The Art of Living Well
Lessons on Resilience, Creativity, and Fulfillment
I'm peeling back another layer, sharing my thoughts on the military, narrative design, reading, and some philosophy and life hacks I picked up along the way.
Why I loved the Army:
Uncle Sam paid for my college degree—no student loans.
I traveled and lived all over the world.
Every two or three years, I moved and changed jobs; it never got old.
How many jobs have a pension plan that lets you retire at age 43 and not have to work another day of your life?
Of course, I did get another job, because I stumbled upon this gig as a narrative designer for a kick-ass video game. What does that look like? pretty awesome.
World building: history, geography, races, factions, magic, mythology—the works.
Character concepts that artists bring to life on cards.
Short stories and other lore.
Scripts and art concepts for in-game trailers and webpage backgrounds.
Website copy.
Proofreading and copyediting.
An interactive narrative tutorial.
A lot more.
I get paid to do what I love: write and play games.
I read every night before I go to bed. I’ll let you know when I find a gem, and I hope you’ll return the favor. I’m currently reading the Red Rising series by Pierce Brown. For the second time. Definitely a gem.
I read at least ten pages of nonfiction every day, too. Here’s four books I recommend.
The Millionaire Next Door by Thomas J. Stanley and William D. Danko.
Atomic Habits by James Clear.
The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman.
The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo.
I’ve got plenty of recommendations for books on writing, too, if that’s your jam. I’ll get into those later.
As far as my own books go:
The Eighth Day was an Amazon bestseller.
Democracy Inc won some awards.
I’m 300 pages deep into Democracy inc’s sequel.
How about some philosophy and life hacks:
Make your phone work for you, not suck your soul dry.
If you need to eat an elephant, do it one bite at a time.
You ain’t the same person you were yesterday; forgive yourself.
If it’s out of your control, don’t waste your emotional health worrying about it.
It doesn’t matter what “they” do; you do you, and do what’s right.
The Army, narrative design, books, philosophy, life hacks—I’ll dive into these in the weeks to come.
But I don’t have all the answers. I’ve made plenty of mistakes, and I’ll tell you about those too. I know what’s worked for me, and maybe we can help each other along the way.
This is a journey, our lives in draft, and we’re in it together.
Talk soon,
Joey
P.S. What do you want to talk about next?
Thanks, Joe