We live in a vague world. And it gets vaguer all the time. In this environment, the power of the specific, measurable and useful promise made and kept is difficult to overstate.

I wonder why anyone would hesitate to be generous with their writing. I mean, if you really want to make a living, go to Wall Street and trade oil futures ... We're writers. We're doing something that is inherently a generous act. We're exposing ourselves to the muse and to the things that frighten us. Why do that if you're not willing to be generous? And paradoxically, almost ironically, it turns out that the more generous you are, the more money you make. But that's secondary. For me, the privilege of being generous is why I get to do this.

If you don't like your definition of 'good enough', then feel free to change that, but the goal before shipping is merely that. Not perfect.

No niche is too small if it's yours.

The only way to get what you're worth is to stand out, to exert emotional labor, to be seen as indispensable, and to produce interactions that organizations and people care deeply about.

Anxiety is practising failure in advance. Anxiety is needless and imaginary. It's fear about fear, fear that means nothing.

Marketing is the act of inventing the product. The effort of designing it. The craft of producing it. The art of pricing it. The technique of selling it.