Are You A Faucet or a Drain?

Reflections on Faucets and Drains and My Big Wish

One of my guiding beliefs in life is that in this world there are faucets and there are drains.

There are those who fill the world with solutions and dedicate their lives to making contributions that move the ball forward; And there are those who suck the oxygen from the room and try to kick the ball out of bounds.

For good or bad, we all come into contact with various faucets and drains everyday. That’s life right!

But on a great day, we get to spend most of our time surrounded by faucets...the ones who provide the fresh water, the added energy, or the extra bit of pressure that helps to fill your glass more than half full.

Every once in awhile we all come across a real drain. Growing up these were the bully’s in the school yard. For some it’s a Carnival Barker like Donald Trump. In the age of Twitter, it’s someone you don’t even know who libels and misrepresents all that you are doing for the purpose of “link-baiting”. Sadly, it’s a fact of life that drains exist everywhere.

As a serial entrepreneur in the digital health space I’m used to dealing with lots of types of drains and luckily it doesn’t much effect my flow. But when you invest nearly every waking hour in life (and the ones filled with dreaming too) trying to solve a really big challenge that you know has the potential to help millions of people, wouldn’t it be great to not have to spend even an hour of your time dealing with drains...

POSTSCRIPT

My wish as I head to sleep is that when I wake, if you are one such drain you will reflect on how you might channel your negative aggression into doing something more useful. Obama said it best this week: we don’t have time for the circus. We need to unite and focus all of our energy on solving the problems of our time.

Flavin at The Modern, FT Worth, TX

Perhaps the Greatest Dance Scene on Film? Shadow Dancing with Fred Astaire

Just listed to great interview with Werner Herzog (one of my favorite film directors) on Fresh Air with Terry Gross. During the interview about his new documentary "The Cave of Forgotten Dreams", he mentioned this film scene with Fred Astaire dancing with his shadow as being the greatest moment in film history. His comment inspired me to watch the scene in it's entirety on YouTube. The shadow dancing takes place in the second half of the clip so do yourself a favor and watch the entire 7 minutes. Genius at work:

At the Forbes Interview with Jerry

The Tuna Steak I just made at Culinary School

Wait until you see the end result!