I honestly do find myself smiling when I remember this fact. We’re all dying. It’s not that I’m in any hurry to finish this thing. I want to live many, many more decades, but when I’m at the gym, or driving in Las Vegas, or just sitting at home writing in one of my notebooks… I stop and remember that I am part of this TINY slice of history right now. People will look back at pictures and videos and think “I wonder what it was like to be alive in 2021?” But we are the only ones who will ever really know. A hundred years from now, nearly everyone we know will be gone. All of us. If you’re reading this, you’ll likely be dead. I will be dead. The stranger you walked by today, your parents, your children, the politician you hate… We will all be gone. Replaced by the generations to come. A few of us will linger on, having our names remembered, but they won’t really know who we were. They won’t really care. And why should they? Life is for the living, right? So this is our moment. Our infinitely, unimaginably small moment on this tiny planet hurling through space around a star no different from the 400 billion others in the Milky Way, a galaxy no more important than the 100 billion plus other galaxies out there we know of… (Not going to lie, this is getting away from me, let’s try and reel it back in) My point is this: we’re all here together. Right now, in this moment. And soon the last of one us will be on their deathbed thinking to themselves “wow, it seems like just yesterday that…” And then they too will be gone.

🖤

Maximum Derek

Can we talk about how Johnny Karate's "Five Karate Moves to Success" are actually a legitimate way toward self-improvement? 🥋

Make something. I am seriously at my happiest when I have just completed a project, and I'm always more motivated to start the next one.

Learn something new. Ugh. My brain feels so much healthier when I am reading or watching anything remotely educational on a regular basis. Tutorials, YouTube, Great British Bake Off 😂 What you consume as part of your mental diet totally matters.

Karate chop something. Okay... This one I'm going to translate as "exercise." I like working out, but if you don't then go dance or take a walk or, sure, literally karate chop something! Haha. Just go move. You'll be glad you did.

Try something new. This is definitely the one I need to work on most. I am a creature of comfort. I have my routine, it helps me be productive, and I do not do well with alterations. That said, new life experiences always lead me to new creative ideas.

Be nice to someone. Having grown up in a small Midwestern town like Pawnee, I feel like just being a decent human being passes as being nice in 2020 😬 But a kind text message to someone you love, or a genuine compliment to a complete stranger can really brighten someone else's day.