tend your garden

First, a quick congratulations to Ben Meer on How to Be Good at Life becoming an instant #1 New York Times bestseller.I wasn’t going to write about it, but after mentioning Vanessa Van Edwards’s new book Conversation in September singlehandedly drove it to the top of the bestseller list, I decided I owe it to Ben to get him on the list for a second week. (As the old saying goes, correlation equals causation.)Ben’s book draws on years spent researching, developing, and writing about systems. He took his time and did the work. When the opportunity came to write his book, he was able to draw on a rich foundation of ideas, tools, and research.Healthy soil leads to a productive harvest.To extend the gardening metaphor, “writer’s block” indicates depleted soil. You’re sitting there at the keyboard with nothing coming to mind because your brain is a Dust Bowl, plowed relentlessly and unreplenished. You haven’t established the necessary conditions for steady creative output.Nobody can grow a…