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The 2013 Challenge?
13 years ago
General
http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-harsh.....better-person/
Of particular note is the closing:
"So how about this: one year. The end of 2013, that's our deadline. Or a year from whenever you read this. While other people are telling you 'Let's make a New Year's resolution to lose 15 pounds this year!' I'm going to say let's pledge to do fucking anything -- add any skill, any improvement to your human tool set, and get good enough at it to impress people. Don't ask me what -- hell, pick something at random if you don't know. Take a class in karate, or ballroom dancing, or pottery. Learn to bake. Build a birdhouse. Learn massage. Learn a programming language. Film a porno. Adopt a superhero persona and fight crime. Start a YouTube vlog. Write for Cracked.
"But the key is, I don't want you to focus on something great that you're going to make happen to you ('I'm going to find a girlfriend, I'm going to make lots of money ...'). I want you to purely focus on giving yourself a skill that would make you ever so slightly more interesting and valuable to other people.
"'I don't have the money to take a cooking class.' Then fucking Google 'how to cook.' They've even filtered out the porn now, it's easier than ever. Damn it, you have to kill those excuses. Or they will kill you."
I know for a fact this is gonna come back and bite me on the ass come December 2013 (looking at you, NaNoWriMo), but I'm gonna do this. Not sure what I'm gonna do YET, but I figure I still have two weeks to figure it out.
...side note: between Cracked.com and "The Daily Show," at what point did lowbrow comedy hubs become the last bastions of integrity and honesty? I'm suddenly recalling the bit from "History of the World: Part 1" where Mel Brooks made the words "comedian" and "philosopher" interchangeable...foreshadowing, or am I finally getting the joke?
Of particular note is the closing:
"So how about this: one year. The end of 2013, that's our deadline. Or a year from whenever you read this. While other people are telling you 'Let's make a New Year's resolution to lose 15 pounds this year!' I'm going to say let's pledge to do fucking anything -- add any skill, any improvement to your human tool set, and get good enough at it to impress people. Don't ask me what -- hell, pick something at random if you don't know. Take a class in karate, or ballroom dancing, or pottery. Learn to bake. Build a birdhouse. Learn massage. Learn a programming language. Film a porno. Adopt a superhero persona and fight crime. Start a YouTube vlog. Write for Cracked.
"But the key is, I don't want you to focus on something great that you're going to make happen to you ('I'm going to find a girlfriend, I'm going to make lots of money ...'). I want you to purely focus on giving yourself a skill that would make you ever so slightly more interesting and valuable to other people.
"'I don't have the money to take a cooking class.' Then fucking Google 'how to cook.' They've even filtered out the porn now, it's easier than ever. Damn it, you have to kill those excuses. Or they will kill you."
I know for a fact this is gonna come back and bite me on the ass come December 2013 (looking at you, NaNoWriMo), but I'm gonna do this. Not sure what I'm gonna do YET, but I figure I still have two weeks to figure it out.
...side note: between Cracked.com and "The Daily Show," at what point did lowbrow comedy hubs become the last bastions of integrity and honesty? I'm suddenly recalling the bit from "History of the World: Part 1" where Mel Brooks made the words "comedian" and "philosopher" interchangeable...foreshadowing, or am I finally getting the joke?
To the point at hand, I guess I already pick art every year as what I struggle to improve in, so I'm already taken, so to speak. I suppose that a call to creativity and skill for the average person does sound appealing though. But I do wonder if it's really for everyone. I mean, not everyone is cut out to be a creator rather than a consumer, and there is nothing wrong with that.