The story of Jon Batiste
📪 The Optimal Agent Newsletter #047
Take Action:
Reduce the distance between your daily actions and what matters to you most.
Why It Matters:
When you close the gaps between what you do and what you believe matters most, you’ll naturally build a more authentic, energized, and joyous life — a shortcut to Agency if ever there was one.
How To Do It:
What’s most important to you? Write it, draw it, speak it aloud. In your heart of hearts, what is most important to you? Allow your thinking to marinate and evolve until it feels authentic and true — and beware of introducing others’ priorities or nagging “ought to’s” into your thinking.
In what order? Now the tough part. If you have to choose between the things that are most important to you, what comes before what? Where will you sacrifice one action, need, or priority for another? Rank-order your important things.
If an omniscient being was observing your daily actions, what would they say is most important to you? Imagine a detached and detail-oriented party watching what you do every day. What would they say is most important to you? What rank order would they apply?
Is there any difference between the lists? The difference represents the distance between your daily actions and your most authentic life. How can you reduce that distance?
The Inspiration:
Jon Batiste could be shrunk to a list of his headline achievements — Record of the Year for “WE ARE”, 5 Grammy Awards, Bandleader of Stay Human on the Late Late Show with Stephen Colbert, seven years at The Juilliard School (beginning at the precocious age of 17), bringing the street music of New Orleans to the people of NYC with his beautiful love riots and subway albums.
Yet the thing to observe is more subtle — Jon lives his values fully and totally. Family, Music, Connection, and Authenticity. His steadfastness isn’t just worthy, it’s breathtaking. His love for his wife through her battles with leukemia, his self-determination through a psychiatric referral for playing the melodica, his Grammy acceptance speech on artistic creation, and the subjectivity of judging music.
To truly understand the power of reducing the distance between your actions and what matters to you most, watch the Netflix documentary on Jon (“American Symphony”) and then listen to the album WE ARE on your favorite music player. You’ll be glad you did.
Explore More:
Listen: O.A. Podcast Episode #47: Prioritizing Life: Strategies for Balancing Work, Family, and Self — where Patrick and I break down a simple framework for making sure you find time for what truly matters (Audio).
Watch: The YouTube version of O.A. Podcast Episode 47. Pat, Annie, and I are leveraging the reach of YouTube to help more people discover Optimal Agency, the community we’ve built, and the joy of pursuing an agency-filled life through Health, Wealth, and Time. Your views, subscription to the channel, and likes matter a ton, and we appreciate you clicking through.
P.S. We love you. Thanks for listening to the podcast.
