This Book Will Change Your Life - Crazy for You by the Paul Theroux and the Steve Lafler.

That, and a rumination on stamina, which might also be a rumination on ambition, which most definitely also involves an embrace of equanimity.

“Stamina, at least at first, presumes ambition. If ambition is what makes us want to write at all, for example, stamina is what sustains that drive or desire over time in the face of the many things that can sometimes thwart ambition and sometimes utterly destroy it.” —“Stamina,” My Trade Is Mystery, Carl Phillips

I tend to get stuck on the idea of stamina, ambition too, though with the latter it’s about how to define ambition. I wish I didn’t think about it at all, that I was somehow above caring about being ambitious. It’s not even about being pure or something like that. It’s that ambition sounds exhausting to me. Which may be a middle-aged thing. I don’t want to be engaged with anything that drains energy unnecessarily. I’m not sure I have it to spare anymore. Still, I’m ambitious, or at least I want things as a worker, a human, and certainly as a writer, and to get those things requires me to keep pushing, because when I stop I won’t be in a position to even maybe get those things I want and no one will care.

I’ll add that for one to make ambition work for them you need to define what it means for you, and to map out how you may get there, because there is a lot of luck involved in anything involving ambition, and you can’t at least seek to make that luck happen if you don’t know what you want. I’ll also add that for me, since I can’t stop wanting things, and I’m certainly not going to stop writing, I’ve had to learn how to embrace equanimity, knowing I will likely fall short of my ambitions, that it’s cool, or has to be, and I can’t stop hustling and pushing then regardless.

This has mostly worked by the way, it does now anyway, because I try to remain as present as I can be in remembering that failure is likely, and that’s not reason enough not to do something. Or at least to try anyway.

I also don’t want to be ableist, we can’t all push even when we want to, and I want to acknowledge that, period, as my son might say.

That said, one element of what we’re discussing here is stamina, a refusal not to stop, not be thwarted, not allow all the ways we will fall short to prevent us from pursuing what we think we want.

Which is also to say, I’m glad I discovered the absolutely wonderful essay “Stamina” by Carl Phillips, because before I read it, I don’t think I thought of stamina in the fashion he describes and having this word in my head and as a lens into how I view my place in the world has allowed me to better understand, and hopefully articulate, how I think ambition survives at all—we keep pushing regardless of the results, we make peace with what may or may not be happening, and we get back to work.

Why am I sharing this today?

Because as I read the terrific new graphic novel Crazy for You by Paul Theroux and Steve Lafler, I kept thinking of Lafler’s incredible and decades long dedication to his craft, his nearly unreal production, and his ability to just keep going no matter what the fuck might be going on in his life and the world.

Full-disclosure, Lafler is a long-time friend and he’s family, and I’d be a fan regardless. His fascination with flawed men, smart, sexy women, Mexico, running, drugs, Jazz, New York City, and bugs—and these are only some of the countless themes he explores—all speak to me, as does his art and style, which is bold, expressive and fun, and now to see him collaborate with Theroux, a true legend, just moves me to no end.

It also inspires me.

Lafler is all about ambition, or what he may describe as being single-minded, and he’s also got the stamina thing that we all need, assuming we want things to happen or when we’re lucky, keep happening. I hope Crazy for You brings Lafler the more far-ranging attention and exposure I believe he deserves—though even that comment is loaded, who says any of us deserve anything?

We don’t.

Yet, I can still want it for Lafler in the same way I want it for so many somewhat obscure artists and writers I love.

And yes, for myself as well, because yes, I’m ultimately ambitious as hell, and want whatever I can get, and that has nothing to do with whether I deserve it, I don’t, put in the time, so what, or just want it, and badly at that, okay, that’s fine.

So, having covered that, please go get a copy of Crazy for You for yourself, as it will no doubt change your life as it has mine, and even if only briefly at that, and if you want to talk ambition, stamina, or anything writing life, please give me a shout. I’m here.