement
• Organize the spice rack/drawer/cabinet
• Paint a wall or room
• Throw away all of the old, useless paint
• Rearrange the furniture
• Pay a bill early
• Roll the coins
• Put $20 in a safe place for another day
• Put your watch on the other wrist
• Look through an old photo album
• Back up your photo library
• Delete old emails
• Unsubscribe from 5 things
• Change your phone wallpaper
• Try a puzzle
• Paint on canvas (by numbers, or freehand)
• Sketch something
• Design a flag for your household
• Learn a card trick 
• Build a house of cards
• Ask ChatGPT/Claude/Perplexity to explain Bitcoin as if you’re 8 years old
• Ask ChatGPT/Claude/Perplexity to explain why socks disappear in the laundry
• Ask ChatGPT/Claude/Perplexity to help you design a new card game
• Ask ChatGPT/Claude/Perplexity to research the history of your building, house, or plot of land
• Go a different way
• Get started

Today is a great day. What will you do?

One second, I was innocently trimming the cherry tree on my front walk. The next, I was running across my front yard, yelling and swatting like a maniac.

Hornets. The angry, malicious, bald-faced kind.

And they got me. Just a few, but still.

It was a big nest. The size of a basketball. How could I have not seen it? Obviously, this thing had been growing over the whole summer. There must have been hornets in and out for a couple months. 

How could I be so blind?

In work, leadership, and life, danger doesn’t always announce itself, or it disguises itself, or even hides in plain sight. You don’t see it till you get stung.

But also, maybe that’s OK. Maybe getting stung was the best path. At least at this time. It helps you course correct. It helps you change your focus. It helps you find a better path. It helps you learn to spot signs earlier.

Sometimes the only way to know the danger is real is to kick it and see what happens. 

Do something hard today.

Your later today self will thank you for it.

Choose the hard path today.

Your tomorrow self with thank you for it.

Companies today are conflicted. 

Especially companies that invested in an address. A parcel of dirt with concrete and steel on top of it. 

Company leadership today is conflicted.

Especially leaders who prefer to sit in the room, or even more so, those who want to sit at the front of the room.

Employees today are conflicted.

Especially employees with children, a hankering for travel, or an extroverted need to be with others. 

If you ask people where they want to work, you’ll get an answer. If you measure where they work best, you may get a different one. Same is true for company leadership and the finance department. 

But the path forward — what we’re looking for — is the overlap in the Venn diagram. That’s the sweet spot. Where people want to work and actually get it done.

How can we find that overlap? Can we design a work system where you get to work where you want most of the time, and also deliver what we need most of the time? Can we design a system that works for the finance department and leadership?

Those are good questions to ask and wrangle.

But they’re not the most important ones. Leadership, the finance department, and even the employees miss the important one.

How do we design a work system that makes all of the people’s lives better, including our customers? 

Because the office doesn’t matter if the work doesn’t matter.

You’re faced with a choice. 

The person in front of you is asking you to lower your value. Maybe that person is a potential partner or friend. Or maybe they’re a potential client or investor.

It’s part ideological, and part practical. 

You know that if you lower your value far enough, you’ll win. 

What is your value? Do you have an accurate view of your value? Are you overvaluing yourself? Is this question an indicator that you need to rethink your value?

Maybe the win isn’t in proving your value to them, but in refusing to let them define it for you.