Between my junior and senior year of college, I decided it was time for me to get some experience in the service industry. Well, to be totally honest, the two (very different) internships I applied for at Bridgewater Capital and MNML Design Studio both fell through in the eleventh hour. So, I decided to learn to bartend and serve for …
Launching and a new sense of empathy
One night in August 2012, I felt completely defeated. I had been working all summer towards the launch of my first startup, MarketOSU. It was a simple idea – basically Craigslist for Ohio State students that required a student email to create an account. For months, I had been marketing an August 20th launch date for the website, and checking …
experience ladders: why YOU are right for the job
A common theme that has come up in conversations this week in the Unreal Collective community is the struggle with self deprecating thoughts and head trash. We are our own worst enemies. I think it’s a cultural thing — part of where our society is right now. When we see beautiful highight reels on social media showing all the COOL stuff …
boundaries: the dark side of being motivated
As I’ve gotten better at building a life of my own design, I find myself really only spending time on things that I actually, really want to spend time on. What a great place to be. Rarely do I have any problem with “motivation” — when your work is totally in the realm of things you have enthusiastically chosen to …
doing fewer + doing more
For a very long time, I said yes to everything that came my way. In fact, I distinctly remember a piece I wrote five years ago about saying “yes” to everything. Opportunities come in all shapes and colors, and rarely do they come when you expect them. I’ve found that by saying yes to almost everything that has come my …
looking ahead at 2019
I don’t know about you, but I’m still not quite sure what happened to 2018. We’re sitting here at November 18, and I vividly remember this time last year. Looking forward at the calendar, the next month and a half are going to breeze by. This week I’ll head to my hometown for Thanksgiving with my family, then I’m heading …
good to great
I’ve been sort of joking for a while that there are a couple things I really like — coffee and sushi — but I’m really not much of an expert. I’ve told people, “I know what’s bad and what’s good…but I can’t really taste a difference between good coffee and great coffee. I don’t have the palette.” And that’s fine …
getting to the edges
If you’ve been following along recently, you know I’ve been on a kick about forming original thought. And it continued yesterday during an Unreal Collective group call when we discussed the merits and challenges of creating unique or proprietary language! As I think about writing more and making my own assertions, frameworks, and methods, I find myself having the most …
relationships and infinite games
I really can’t overstate the value of relationships. Relationships really make the world go ’round, and they are also (in my opinion) the most fulfilling part of life. I’m blown away by the volume of Linkedin messages and emails I get on a daily basis that jump from zero (I don’t even know this person) to 100 (want to hire …
your apples to their oranges
There isn’t much that’s more exciting than a new idea. You have that initial excitement of, “Oh wow, this could really work!” But then you start doing research into other people who are doing similar work. First, you find maybe one or two people “but they aren’t doing it this way, so I’m still fine.” Then as you dig deeper, …