This post is a month old but I only just stumbled upon it: Fight, by Shawn Blanc.

Shawn talks about deciding what is important to you, and how you should make sure that you really are making that thing a priority. If you’ve read Merlin Mann’s 43Folders, listened to the early episodes of his Back to Work podcast, or have been following Seth Godin then a lot of what he’s saying won’t be new to you. But there is something powerful about the succinct way he puts some of these same old ideas into words:

What then if you lived like nobody else?

• Don’t spend hours each day watching television or scrolling through social networks.
• Don’t let your work life dominate over family time, personal values, or happiness.
• Don’t ignore the importance of investing over the long-run and planning for the future.
• Live as far below your means as is reasonable, and don’t derive your happiness or self-worth by the fanciness of the things you own.
• Don’t let laziness or busywork keep you from building something meaningful.
• Don’t assume you need a better tool in order to do better work.

It’s funny. Simply doing the opposite of what most people do can actually open up many opportunities for you to do meaningful work.

It’s not a long piece, I recommend giving it a read. And then getting back to writing.