The Cult of Done

I wanted to make this article a cornerstone of this blog, which is why I wrote this article months ago but planned it as the very first one for 2024! It’s about a deep idea or philosophy about productivity which extends all the way to defining the meaning of life.

In my eyes, at least.

It’s about the thing that helped me—and many other creative people—escape the pit of unfinished projects and doubt.

This philosophy (combined with some other lectures and talks) was a wake-up call. I looked back at the past 5–10 years and saw that I had nothing to show for it. I’d started hundreds of projects, never finished one, never published one for the world to see or use.

If I had died there and then, I’d have left nothing behind, while only having worked instead of enjoying life.

If I were given a big project there and then, I’d have been helpless. Because I only had (endless) experience doing the first 20% of any project, never finishing it or even crossing the halfway line.

This is true for nearly all people, not just creatives. We get stuck in our heads, doubting, thinking we need to be perfect before we even try anything, thinking we need to be perfect after we’ve tried something, it just never ends. It all leads to inactivity and not doing.

As this article shows, your body of work is only as large as the things you finished. Your feeling of satisfaction or enjoyment (from creative endeavors) can only come from doing, never from not-doing. Your productivity is almost entirely linked to mind-set and approach, never external struggles or personality.

So … where do we start?

The Cult of Done

A long time ago I stumbled upon the “Cult of Done”. Which is meant as a joke, by the way, as it’s not actually a cult in any way.

It was the first time I saw a philosophy of mine—something I discovered myself after years of struggling—so clearly reflected and defined in terms of principles.

I will give you these principles, though I don’t agree with them 100%. It’s a good starting point, but it’s needlessly complicated and restrictive in some ways.

1. There are three states of being. Not knowing, action and completion.
2. Accept that everything is a draft. It helps to get it done.
3. There is no editing stage.
4. Pretending you know what you’re doing is almost the same as knowing what you are doing, so just accept that you know what you’re doing even if you don’t and do it.
5. Banish procrastination. If you wait more than a week to get an idea done, abandon it.
6. The point of being done is not to finish but to get other things done.
7. Once you’re done you can throw it away.
8. Laugh at perfection. It’s boring and keeps you from being done.
9. People without dirty hands are wrong. Doing something makes you right.
10. Failure counts as done. So do mistakes.
11. Destruction is a variant of done.
12. If you have an idea and publish it on the internet, that counts as a ghost of done.
13. Done is the engine of more.

Principle 1

This is just a defining axiom. It reinforces that there is no such thing as “I’m on my way to do something”, or “I have planned to do something”, or “yeah I guess it’s finished, but I should still do X and Y and make Z perfect”.

There are only three states.

• You’re either at the start of a new project, journey, idea, skill, whatever. Blank slate, unknown, let’s go.
• Or doing something with it.
• Or you have finished it. You are done, you have learned the skill or tested the idea, and there’s nothing left on your mind. You’re done, continue.

Principle 2

The age-old trick of telling yourself “I’ll just write a terrible chapter for ten minutes and then go to bed”. Before you know it, you’ve spent an hour writing a chapter that ends up good enough to be in the final book.

Never expect what you’re doing to be the final, perfect version. Never think you have one shot and that’s it.

Everything is a draft, just one of many versions.

Not only does this help let go of perfection, it’s also just how the real world works.

The most famous, best-selling video games of all time are full of “temporary hacks” and “ugly code we should change some time (but never did)”.

Bestselling books contain paragraphs that are just the stream of thought of a writer too tired to write the actual story.

Don’t expect it. Also don’t rule out the possibility of imperfect drafts being the final version.

Principle 3

This one is very powerful. I’ve learned this truth myself (many times over), but also received this advice from industry professionals in different fields.

Don’t endlessly edit what you have. Instead, create 4 new ones.

Receiving feedback on your work doesn’t necessarily mean you have to do another version of that work, improving or repairing it. It means you’ve learned how to do it better. Take this wisdom to your next project.

This is, again, based on the real world. (I’ll go over common criticisms and arguments against this approach later in the article.)

Countless crucial systems in our world are slow and absolutely terrible. Why? Because the creators kept trying to edit what they had. They tried to modify their existing codebase (or regulation) to fit the new requirements or problems. After hundreds or thousands of edits, the whole system is an incoherent, inefficient, outdated mess.

After a while—and this period is shorter than you might think—it’s better to ditch the old project and just completely start anew. (This idea returns in later principles about destruction.)

Principle 4

Ah, the “fake it till you make it”. The advice that is, somehow, both very true and very false.

Simple example: faking that you are healthy while you have chronic health issues does not make those health issues go away! Speaking from experience here!

More nuanced example: in my earliest projects I’d often include lots of self-deprecating comments. “I know this game isn’t perfect” or “The story is a bit slow, but I don’t know how to solve that, so …” Once I approached such projects with this idea of “I am a capable writer and this is a solid book”, everything became better and more professional, while more people responded to it. Fake it till you make it.

This can help; it can also do absolutely nothing. In general, it only helps with …

• Actual skills on which you can and will (rapidly) improve with more experience
• People who lack confidence and are doubters by nature

I think a middle ground is usually the way to go. “Fake it” doesn’t mean you call yourself amazing and puff up your ego, it simply means you don’t actively destroy or negatively impact your mindset and confidence. You simply ignore the lack of confidence. You make something anyway, even if that voice at the back of your mind says you can’t do it or you’re not good enough.

So I guess it’s more about ignoring things that cause you to not make it, rather than faking it.

Principle 5

Another dangerous one. “Banish procrastination” is obvious advice that’s easier said than done, while “abandon it” is a bit too harsh.

The meaning of the principle, to me, is simply:

If you still haven’t been able to force yourself to do something after a whole week, you’re clearly too disinterested. Leave it be, do something else, return when the idea is more appealing.

For years, I thought I was “disciplined” because I stuck with projects for months, even though I’d already grown tired of them after a week or two. I thought I was doing great, and that it was professional, and that is how you get things done.

It is not. You can rely on discipline for a few more weeks, then you’re just burnt out and so done with the idea that you want to kick it far away and never open your laptop again.

You don’t want to reach that stage. There’s an endless well of creativity and motivation to do stuff inside us all, it’s your job to keep that channel open and flowing. If it moves in wild twists and turns for you, then pick projects you can finish before that first week is over, or chop them up in tiny bits that you spread out over time.

Some people adore long projects. To get into the nitty-gritty, really dive as deep as they can into one topic or idea, make it their life’s work.

I do not. Find what works for you. If you take more than a week to do anything for an idea, then it doesn’t work for you (at this moment in time).

Principle 6

Ah yes, another powerful one. The point of finishing is not to finish, but so that you can continue with the next idea (with an empty mind at ease).

I’ve tried to explain this to people who don’t do creative or hobby projects … and they generally don’t get it—at all. They are flabbergasted that …

• I’m not “happy” or “cheerful” when I finish a project.
• I’m not even interested anymore in an idea once I finished it.
• My mind is already dead-set on the next one, and the next one, and the next one …

I’m a producer, not a consumer. Once I’ve produced, I don’t want to consume my own work. It’s dead to me. It is for others to find, enjoy, and experience for the first time.

All I do, is make it, finish it, then move on to the next one.

The best way to light a fire under your ass is to say: “If I just finish this project now, then I am able to start that new shiny idea on Saturday!”

Knowing that completing my current project brings me that much closer to starting a fun new one, is perhaps the best way to stay productive and motivated.

Principle 7

This is a principle that more people take issue with. On the surface, it sounds stupid. Why throw it away? Why make something at all if you’re just going to destroy it, or hide it in a closet, or delete it from your computer?

But it’s not necessarily about the action of destroying it. (Although I will refer back to principle 3: throwing it away gives room to create it again, but better this time.)

It’s about the mind-set that …

The end product is interchangeable and not important. It’s about enjoying the doing.

We’re nearing a deeper philosophical truth, but I’ll keep it at bay for now.

This is your typical “it’s about the journey, not the destination”.

You should view your work as a fun road trip, where it doesn’t even matter if you end up in the middle of nowhere, where everything is closed. Heck, maybe your destination burned down while driving towards it. It doesn’t matter!

You had fun on the way there.

When I was younger, I used to write To-Do lists with specific goals. Every day, I’d get up and tell myself: “You have to do X and Y, then at the end of the day I should have chapters 20-22 finished”

While sometimes necessary to hit deadlines, and sometimes helpful, this isn’t the best mindset. You get focused on the result. But the result is just a tiny moment in time that doesn’t matter. If you only enjoy writing once the book is done, you’ll hate 99.999% of writing.

So now, every single day, I get up and tell myself: “You’re going to do X and you’re going to have fun doing it.”

Sometimes I fool myself. Sometimes I don’t. It doesn’t matter, it’s just about the mind-set.

The goal of doing is to finish a project. But it’s the doing that’s important, not the goal.

As such, cultivate the mind-set that anything you make can be thrown away, destroyed, discarded, changed unrecognizably. It helps put your mind off of “destination-thinking” and onto “journey-thinking”.

Principle 8

Not much to say about this one. Perfection doesn’t exist. Trying to reach it is like building a road towards a planet infinitely far away, or a staircase to heaven. Great ambition, practically stupid.

If you catch yourself thinking “oh if I just change that one thing it’ll be perfect” … don’t change anything anymore. Otherwise you’ll start an endless cycle of “tweaks towards perfection”.

Learn to live with imperfection. Learn to live with knowing your last project had flaws, your last attempt was a failure, and being strong enough to not get stuck trying to perfect it.

Principle 9

Ah, another one that makes people mad. Because, inside us all, is just a lazy monkey who just doesn’t want to get his hands dirty.

But it’s the truth. 15+ years of experience making stuff tells me that this principle is completely true.

Doing removes doubt.

Doing leads to knowing.

I will always stand behind the person who tries their hardest. The one with the bad plan but the dirty hands.

I will not stand behind the one with the clean hands and theoretically great plan, if only somebody else would actually execute it and work out the kinks …

It’s another clash between wishful thinking and the real world. The real world is messy. Most issues with projects, most imperfections, come from the unpredictability and physical constraints of our real world. You can only hit those restraints, know about them, and find solutions by doing.

Countless times I’ve written the perfect plan for how to structure a game, or a book, or a website. The moment I actually start work, the plan instantly falls apart. Again, and again, until I’ve learned not to make any significant plans and just go do it. It’s vastly more efficient and practically useful.

So get your hands dirty. It makes you right.

Principle 10

This is probably the principle that receives the most counter arguments. But I’ll discuss that below.

The general idea is good.

Trying to make idea X work, but failing, still counts as done. You tested if it could work, it couldn’t work, so you’re done. Don’t waste months trying to make the idea work anyway or overcome that specific failure. It’s done, move on to the next idea, using the lessons learned.

Similarly, a book with three typos in it is still done. It’s not “almost done” or “almost perfect”. As perfection doesn’t exist, how can one be “near” it? The book is done and the three typos in it are a beautiful mark that sets it apart. The mistakes are part of the project, even when it’s done. Don’t start thinking “I’ll do a new version someday with that fixed”.

Failure and mistakes count as done. If you can’t do something, you haven’t failed—you’ve just discovered 10,000 ways in which it doesn’t work.

Principle 11

Very similar to the earlier principle about destruction, and the previous principle. Not sure why this is a separate one.

Probably because the Cult of Done manifesto was written in 20 minutes, as they only had 20 minutes to get it done ;)

It highlights the exact reason for its existence. Despite flaws and quirks, I’m still writing about this one idea, and it has positively influenced millions around the globe.

Finish things and give them to the world. Despite flaws, mistakes, uncertainty, whatever.

It’s all that matters.

Principle 12

There are two interpretations of this.

• Talking to people about your idea or what you are going to do is not the same as doing. It’s a ghost of done. (It tricks your brain into thinking it is done, which is why it’s generally bad advice to talk about upcoming work or ideas. Do it first, then talk about it afterwards.)
• Sometimes you get ideas for which you just don’t have the time or skill. It’s fine to give them to others. You’ve done your bit—you are done. (But it’s still a ghost, as you haven’t actually executed the idea.)

I’m still learning this one. I’m sitting on mountains of ideas, some of which I think are truly gold. But I lack the funds, or the skill, or the team, or the time right now. I should really just create a public list of “good ideas I will probably never make, so take them”.

A common saying is “ideas are worthless”. That’s not entirely true, as this shows. The right idea makes everything a lot easier. We can easily distinguish between “good ideas” and “terrible ideas”, and sharing your good ideas with others can be a truly beneficial trade.

The reason people say that, however, is because there’s some truth.

An idea is only 1% of the job, the other 99% is the execution.

Having an idea, even writing it down with more detail or notes, takes only minutes. Actually executing it takes much more time, energy and money than that.

And two people with the exact same core idea will probably end up at wildly different projects.

Principle 13

The last of the three most powerful ones. Done is the engine of more.

I’ve always summarized this in a more general way: “Movement leads to movement, stasis leads to stasis.”

Doing something makes you more likely to do more things. Creative or mental momentum truly exists, and it’s perhaps one of the most crucial states to cultivate.

Doubting, sitting still, slowing yourself down … it only leads to more doubt and more sitting still. No exception.

It all comes down to that. Prefer creating 5 projects in a month that might be terrible or stupid over trying to create that 1 perfect project.

In the first case, you’ve actually made 5 things, from start to end. They are done, they exist, they might be great, someone out there might truly enjoy them. You’ve built momentum and won’t hesitate to start a 6th and a 7th project next month.

In the second case, you maybe made 1 thing, and it is maybe better than any of those 5 things. Even worse, you have no momentum at all and probably spend next month worrying if that 1 project is even finished and perfect now.

Do stuff and it leads to doing more.

Critiques against the Cult

This leads to bungled work!

The major critique is: “Yeah, great, and this is why we have broken apps, terrible systems, and extremely flawed and rushed entertainment.”

People worry that quality goes down when you prefer quantity or “getting it done” over everything else. And it seems like a rational fear and a strong counter argument.

It is not.

First of all, there are many reasons for flawed systems or projects. Good productivity and mind-set are unlikely culprits. Bad films, for example, are almost always the result of the higher-ups (with power and money) messing with the creative process while having no mind for storytelling at all. They aren’t bad because the writers followed the Cult of Done.

Secondly, it’s well-known that quantity breeds quality. I already touched on this with principle 13. Make 10 things, and there’s simply a much higher chance of one of them being great, while you also learned more from it. Try to make one perfect thing … and you get stuck while making something far inferior.

The entire reason I can write this article now, is because I’ve written thousands of articles before. Some in broken English (when I was really young), some with unclear language, some without any good flow or structure. I chose quantity over quality a long time ago, especially when writing, and it’s brought us here. Me writing this article in an afternoon, you reading it.

Any “overnight success” can point to the 50 failed projects they did before then. Any bestselling writer that seems to write perfect book after perfect book, can easily dig up old projects that are laughable and unreadable. Not just one or two, but easily hundreds.

The wrong choice

But thirdly, and most importantly, people think this is a choice between “good work” and “rushed work”. A choice between “get it done perfectly” or “get it done badly”.

That is obviously not the case.

It’s a choice between “it does not get done” and “it does get done”.

This article was only written because I’d told myself that anything goes and I’ll see where I get within a couple of hours. If I wanted it to be perfect, I probably would be too afraid to even start. If I wanted it to be even better or include even more examples, the release might have been delayed, again, and again, until it never saw the light of day.

All my (board) games exist and can be enjoyed because I finished them. Because they are done and I presented that final product. If I’d gotten stuck anywhere during that process—trying to make it look even better, sharpening rules, doing more playtests, reconsidering the title and marketing, etcetera—the project would simply not exist to the outside world.

If I didn’t follow these principles, almost all my websites and work would not exist to you. You’d never know. The world would never know. Because it was never done.

The real choice for any human being—directed by motivation, emotions, the unpredictability of life—is whether it does get done or does not get done. That’s the true choice.

Whenever I see a flawed film or read a bad book, I can still appreciate the fact that it exists. That I was able to enjoy the good parts because the author finished it. Without that, the book wouldn’t exist, and neither would my enjoyment of its best ideas.

By all means, give feedback. Played my games? Read my books? Give feedback, critique, your honest thoughts.

I will probably not improve them, however. I will take it with me to make the next ten things better.

Think back to my example of the “plot twist” unable to surprise me ( = the writer). That projects and ideas are dead to me once executed.

It is not for the creator to decide whether it’s good or bad. It is for the creator to let the life force flow from their mind and their fingers, to create and to finish, then move on and keep the channel open.

Without having your worst ideas, the world will never have your best ideas.

Comfortable & Risk Averse

Another “argument” against this comes from the large group of narrow-minded people afraid of the tiniest bit of risk or uncertainty.

• “Don’t be foolish.”
• “Be reasonable.”
• “It won’t work.”
• “It’s too risky.”
• “Stay in your lane.”
• “Why don’t you pick a safer option?”

Anybody with even a shred of creativity or ambition will have heard these countless times before. I’ve heard how everything I’ve ever tried was a bad idea and too risky, from everyone all around me. And you know what? Sometimes they were right!

How do I know? Because I did it. I experimented, tried it, did the thing, and learned exactly where the issues are and why.

After years of failures and “bad ideas”, I know exactly how to sidestep those issues. I can gauge—with actual logic and arguments—when an idea likely won’t work or how to solve that.

Most importantly, it’s still not about the goal. It’s about the doing. I did something, the outcome is irrelevant. I wrote countless books—whether they’re good or bad is irrelevant, though I can obviously see that the quality of my first books (as a teenager) was much lower than my current books. I created countless games—whether they were even playable or not is irrelevant.

My writing was bad and unsellable, they all told me. Look at where we are now.

My drawings had terrible composition and color, my school teachers told me. Look at where we are now.

My piano playing was out of rhythm and my lyrics full of broken nonsense English. Look at where we are now.

A game where you cut into the paper? Foolishness! An interactive story that’s also a puzzle? Idiocy! Randomly generating game material for free on a website? Insanity!

There is no shortage of people eager to tell you, from their comfortable seat of not achieving anything, that things are too risky and a foolish endeavor. Even if they’re right, which they’re most likely not as they have no basis for there arguments, that’s no reason not to do them.

Find the few people who will encourage you to do stuff. Not necessarily stand behind you, or share your vision, or think it’s a good idea. They can’t! The vision and creativity is in your head and yours alone until you make it and show it to the world. But look for those who will say “if you want to do this, then go do it”.

As the saying goes: “The master has failed more times than the beginner has even tried.”

Nobody lies on their death bad thinking: “boy, am I glad I lived a comfortable life. Never tried anything, never achieved anything, didn’t have any impact on the world or my surroundings, and never did the things that would’ve really made me happy. Great!”

No, nearly everyone opens death door with regret about the things they didn’t do, and the risks they didn’t take, and the day-to-day rut in which they’ve found themselves stuck for 40 years.

Read this article, take its advice to heart, and you can maybe prevent this feeling as you’re leaving this world.

The real world I

Which brings us to the final point, which I’ve brought up several times already.

These principles are based on the real world. On creating stuff and living your life in the actual world, not in some theoretical ideal situation, or some idea palace in your mind.

Most critique at this point is from people clinging to that idealized version, a theoretical “better” way to do it, that just doesn’t hold up in practice.

“No, game developers should just work on a game until it’s done, then release it!”

Some do! Those with enough money to sustain developing one game for decades. Because that’s how long it takes … if they finish that “perfect” game at all.

Once in a while, I visit those pages for highly anticipated games from famous developers. Hmm … they all still say “release date: whenever it’s done” ….

Similarly, some authors are notorious for this. They’ve released one or two books that became major hits, so now they’re just sitting on “the next book might come soon” for 10, 20, 30 years. Without a deadline, without the purpose to finish this project so you can move on to the next, almost any human being would simply stop producing. Or move so slowly that it’s basically the same thing.

“Deadlines are random and restricting. Good art takes as long as it takes. Give creatives the freedom to remove the flaws before releasing some half-baked project.”

Same thing. The duration of creation is random, it can be as fast or as slow as you make it. The scope of a project is random: up to internal and external constraints, such as your skill, your team, your budget, your vision, your energy levels and mood.

Perhaps good art takes as long as it takes. But, you know, finished projects take as long as the time you’re given to make them. And whoever you are, that time is at least cut short by your life span.

As the saying goes: “There is no such thing as a work that’s finished, only one that is due.”

“Ugh, why can’t the developers fix this simple bug? I’m a programmer and this is like 5 lines of simple code! They clearly don’t care about the game, they rushed it out and chose quantity over quality.”

If the developers fixed every “simple bug” before releasing the game, you’d never even know they were making a game. It wouldn’t be done.

Additionally, they probably have a list of thousands of simple bugs or tiny tasks. Some people will be fortunate to see their issues resolved quickly (at the top of the list), while other tasks might be so far down the list they are never reached.

Welcome to the real world, in which time, energy, money and motivation are limited or even scarce resources.

Any people saying such things should ask themselves how they’d like the world if all those projects, all their favorite games with issues, all their favorite books with plot holes … simply didn’t exist. They were never done.

Would you like that better?

The real world II

This coin obviously has another side. Because the real world is messy … these nice principles from the Cult of Done also won’t perfectly apply, ever.

Even though “editing doesn’t exist”, I still edit my books. I know a second or third pass over the text will bring it to a much higher standard that people will enjoy more.

Even though “everything is a draft”, I still approach the most important parts of a project with a sense of “this has to be done right”. I usually schedule those early in the morning, so I can tackle them with a fresh head, right out of bed.

I err on the side of the principles, but real world constraints and unpredictability—and my own human imperfections and emotions—will pull everything in different directions.

Find the middle ground that works for you.

Find how much editing you can do while staying motivated and energetic—because you know this is a good choice—before it becomes something that hinders you. Find out how long you can perfect your project before your tweaks actually make it worse.

This is perhaps a lifelong process of learning … so start now!

With every year and every project, I step closer to that perfect middle ground. It’s why the pace of released projects has ramped up over the years. It’s why I now write several books a year, instead of one book in three years. And despite the increased volume, they’ve also increased in quality. I still edit, just not too much. I still come back to projects for one final “polishing pass”, but also know when to throw away the remainder of that long to-do list.

In the end, almost every nitpick and flaw I saw in my own projects (which I released anyway), has never been mentioned or even noticed by anyone else.

They see my project and say “oooh such nice colors and cute drawings!”

I see my project and say “this thing has the wrong proportions, and can’t I find a better color for that?”

It is not up to us to judge whether our work is good or bad.

Conclusion

As I said, I think the manifesto is needlessly complicated. Thirteen principles!? I’m a mathematical engineer and even I think that number is way too high!

My summary

It all comes down to this.

• Doing beats not doing. Movement leads to movement, stasis leads to stasis.
• Finish stuff before you get bored or distracted. Pick your projects wisely based on that.
• Quantity breads Quality. Perfection doesn’t exist and shouldn’t be the goal, but if it were, only doing something a lot and making loads of mistakes will get you there.
• The real choice is between whether something exists or not, not whether it’s done “badly” or “perfectly”. And for most people, for most purposes, their idea existing is what matters.
• The goal of doing a project is to bring your idea to life. But it’s the doing that’s important, not the end goal.

That last one is my personal modification of a famous quote about games (from Reiner Knizia, I believe).

“The goal of the game is to win. But it’s the goal that’s important, not the winning.”

It perfectly encapsulates how to approach games for maximum enjoyment (for everyone). A game is at its best if everyone tries their absolute hardest to win. Whoever actually ends up winning … is irrelevant.

The Meaning of Life

It also encapsulates how to approach … life.

Whenever people ponder the meaning of it all, they immediately jump towards “destination-thinking”. They invent nonsense religions because the goal of life would be to reach heaven (or something similar). They invent other systems or ideas, such as that the goal of their life is to get rich, or to raise a family, or to get a nice degree and stable job.

People often feel lonely, sad, or like a failure when they don’t reach those goals. Goals they set for themselves, or goals they feel pressured in having because others are racing towards it.

Even with this knowledge, I can see one of my friends achieving some milestone I wasn’t even aiming towards, and still feel like a failure and like I’m falling behind.

The problem isn’t the wrong goal, or an unattainable goal, or not doing the right things to reach it. It never is.

The problem is that the whole line of thinking—in terms of goals to reach—is useless. I mean, in the end, everything is useless. You will die. Everyone you know will die. The earth will be swallowed by the sun and the universe will die.

It’s not about the goal. It’s about what you do with the time you have, what you do every day.

The meaning of life is simply to live it.

The meaning of life is to do stuff. Wake up every day, do stuff, keep the momentum, then go to bed exhausted but satisfied.

The Cult of Done—or my modified summary of it—is just a way to reach this ultimate state. A way to always keep doing stuff, while taking the real world into account (and the fact you need to publish, deliver, or get money from somewhere).

And the actual stuff you do doesn’t matter. Or it matters to the extent that you need something on which to survive in our society (if you’re an adult), but no more.

Absolutely fell in love with something? Chase them and make it happen. You’ll figure out if it was the right move as you go. And even if it wasn’t, you’ll have learned things about yourself and what you look for in relationships. You either truly learn you want to have a committed relationship and raise a family, or you learn that you don’t. Both are valuable, and while learning this crucial information, you’ll probably have months full of love and happiness with this amazing person.

Insanely hyped about some new technology or idea? Chase it. Rapidly finish your current project so you can immediately start with this next idea. Maybe it turns out to be a dud, but you’ll still have enjoyed the week you spent on it. Or maybe, just maybe, you become the first to create something awesome that shapes how this technology/area develops for the next decade.

You planned to write that novel the whole day, but then you wake up, it’s a beautiful day, and you feel like going for a run through the area? Do it! Do what your body and mind feel like doing. Let that positive energy and motivation out, keep the channel open. When you come back, satisfied and energetic, those three chapters of the novel probably happen anyway.

Because, in the end, all we really have is motivation. You can have the time, the skill, the money, whatever. If you have no motivation to do it, you don’t get it done. And motivation comes from feeling satisfied, at ease, fulfilled, in motion. Besides that, motivation is a fickle mistress and you should really rely on habits, such as the _habit to get things done ;)

State of Bliss

I once summarized this in one sentence, which I still want to use as a book title someday: Until exhaustion hastens me to sleep.

To me, the ultimate state of living—the unreachable dream of bliss—is to live every day to its fullest. To be so busy doing stuff and chasing cool ideas that you end every day exhausted. So exhausted that your head hits the pillow and you instantly fall into a deep, satisfying sleep.

Maybe this is unique to me, with my hyperactive brain and body, coupled with hypercreativity. But I don’t think so.

I see it everywhere around me. People who had a long day of work/sport/social activity, who drop on the couch exhausted … and then they look so satisfied. They’ll go to bed satisfied, instantly sleep, have good dreams, and wake up fresh tomorrow.

The person who spent all day procrastinating, doubting, sitting still will not be satisfied. They’ll twist and turn in bed, barely getting any sleep, and wake up even less satisfied with life the next morning.

The meaning of life is just to do stuff, every day, with as much vigor as you can.

So that, at the end of every day, exhaustion hastens you to sleep.

Actual conclusion

With that thought I will leave you. The Cult of Done, despite its imperfections, remains a great guide on how to get the most out of yourself, your dreams, your life.

Because it encapsulates the only true purpose of life, the only thing to consider. And that is just to live it and to do stuff. We’re not going anywhere. There’s no goal. Fixating on the goal is defeating the goal.

It’s about the journey. And the journey is about doing stuff, finishing it, then moving on to the next. Trying stuff, considering it done once you’ve failed and made too many mistakes to continue, then trying again.

A Dutch theatre artist/musician—Maarten van Roozendaal—wrote an amazing lyric about this: “Uit volle borst op weg naar nergens.”

Loosely translated, it means: “Running towards nowhere with all our heart.”

Use that motto to have the best life you can,

Tiamo Pastoor