Part 3 (1/2)

Mine? Not any different than anybody else's. Some people are called to be a good sailor. Some people have a calling to be a good tiller of the land. Some people are called to be a good friend. You have to be the best at whatever you are called at. Whatever you do. You ought to be the best at it-highly skilled. It's about confidence, not arrogance. You have to know that you're the best whether anybody else tells you that or not.

Embracing a calling is about being the best at something, or doing something that you feel no one else can do. Not necessarily in a compet.i.tive manner, where you have to beat someone else, but according to your own standard of what you know is true.

Some of us discover a quest, and sometimes the quest discovers us. Whichever is the case with you, once you identify your calling, don't lose sight of it.

Jiro Ono lives in Tokyo and operates the three-star Michelin restaurant Sukiyabas.h.i.+ Jiro. At more than seventy years old, he has spent his adult life preparing and serving sus.h.i.+ with unwavering pa.s.sion. He is absolutely, positively committed to the task at hand. Meals at his restaurant take only fifteen minutes to eat at a simple counter. There is a set menu of sus.h.i.+ (No appetizers! Nothing ordered a la carte!) and reservations are taken up to a year in advance. The bill is approximately $300 per person, no credit cards accepted.

During much of a doc.u.mentary film that portrays his family and restaurant, Jiro repeatedly declares his dedication to his work, how he values his skill above all else, and so on. It's n.o.ble but a bit monotonous. Then we see him come alive as he talks about what really drives him: the fish itself. ”When we have a good tuna, I feel great,” he says with a smile. ”I feel victorious!”

I laughed out loud when I heard Jiro talking about feeling victorious over a good tuna. But I also got the message: The man loves what he does.

There's a popular online video of a train enthusiast who spots a particularly exciting carriage coming his way down the tracks. ”OH MY G.o.d!” he shouts. ”I've been waiting for this moment for months, and it's finally here. I am finally gonna get a Heritage Unit on camera! Whoo-hoo! Yeah!”

Don't relate to the excitement? Don't know what a Heritage Unit is? That's because you're not a train enthusiast like Mark McDonough, the guy who made the original ”Excited Train Guy” video.1 The point is, maybe your heart doesn't race over vintage train carriages, and maybe you don't feel pa.s.sionate about tuna-but that's how you'll feel when you find your quest. It will be big, exciting, and maybe even a little scary or overwhelming. Deep down, you'll be drawn to it in a way that feels authentic and long lasting.

Back to You

Your calling might not require you to walk the earth in silence for seventeen years, and it might not beckon you to Tokyo in search of the world's most uncompromising tuna. You might not pack your bags for Israel or anywhere else that seems far away.

Nevertheless, there's a mission out there that is greater than yourself. Whether or not you think of it in spiritual terms, a true calling will challenge and thrill you.

A true calling also involves trade-offs. If your dream is to take an extra hour for your lunch break and walk in the park, it's more of a task than a mission. A real dream requires investment, and often it calls for sacrifice-yet when you feel excited about something, even if it doesn't make sense to others, the journey will produce its own rewards.

Many years ago, when she was flying high and challenging a.s.sumptions of what women could do in a male-dominated world, Amelia Earhart might have put it best: ”When a great adventure is offered, you don't refuse it.”

Remember Hannah was challenged by reading about the spies of Canaan. When her inspiration finally took hold, she found her next step.

”The taste of freedom” that John Francis found was enticing-and seemingly addictive. Once he had it, he couldn't return to his old way of life.

If you're not excited about tuna or trains, what are you excited about? Be attentive to what happens when you lose yourself in the moment.

1 The most popular ”Excited Train” video is actually an homage to the lesser-known original. To see both of them, Google ”excited train guy.”

Dispatch

COURAGE.

The first time I went to Dubai, I landed late at night. I arrived at the airport after a long journey that had taken me from the United States to Denmark, then to Athens, and finally down to the Persian Gulf. It was my first time in the region, and only the second big trip I'd taken since deciding to visit every country.

Most airports are restricted to flights that land or take off in the daytime and early evening hours. Once midnight hits, it's lights-out at the terminal in much of the world. But in Dubai, the opposite is true: Cras.h.i.+ng the town at one a.m. seemed perfectly normal, as crowds of Banglades.h.i.+ and Filipino pa.s.sengers descended from planes at remote gates and were bussed to immigration.

I stepped outside the terminal into a hall of rental car companies. I'd arranged to rent a car for the following five days, but the company whose name was listed on my reservation email was nowhere to be seen. After a fruitless search, I found a guy who knew a guy who knew another guy who would rent me a car with a different company. It sounded random but I followed him to another counter in the outdoor lot, avoiding the throng of arriving pa.s.sengers queuing for taxis and immigrant workers waiting for the bus.

Despite the runaround, the paperwork to get the car was surprisingly easy. My handler said good-bye and I took a deep breath. Ready for this? I asked myself. I was heading to Deira, a market district that was reported to contain a number of budget hotels. I studied the map I'd received at the airport and turned the key. It was now nearly three a.m. and raining, yet the street was teeming with vehicles. Fortunately, I found my location-or at least, I found a parking spot on a street with hotels-and then after a couple of false starts, I found a room for $40 a night. Success!

Late the next morning I checked out and prepared for a long drive. I'd be heading out of Dubai and into the desert. Equipped with the map and a bag of samosas, I drove out of the city and onto the national highway. For the next three days I drove through the country, visiting all seven emirates before returning to Dubai. I spent the night at a seaman's hotel in Fujairah, and I drove through part of Oman, a neighboring country that also maintains a small enclave within the United Arab Emirates.

The rental car was equipped with an annoying ding! sound that erupted whenever I drove above the speed limit. Once I was out of the city, however, the six-lane highway was flat and wide open. Cars would zoom past me even as I pushed the limit. Finally I gave up and joined them, deciding to ignore the ding! as I continued down the road. I felt a sense of freedom being out in the desert. This is actually happening, I thought. I can do this.

On the third day of the journey, I found myself lost as the sun was going down. Would I run out of fuel? I wondered. Did I know how to find my way back?

Yet instead of worrying, I felt surprisingly peaceful. I was on the road, just as I'd planned. I had figured out how to navigate a new environment, and the accomplishment gave me courage for the next steps. All would be well.

Years later I met someone who was getting ready to head out on her first big trip. ”Compared to where you go,” she said, ”it's no big deal.”

Then I heard from someone who wrote in to say he'd ”only” been to twenty countries. What? Twenty countries is great. Plenty of people never go anywhere.

Embracing new things often requires us to embrace our fears, however trivial they may seem. You deal with fear not by pretending it doesn't exist, but by refusing to give it decision-making authority. When you venture to new lands for the first time, it is a big deal.

Chapter 4.

Defining Moments

He had decided to live forever, or die in the attempt.

-JOSEPH h.e.l.lER Lesson: EVERY DAY MATTERS. THE EMOTIONAL AWARENESS OF MORTALITY CAN HELP US PURSUE A GOAL.

The rule of improv theater is to always keep the story going. You finish your part and ask, ”And then?” The idea is that every story can be extended, sometimes with unexpected results.

But if you want to understand a life story, you don't look forward-you look back. Instead of asking ”And then?” you ask, ”But why?”

In The $100 Startup, I shared a few stories of people who started successful businesses after being fired or laid off from their jobs. These stories were inspiring, but in some ways I was even more inspired by those who'd created their own freedom without such an obvious push. When everything is going along swimmingly, yet someone still feels the need to change it up, that's when you know they're serious.

Any given moment can change your life. For some people it's a conversation that opens the doors of possibility: a new business opportunity, perhaps, or a new relations.h.i.+p. For others it's the sudden s.h.i.+ft in perspective: I don't have to live like this anymore. For Tom Allen in England, the tipping point was hearing the news of a good job offer, yet feeling strangely discomforted by the idea that his life was now set in place for the foreseeable future.