628. Going All in for the Power of Story

Growing up in Ipswich, England, Patrick (“Paddy”) delighted in writing “cheeky scurrilous, surreptitious things” and poking fun at authority. But his writing took a serious turn at 14. “I was lying face down on my bed. Suddenly I felt compelled to write something. My body was pushing me toward the pen and paper. I started to write, and I wrote a 17-line poem about rape, a terrible subject. I have no idea why I did it. I gave a copy to my English teacher, and it blew her away.” Recently, that same feeling—of being compelled to write, as if by an outside force—returned strongly. “It came back to me in November of 2014 when I wrote a piece that would go on to become my first viral video. I had read about that kind of epiphany-like experience from other writers.”

Rising quickly on the staff of a charismatic woman in the British Parliament, Patrick’s political career put him at the center of the storm when the global banking crisis struck. “It was crazy—with 120-hour weeks. It was exhausting and pretty much broke me. In another six months, I probably would have had a nervous breakdown. That’s when my life changed significantly. My girlfriend at the time was living in Poland. We had one of those conversations about what are we going to do in our relationship? I said, ‘I’m 27, haven’t got kids, I’m a little bit tired of London. Maybe now would be a good time to go live in Poland.’ That was obviously a big sea change in my life.”

“I very quickly realized that if I was going to live here in Poland—and I did so very much want to stay here—I had to go all-in. I didn’t want to be living on the surface, on the top of the iceberg.” As he went deep, learning the language well, a whole new world opened to him, and he learned the immense power of story. Hearing the hero stories of survival, resistance, sacrifice and courage, raised questions like: What are you prepared to do for someone you don’t know? What are you prepared to do for someone you do know? What choices do we make in life about who we want to be?”

1. Be proud of what you’re good at. Own it all. Never be shy about saying you are good at the things you do.

2. Understand that your horizon is far greater and wider than you think, so take a single-minded approach, with clarity about what really matters to you.

3. Make sure your work is a labor of love, and remember, we all do things for love which are irrational.

4. When you find the passion that drives you, go all in. Don’t be content just to stay at the surface, immerse yourself deeply.