Caring is cool. Nonchalance is a cop out. You don’t get unlimited chances. Get over your fear of failure. Pour your heart and soul into what you do. Try hard. Give a damn.
Roger Federer was just inducted into the tennis hall of fame. He embodies a central idea in The Way of Excellence: the things you care about are the things that break your heart are the things that fill your life with meaning and joy.
When you hold yourself back because you fear failure or looking ‘uncool,’ you sacrifice growth and potential (and mastery and fulfillment and richness and love and all the other good stuff in life) for short-term safety and comfort.
It’s a trap. Get over it.
“In the 1,526 singles matches I played in my career, I won almost 80% of those matches... Now, I have a question for all of you... what percentage of the POINTS do you think I won in those matches? Only 54%. When you’re playing a point, it has to be the most important thing in the world. But when it’s behind you, it’s behind you,” says Federer.
He also says that effortless is a myth. “I didn’t get where I got on pure talent alone. I got there by trying to outwork my opponents. Discipline is also a talent, and so is patience.”
The world doesn’t need more mediocrity or going through the motions. The world needs more people putting themselves out there and giving it their all. The world needs more people who have the guts to care.
The best athletes care deeply.
The best artists care deeply.
The best leaders care deeply.
The best coaches care deeply.
The best teachers care deeply.
The best doctors care deeply.
The best writers care deeply.
The best scientists care deeply.
The best parents care deeply.
Caring deeply is the cost of admission to a big and textured life.
It’s easier than ever to sit on the sidelines. To think about the thing. Research the thing. Listen to podcasts about the thing. Talk about the thing. But these are all ways of protecting yourself from actually doing the thing. Only doing the thing is doing the thing.
Fear, doubt, and insecurity are all part of human nature. You can either go through the motions and be superficially cool (but actually boring). Or you can step into the arena, lay it on the line, care deeply, make yourself vulnerable, and fully live your one and only life.
Try hard and give a damn.
This post comes directly from The Way of Excellence. If you found it resonant, you'll love the book. Get it today plus a weekly program to help you apply all the mindsets, ideas, and habits.
Fifty-four percent of points is the statistic to keep, because it describes almost every craft where the work is mostly ordinary and the outcome is not. In an operating room, caring deeply looks unglamorous from the outside — it is checking the same thing a third time when nothing suggests you need to, and the reward for doing it is that nothing happens. Federer being explicit that effortless is a myth is the part worth handing to trainees.
I'm ~99% nonchalant / ~1% caring. But I ignore everything in the first category and could fill ten lifetimes with the second. I am excited to be where I am. By definition. If I wasn't, I'd leave and go do the exciting thing. A mantra I tell myself when it gets hard/scary/painful "I chose to be here" which is always literally true and encourages me in MMA/running/climbing/lifting. Also competitively, you can sometimes see when someone doesn't really want to be there anymore. They don't care if they lose and just want to go home. That's when "I chose to be here" gets predatory: they want to tap/coast/relent and you're there to assist.