Rule Breakers (DB Exclusive, 6.3.25)
Tetelestai.
My first posts on LinkedIn and Substack were short, topical reflections (e.g. a gratitude reflection the week before Thanksgiving). But as my rekindled passion for writing grew, I found myself thinking more deeply. A reflection on being intentional about my gratitude led to asking not just why intentional gratitude has greater transformative power than spontaneous gratitude, but also how one nurtures such intentionality, and where the strength for that resolve comes from.
The process of naming my Substack — Deeply Boring — emerged from this realization, that my writing is fueled by a desire to explore the terrain which Rich Villodas describes as “beneath the surface”; a determination to identify and understand the mechanisms and motivations that drive us.
Before long, these explorations demanded more than I could accomplish in brief reflections. Recently, I decided to take on the challenge of presenting my ideas in essays that could both stand on their own and also as part of a sequence – of a string of essays, or an “arc”. The first such arc challenged the clumsiness with which we handle “high virtues” such as truth, beauty and goodness (see “Posed Modernism”). A second explored the limits of human agency (see “B-Sides”).
Today’s post collects the third arc, which addresses the dissatisfaction we all feel with the state of the world. The first essay adopts the perspective of the individual - by asking what a perfect world might look like, and, more importantly, whether we think would deserve to live in it (see “The Outsiders”). The second essay inhabits the perspective of the world designer – by asking how eligibility decisions should be made for membership in this perfect world (see “Right to Choose”). The third essay attempts to resolve the conundrums presented in the first two essays by posing the essential question of Easter, i.e. “who pays the price of a broken world?” (see “Cross, Word, Puzzle”).
Having written out what I planned, I thought my work was done. But in reviewing the closing of the third essay, I found myself, once more, “beneath the surface”. What emerged was an epilogue of sorts, returning to the perspective of the individual, but this time exploring the transformation that occurs when one has accepted the ramifications of the essential question of Easter (see “Contrast Settings”).
In today’s world of independent authorship and generative AI, there is way too much content for anyone to consume - and I am but a speck of pollen in a springtime country field. Yet, if somehow, against all odds, you find yourself here, please know that these essays were written for you. Someone important – infinitely more important than me – is trying to reach you, and has more to offer you than you can imagine.
May your day be filled with grace and peace.
J
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This deserves a second read!