Quotes
“Life is like that. There’s always more, always a reveal.”
Cheryl Strayed
I contemplate suicide now and again. Not as much as I used to, in college, back before people knew how dangerous higher education was and a safety net/mental health infrastructure was required, and the decade thereafter, when I was trying to find myself in a world that rarely squared with my conception of it.
I’m not exactly a happy camper today, but things are going pretty good. I think it’s got partly to do with getting older, you understand the game, you realize those who think they know…don’t. I’d never want to be President. CEO of the giant corporation known as the USA? Sounds like a crappy job to me.
But every once in a while I get frustrated. Not only when I hit a metaphorical brick wall, but when I realize I haven’t changed or am encountering the same damn problem once again. It’s like an episode of “Groundhog Day,” but without the reward at the end.
But it’s quotes like these that keep me going.
Because life is truly a mystery. Better than any book or movie. You’re just bouncing along and the strangest thing happens, especially if you put yourself in play.
And you should.
“WE ARE FAMILY: When a book saturates the culture as pervasively as Cheryl Strayed’s ‘Wild’ – at No. 15 on the combined nonfiction list after 56 weeks – it can be hard to imagine there are readers left who haven’t encountered it. But when a Pennsylvania woman checked ‘Wild’ out of her local library recently, she was surprised to find far more than the travel adventure she was expecting. ‘I often get e-mails,’ Strayed wrote on Facebook last month, ‘from readers who tell me we’re connected because their lives are so very much like mine – similar childhoods, similar losses, similar struggles. This experience has been a great reminder to me how very connected we are, in spite of our differences. As I read one such e-mail recently I thought I was reading the usual until I came to the part about how the e-mailer sat bolt upright in bed as she read “Wild” because halfway into Chapter 1 she realized we have the same father. My half sister, who came upon my book by chance, who knew of my existence but not my name, found me.’ Strayed told me she had made efforts over the years to locate her half sister and brother, but online searches turned up nothing. But when her half sister started ‘Wild,’ she ‘knew just enough about me and my siblings that she put it together. She read the rest of the book and then she wrote to me. She was stunned. I was, too, and yet I always knew our paths would cross. Life is like that. There’s always more, always a reveal.'”
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“Generosity is its own form of power.”
It’s all about the favor economy.
That’s when you know you’re in the game, when you realize this.
If you haven’t been asked for a favor, you’re not playing.
But tread lightly with your requests, the other shoe always drops.
Little gems like this are sprinkled throughout “House of Cards.” They make me bolt upright, startled with the recognition.
I know not to ask.
Because it always comes with a price, nothing is free. Ever.
No one is more generous than Irving Azoff. He might have learned it from Jerry Weintraub. Irving will jump through hoops your own siblings, never mind your parents, will not. This is where his power derives from.
You think it’s about networking, knowing everybody. And I don’t want to denigrate that, but really it’s about building good will based upon a network of favors. If you can’t do something for somebody with nothing specific expected in return, you won’t make it very far. Because when you get near the top you need your allies, people you can count on.
That’s how the world works.
David Geffen too. He’ll do anything for you. All the big power players.
Not just for anyone, but someone in their orbit, someone who might prove useful down the line.
“Useful.” It doesn’t mean being used. It means you encounter people down the line that you never expected to cross paths with. It’s good to have a prior relationship, not built on cunning or saber-rattling, but generosity. People who might not grease your way, but certainly won’t block it. People who will do the tiniest of things that others will not. Like get your e-mail read, get you time with the supposedly unreachable.
And only an amateur muscles, only an amateur squeezes the recipient to deliver. If you’re playing it like the Mafia, you’re not going to be playing for long. No, the giver asks for something. You get to decide whether to deliver or not. All you know is if you don’t, you’re done.
And a pro never asks for something untoward, something you wouldn’t be comfortable doing. That comes if you’re truly related, if you’re truly bosom buddies. They understand that you might not want to do it.
Which is why you probably shouldn’t ask. Not unless you see that those free concert tickets come with a price.
Then again, those concert tickets are currency. As are your relationships. Give ducats away on a regular basis. Do kind things for others. The dividends might not be immediately apparent, but if you’re deflated about the lack of return you haven’t waited long enough. Or you’re not skilled at the game.
And power is a game. Every bit as complicated and difficult to play as baseball and football.
And the world is all about power.
But it’s based on love.
