Traveling for 10 months around the world through 17 countries covering Africa, South East Asia, Australasia and North, Central and South America. The trip was centered around surfing and photography

Presenting in Hong Kong, Japan, the US and London

Writing a book for O’Reilly as I went, titled JavaScript Web Applications

Writing another book on CoffeeScript, soon to be published by O’Reilly.

Doing a ton of open source libraries, such as Spine, Spine.Mobile, GFX, and Juggernaut.

Building a startup prototype

Presenting at FOWA

And finally, landing a job at Twitter

A friendly reminder, you understand.

Moving.

It isn’t always this simple, of course, but this is usually adequate.

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

This was the most common regret of all. When people realise that their life is almost over and look back clearly on it, it is easy to see how many dreams have gone unfulfilled. Most people have had not honoured even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made. 

It is very important to try and honour at least some of your dreams along the way. From the moment that you lose your health, it is too late. Health brings a freedom very few realise, until they no longer have it. 

This is the first one, and the best one. I’ve thought a lot about this one recently. There is only one thing stopping us from living the life we want to lead–ourselves and the choices we make.

Don’t be a pussy who dies full of regrets. Live the life you want to lead. You’ll be dead soon. Get to it.

It’s horribly unfair that we usually cannot live near our friends. When we are children we are stripped from close relationships because our parents had to move, or because their parents had to move. And these decisions in turn hinge on mundane things like company x needing someone in Wichita, or, as it often turns out, not needing someone in Wichita anymore.

So, as if it were a minor thing, worlds are ripped from each other. Two friends that used to live near each other suddenly don’t, and in the past this basically meant that person would cease being your friend. Even today, with all the technology we have, there is no substitute for being able to see someone physically, on a regular basis, for nurturing a close relationship.

I’m reminded of this every once in a while, and it depresses me.

This is one of a few videos that Scott Adams recently talked about being designed to change mood. I think it worked on me.

To my writing classes I used later to open by saying that anybody who could talk could also write. Having cheered them up with this easy-to-grasp ladder, I then replaced it with a huge and loathsome snake: “How many people in this class, would you say, can talk? I mean really talk?” That had its duly woeful effect. I told them to read every composition aloud, preferably to a trusted friend. The rules are much the same: Avoid stock expressions (like the plague, as William Safire used to say) and repetitions. Don’t say that as a boy your grandmother used to read to you, unless at that stage of her life she really was a boy, in which case you have probably thrown away a better intro. If something is worth hearing or listening to, it’s very probably worth reading. So, this above all: Find your own voice.

Watching Christopher Hitchens die in print is very disturbing to me. I cannot believe he will not be able to create beautiful language forever.

The only thing that makes it tolerable is realizing that everyone else is dying too.

No words.