“I haven’t had a chance to call.”

Let’s be clear: not calling is a choice.

Unless you are incarcerated and your calls are limited, you have had a chance, and you’ve chosen to not call.

Calling, after all, can be awkward. Especially if you haven’t spoken in a long time. Especially if you don’t have an urgent need to call.

Plus, a “catching up” call is never brief, and you’re busy. Very busy.

But if the relationship is worthwhile, it’s worth a call from time to time. It’s worth more than a like or a retweet.

For the hearing world, our need for spoken conversation predates our need for reading letters, emails, and texts (even the really good ones).

The longer you wait, the more awkward it will be. Just make the call. You’ll be glad you did.

There’s something beautiful about a newly stretched canvas — especially if you’ve done it yourself. Sturdy, straight stretchers. Taut, pristine surface. Smooth, white gesso.

It takes a few hours of careful work to prepare a canvas in this way.

When an artist is just learning how to paint, however, this is a problem.

• The perfect surface

• The anticipation

• The sunk cost of the prep work

• The expectation of a painting worthy of the canvas

A useful technique for new students is to paint on cheap newsprint or cardboard. To paint on something disposable, which requires no preparation. To not be precious with it.

Not to aim for failure, or to try painting poorly, but to be willing to accept what happens. To get beyond the high expectations that sow fear and anxiety. To move past the worrying, and to get to the doing.

It’s the same with many new creative endeavors. Our best learning happens by making work that can be discarded, and then doing it again. And again. And again.

Sometimes a small spill prompts us to spot clean an object, and we suddenly realize how dirty that object has become.

Dust, dirt, and sediment have a tendency to build slowly — so slowly that we don’t even notice…

…until we clean that little area.

Then, we get a very clear sense of how bad things have gotten.

It’s easy to do a little test — spot cleaning the hood of a car, the porch railing, a window.

It’s a lot harder to test things that aren’t remedied with detergent and elbow grease.

Politics. Physical health. Social justice. Civility.

Consider the valuable mental exercise of imagining these things at their best. Pure and clean.

If we can do that, we can begin to assess how bad it has gotten, and what we might do to clean it up.

A large bank note is useless at a vending machine that only accepts coins.

The hydroelectric power station isn’t much help in solving your dead AAA battery remote control problem.

Portion-size and packaging matter.

Even when you have the right materials — the right ideas — the delivery matters.

There are times when you’ll want to offer the fire-hose version of your grand idea when the drip-by-drip method is what will be most effective.

Those who know you may have you typecast. They know your strengths and weaknesses. They know the hobbies you pursue, and the things you do professionally. They know your history.

Being able to define you is a comfort. There are labels that can be applied. Job titles. Vocations.

So when you try something new — something that doesn’t fit the known mold — you might meet resistance from others.

“Hmm. I didn’t know he was a singer.”

“That’s surprising. I didn’t know she was a writer. Has she written anything before?”

“He’s changing careers? Huh.”

The new thing might confuse your acquaintances. They might not know what to do with it.

Don’t let that stop you.

New adventures can start today, and they don’t have to relate to your past.

And when you’ve sung fifty songs, or written a dozen short stories, or celebrated an anniversary for your new business... no one will say, “Hmm. I had no idea…”

Your past doesn’t get to determine what you do today. You do.

When you speak up, is it to add value to the conversation, or is it more about demonstrating to the group that you have an understanding of the subject matter?

Are you moving the needle, or are you telling everyone, “Look! I know where the needle is too!”

It’s the difference between initiating a sound that resonates, and merely adding noise.

Water — applied to the bark of a branch — will do little to grow a tree.

Even if the water is really good, and the application is done lovingly. Consistently.

On the branch, it doesn’t do much.

It’s the same with our personal growth and our business growth.

That is, in order to grow, we need to nourish the right areas. We need to apply effort in the right places.

When we feed those areas… when we level-up in those places… that’s when real growth happens.

Does your neighbor remind you that the special refuse pick-up is next week?

Does a colleague dial your extension to let you know there are some home-made treats in the office break room?

Does an acquaintance let you know that the hallway you’re walking toward is blocked?

I’m not asking, “Do you have friends?”

Rather, “Are you making meaningful connections with people — enough that they care to think of you?”

Here’s the secret: it usually starts with you. You being thoughtful. You being courteous. You being generous.

That sort of thing tends to work its way back to you.

And not that it’s the reason for being nice… but sometimes you end up getting the scoop on baked goods before they’re all gone.

When there’s an emergency, we act.

Sometimes we don’t know what to do and so we act on impulse and instinct. We make quick, educated guesses.

Other times, we've prepared for the emergency. There’s a plan in place, and we follow the plan.

* * *

When there’s not an emergency, however, it can be harder to act.

Nothing is pressing. No immediate harm will be done if we sit idle.

So the challenge is to be productive amidst the lull. To be self-motivated. To make a plan and to execute. To do our best work with a sense of purpose and urgency.

* * *

Of course, some people like to manufacture emergencies. They create chaos so they can do a lot of yelling and hand-waving. Then they spend all their time problem-solving and playing the part of the hero... solving the problems that they never really had to create in the first place.

Dear reader,

Don't forget that the “dear” in a salutation is an adjective.

It’s part of conventional etiquette, so we often include it without even thinking.

But there are plenty of other adjectives we could use to address the people with whom we correspond — particularly if we are close to them.

It’s worth considering from time to time, generous reader.

When we put work into the world — when we post on social media, when we blog, when we put work in a gallery, when we sing — there’s not always a response.

It can be unsettling.

Did anyone hear me? Did my voice find an ear? Does my message resonate?

Sometimes, there’s nothing.

Without focus groups, without likes, without comments, without reviews… how do we know?

There are times when we simply don’t know. But that doesn’t stop us.

We put work into the world because we are trying to make change happen, and that unfolds slowly. Sometimes quietly.

So we can’t be impatient when we publish. When we create. When we ship. When we speak.

Before social media and hyper-connectivity and tracking cookies, the writers and artists and thinkers who changed the world did so without real-time analytics, and without a single retweet.

You can trick some people into doing what you want them to do. Colleagues, employees, volunteers, children, clients… they can all be fooled into compliance.

But sometimes, people know they’re being tricked.

* * *

So you’ve gotten your way, but it cost you trust.

And now you don’t have enrollment; you just have your way.

You have to decide whether the loss of trust is worth it.

If you were running for re-election in your personal relationships, what would that look like? What would you list among your accomplishments for the past term? What promises would you make for the future?

Luckily, that’s not how relationships actually work.

However, you could still take pause and make quiet personal goals to improve… and to keep your imaginary campaign promises.

It’s one thing to ask, “Do you hear what I'm saying?”

But it’s perhaps more important to ask, “Do I hear what I'm saying?”

Can I have enough self-awareness and empathy to hear myself through the ears of another?

When you’ve gathered your belongings and set off for the door, keys in hand, and you ask, “Hey. Need anything before I go?” what you are really saying is, “I have something else to do. Are you in such need of help that I should divert my plans?”

It changes quite a bit when we approach someone, empty-handed, sans travelling coat, and we say, “I’d like to help you in some way. What can I do?”

In the first example, we ask someone to press upon us twice: once to change our schedule, and then to do the thing that helps.

The other way — the more generous way — is to show up, unsolicited… not poised to leave, but poised to help.

Sometimes, there are thick walls between us. As our relationships develop, we can perforate those walls to some extent, but they never disappear completely.

So when we have an interaction with someone new, all we have is a tiny little window into that person's world. A peephole in the wall.

And that person has a tiny little window into our world.

When those windows align, the temptation is to make generalizations based on what we can see.

It’s easy to forget that we're only looking through a little window. A tiny little window.

We peer so intensely that we forget that the aperture is on the face of a huge building, most of which we cannot see.

Our imaginations and prior life experiences tend to fill in most of the blanks.

If we’re not careful, we'll start to convince ourselves that we know the floor plan of the entire house because of what we can see through that tiny little window. We’ll assume that, for the most part, the house is much like our own.

And we’d likely be wrong.

When you feel your eyelashes brushing against the pane of that tiny window, remind yourself that there’s a vast interior completely hidden from view.

There’s a deep satisfaction that can be gained by doing something good without receiving credit.

Consciously being generous, in secret.

Doing something right, or kind, with no one knowing.

When the reward of acknowledgement is stripped away, when personal thanks is eliminated from the equation — when you do good just to do good — what’s left is the feeling of having given in the purest form.

“But I’m tired” — the same protest a parent might hear from a young child being roused for the day — is a phrase that does not typically change what is presently required of the speaker.

Our tasks and deadlines, generally, are indifferent to our level of energy. Our responsibilities do not ask, “Have you slept well?”

“But I’m tired” is a thought that can start us down the road of doing work begrudgingly.

Of course, it might be true. We might indeed be tired.

Alas, our work — the important work that the world needs of us — that work awaits. It does not lessen because of our fatigue. It does not base its urgency on our desire for rest.

So, there are occasions when we are tired, and we will need to do our work... tired.

* * *

Post Script: When our work involves the safety of others — when the task is to transport passengers or to move equipment on busy highways — our responsibilities indeed ask if we are alert and well-rested. In those situations, go back to bed. Rest. The world needs productivity and generosity — not recklessness.

If you’re obsessively checking your various inboxes, you’re avoiding work. You’re stalling.

You’re waiting for an opportunity to have to react to something that’s coming your way.

Looking for an urgent issue.

Awaiting an emergency.

Here’s the thing: the things that can’t wait — they will find you. You don’t have to seek them. If it’s urgent enough, you will be tracked down.

For now, while there’s nothing incoming, it’s a gift.

You’re not a defense waiting for an offense. For now, it’s just you, and the path forward.

Go.

When breakthrough technology is announced, there are inevitably people whose initial response is, "What's the point?"

Innovators — true innovators — operate on the front lines. The leading edge. They have a vision that is beyond what the masses can see. They have a vision that is beyond what intelligent pragmatists can see.

It makes sense that some people will not see the point in the experimental, or the avant-garde. It's because they're seeking a conclusion when presented with a segue. They're looking for a map when someone opens a new door. They want to read a synopsis for a story still germinating in the artist's mind.

The injustice, of course, is that those who contemptuously questioned the purpose of the bridge will ultimately find themselves happily on the other side of the canyon... ready to ask the next generation of bridge-builders, "What's the point?"