The Art of the In-between

The Art of the In-between

Hi, 

I have been thinking about this idea from one of my college professors, “The thing that greatly successful people have in common is that they have an acute sense of their minutes.” I have been trying to put that into context of my life currently, and I have boiled it down to this idea: The Art of the In-between. 

Typically, the stories we hear of purpose are people saying that they have a “calling” or wake up excited to progress their thing, but what about the rest of us? 

Either you aren’t in a financial position to go full-time on your purpose, or maybe your purpose isn’t a financial endeavor. 

That is where the Art of the In-between comes in. 

The In-between is any moment between things that must get done to keep your current life afloat. 

Thus, making The Art of The In-between finding the actions that bridge your current life to the future life that you desire. 

Let’s dive in.

When we started The Hero’s Journal, the mission was not to start a journal empire. The goal was simple, learn what it is like to launch a product. Everything from design, marketing, production, fulfilment, finance. I wanted to see how it all worked. 

Everyday, I woke up and went to the gym, listened to start-up podcasts, got to work early and read business books, made my 100 dials, then went to a coffee shop to work on the journal. There weren’t many empty moments. My life was optimized. 

A few things made this possible, but the primary driver was that I didn’t need it to work. The journal thing could’ve fallen through the cracks, and I would have been fine. The life I was striving for was more about who I became rather than what I wanted to have. 

The irony was that overtime as the business grew, and afforded me the freedom to work more on who I wanted to become, I started to do it less. 15 minutes between meetings turned into 30 minutes of Youtube Time (2x speed IYKYK), and the gym became a thing of the past.

The In-between was lost because I didn’t know what future that I wanted to build. 

The best way I can put it was that I was sedating myself. Scrolling, video games, uber eats, all became ways for me to push time forward to the next thing I had to do in order to keep my life afloat.

The obvious consequences of that caught up, gained weight, mind was hazy, and was no closer to the life I wanted. 

When you lose sight of the future self that you are building, the positive In-between actions can feel all but impossible. 

What is the point of exhausting yourself for a future you may not want? 

This question is the crux of the issue because it is reasonable, but it isn’t logical. ← A little inverse of a previous newsletter.

Being reasonable would say that it makes no sense to work super hard for a future life you may not want. 

But, logic states that there is going to be a future life regardless. Which one would you rather want: the future where you sedated yourself or the future where you did things that you know would at the very least make a stronger version of your current self? 

It is obvious. 

This is not a try harder manifesto. I am anti-try-harder. I am pro-intention. 

Identify your time, look at the In-betweens you can take advantage of, rest, and repeat. 

The In-between may call for a lazy sunday or a movie night, it may also call for early gym wake up times or meal prep, that is what makes it an art not a science. 

At the end of the day, The In-between acts as a scaffolding for the new life you are building, only to be pulled down when the new life is strong enough to support itself. Remember a new version of life is coming, whether you are ready for it or not. 

Kyle