Our friends, family, coworkers, neighbors, loved ones, and even complete strangers appear to have an unfortunate superpower: they can change our mood—from joyous to sad, from chipper to insecure, from smiling to upset—in an instant.

A single cavil, niggle, or snide comment can send us into a spiral of anxiety, agony, anger, and despair.

Why? Because we’ve outsourced our happiness.
Without realizing it, we cling to the admiration of others.

If they like me, I’ll be happy.
If they don’t, I’ll be unhappy.

This isn’t love—it’s relationship consumerism.

But who told us that we need their veneration? Even the people closest to us—our parents, our spouse, our child—who told us that we’d be a lesser human without their so-called respect?

No one.

That’s merely the story we tell ourself. Sadly, we’re correct. If we need someone’s acceptance, they will forever wield a rubber stamp over our internal state.

When we no longer need their validation, however, we immediately recover the power we relinquished. In turn, we reclaim our freedom.

How is this possible?
By letting go.

How do we let go of the need for approval?
We mustn’t do anything.
We must only cease our clinging.

What others think,
what they believe,
what they expect—
these are bars to a prison cell.

To break free, we must realize that those bars are lining their cage, not ours. We can walk away at any point.

Their opinions don’t matter.
Because nobody’s opinion matters.
The only thing that matters is the truth.
And the truth is that we are already complete.
Indeed, in an empty room, all alone, we are complete.
So the need for praise can only incomplete us.

Once we understand this—not in our head, but in our heart—we will be free. Ironically, in this state, we will earn more respect than ever.

We just won’t need it to be happy.

Everyone develops their own creative process over time.

Some sculptors, Betty woodman for instance, build sculptures with clay. Others, like Michelangelo, carve from marble. Though I’m no Michelangelo, my creative process tends to mimic the latter, building way too much and then removing massive amounts of excess until I uncover the beauty beneath the banality.

I call this process Subtractive Creation. Unlike most carving sculptors, though, I also have to quarry the marble from which I pitch, chisel, and polish.

The essays on my blogs are published with around 400 words, even though they often start with 2,000 or more.

When I edit this way, the final result is far more meaningful to me, and to the reader. The care and handcraftedness shows in the final work. How to edit this way, that is, to spend one-third of the time writing effectively, and two-thirds of the time editing—shaping the work into something more concise, more powerful, more beautiful.

Subtractive Creation seems to be an appropriate metaphor for the rest of life as well: there will always be life’s excess, always more, always too many inputs bombarding us from every direction—but instead of abhorrent multitasking, instead of trying to get things done, we can make life more beautiful via subtraction.

We can filter out the noise. We can let go of sentimental items. We can get rid of negative relationships. We can avoid the American Dream. And when everyone is looking for more, we can focus on less.

Sure, there’s an infinite amount of materials with which to build our lives—but sometimes the best way to build is to subtract. The best lives are often well-edited, carefully curated lives.

As your phone slips from your hand, your world shifts to slow motion.

You can’t name the intensity, but it’s so overpowering you can almost taste it as you reach for the plummeting device. Everything is more vivid: the colors are louder, the sounds are brighter, your movement, at least for this split second, mimics the grace of a ballerina.

You are completely in the moment, alert, fully aware of the world around you as the gadget nosedives toward its cracked-screen fate.

Then, suddenly, it’s over. You catch the phone at the last possible second, the panic subsides, and your world speeds up again, covering everything with an opaque layer of dullness, thrust into the prison of daily routine. In a meaningful way, you become less aware—less free.

But it’s possible to channel that same level of awareness on demand, isn’t it?

Instead of dropping the phone, we need only pause and intentionally slow down the world around us.

See—not just look at, but truly see—the colors in front of you.
Listen—not just hear, but actually listen—to the sounds around you.
Feel—not just touch, but verily feel—the ground beneath you.
Breathe—not just inhale, but really breathe—the air around you.

When we recapture this level of awareness, that is when we experience real freedom.

There’s a direct correlation between a man’s weakness and his ability to say “I’m sorry”—at least that’s what I used to believe.

In my imagined world of yesteryear, I thought that if wanted to be indomitable—if I wanted to be a real man (whatever that means)—then I should refuse to apologize at all costs because an apology is a sign of fragility.

So I puffed out my chest and held my head high, even when I was dead wrong (especially when I was dead wrong). I refused to acknowledge my faults because I confused flawlessness with fortitude. And since I believed perfection was power, I was afraid to be vulnerable.

How silly.

Think about it.

In the real world…

Apologizing is the epitome of strength: it requires integrity, character, backbone.

An apology isn’t a justification for our negligent actions; it lets others know we hear them, we understand them, and we respect their feelings. An apology is considerate: it shows people we recognize the problem, and it is the most rational step toward a solution because a solution is impossible to find if we pretend the problem doesn’t exist.

Refusing to apologize, on the other hand, ignores the problem, providing it space to fester, to grow, and, eventually, to explode.

So, we can act like a child, we can be weak, we can cower at the thought of apology—or we can act from a position of power and simply say, “I’m sorry.” Your apology won’t fix the past, but it’s the first step toward fixing the future.