I'm nearing the end of the year and with it, I'm approaching my birthday, which all my life has been both a blessing and a curse.

An early January birthday takes place right after the holidays and celebrating it feels akin to going to dinner with someone who has just begun a serious and terrible low-carb diet.

There's nothing wrong with dieting. Dieting is intrinsically good. It keeps you trim. It keeps you from suffering a massive heart attack. It keeps you from developing sores on your feet from consuming too much sugar.

But, aren't strict dieters the worst people in the world to have dinner with?

Nobody likes to drink a hefty glass of red wine across from someone sipping a diet Dr. Pepper. Nor does anyone enjoy devouring a brick of a ribeye accompanied by a fat buttery baked potato while their date is forking away at some flimsy pitiful salad topped with whatever broiled whitefish is on the menu. 

I'm a fairly clean eater. But, when I'm going to dinner with someone, I'm going to goddamn dinner. If I know it's going to be a fairly unhealthy dinner, I'm getting a few more extra miles in on the treadmill prior to the meal and I'm probably eating light throughout the day as not to commit too many dietary travesties.  

Because of this preparedness, I like to think of myself as a very good dinner date. I very rarely turn down a glass of red wine nor a good steak. Though, I will, from time to time, turn down something exceptionally bready or deep-fried. I like bread and deep-fried delicacies. But, I also feel like there are more delicious places to spend the calories. 

Anyway, what I hate about the New Year is that everybody and their brother is saying no to the red wine and the ribeye steak and even the bananas foster.

(Which, speaking of Banana's Foster, if you ever find yourself hungry and in Nashville, visit a place called Sperry's and at the end of your meal, ask for theirs... they make a real show of it, preparing it on the spot, right in front of you with fire and a very hot pan... the only stunt that would make it better is if it also came with a handjob but that's getting into murky territory, isn't it?)

At this point, I imagine you think that I'm rambling. I am. But, I promise that I'm rambling with a purpose.

The problem with New Year's resolutions and dieting is that they're approaching change (like weight loss) the wrong way. 

It's like the guy at the gym who busts his fucking ass, as if he's training for a goddamn Iron Man but only does this ass-busting for a few days at a time before going back to his old ways or not going to the gym at all. 

Why is it that we humans have this strange propensity to exist in a world of extremes? It's always all or nothing all of the time. 

There's this habit mage online that teaches stuff about habits.

His name is James Clear. A lot of people think he's the second coming of Jesus Christ. I, personally, think he repeats himself a lot. But, all in all, he's a reasonably smart guy.

He once wrote something about developing the habit of flossing his teeth. He said he would just commit to himself to flossing one single tooth each night and when he'd do this single-tooth flossing, he would feel stupid for flossing just one tooth and he'd instead floss all of his teeth. 

While I don't know how much I believe in habits, I certainly believe in simplification. 

A good way to simplify dieting is: eat mostly unprocessed foods that your grandparents would recognize (and try not to eat too much of it). 

A good way to simplify exercising is: choose something, anything, that you can do a little each day (or most days) for the rest of your life. 

I find this metaphor also applies to work and eventually reaching a place that could be described as great and, perhaps, even prolific. 

A good way to simplify greatness is: being decent over and over again. 

The same can be said about being profound.

A good way to simplify being profound is: being prolific.

Being profound is actually wildly boring to watch.

You show up each day, you get some work done. You rinse and repeat the next day.

Eventually, you become a mother fucker like Voltaire who dies at 83-years-old with enough material to fill 2,200 books. 

But, I digress. 

By Cole Schafer.

This week on Twitter...

Genius Lyrics...

"Schafer, perhaps under the influence of a psychoactive drug at the time of this Tweet's writing, wonders why the age-old exclamation "holy smokes" hasn't been repurposed as the brand name of a marijuana company..."

Here's a sneak peek at this week's edition of Chasing Hemingway.

Last week, I picked up a basketball.

It was the first time in two, maybe three years.

(For those of you who haven't been reading me for long, in a past life, my craft wasn't writing but basketball...)

Back when I was playing pick-up ball regularly, I was good. Damn good. 

Very few players could outjump me and I reminded them of that fact, time and time again, by aggressively snatching rebounds out of the air with a thunderous "pop" that would echo through the gym –– my greedy palms and outstretched fingertips acting as a pair of drums against the ball's leather surface.

My leaping ability, my 200 lb frame and a cat-quick first step made me a bitch to guard when I'd make a tear for the rim...

How I'm using Twitter to come up with some of the more interesting headlines I've ever written.

Writing has historically been this lonely process where the writer holes himself up in a quiet, isolated place and doesn’t come out until he has something he feels is readable.

Two of the literary world’s most reclusive writers, Charles Bukowski and J.D. Salinger, both wrote this way.

There are some exceptions to this rule.

Chuck Palahnuik, a hugely collaborative writer, will come pretty damn close to workshopping every page of his book, sharing much of his material with friends at local pubs, to gauge their reactions.

Lately, I’ve been stealing pages out of Palahnuik’s book, taking a more hybrid approach to my writing.

I’ll share the vultures that have been circling my mind over on Twitter and I’ll then dog-ear the material that makes a ruckus.

Below, you will find some of my most popular tweets.

It doesn’t take a hugely creative person to gather that they could also double as great headlines (and be fleshed out into much larger articles like the one I’m writing now).

*Cole is tweeting now*

“Great men are rarely good men. Be an exception.”

18 likes.

“Pay close attention to the way someone talks to you about others because it's how they're talking about you to others.”

152 likes.

“There's really no reason why a Zoom meeting should ever run longer than 30-minutes.”

96 likes.

“You get what you want when you realize you don’t need it.”

23 likes.

“Changing your mind isn’t an act of hypocrisy but self-development.”

18 likes.

“Never apologize for your feelings. Apologize for being an asshole because of your feelings.”

1,000 likes.

We’re quick to flock to Twitter for its audience-building capabilities. But, I’m beginning to wonder if the value isn’t in the real-time, candid feedback that it provides.

But, I digress.

National Geographic calls this ancient Carthaginian warrior the most creative general of all time. 

Hannibal Barca was a legendary figure in the Punic Wars, which were fought between Carthage and Rome.

His army consisted of somewhere between 40,000 - 60,000 troops and employed countless African elephants.

Hannibal is considered by many –– including the likes of National Geographic –– to be one of the most creative generals to ever live.

After this story that reads stranger than fiction, you’ll understand why.

During the Second Punic War, Hannibal’s scouts misread the terrain and navigated his troops into a marsh with the sea at their backs.

The Roman army led by Fabius Maximus, Hannibals arch-nemesis, had the Carthaginians cornered.

Or, so they thought...

Come nightfall, Hannibal had branches tied to the horns of the 2,000 oxen that accompanied his army.

He then ordered his troops to set fire to the branches and send them in a line up the mountain beside them.

The Roman army looked on in horror as the fiery line moved up the mountain and eventually burst into a fury of flame and demonic cries, setting much of the mountainside on fire.

The Romans retreated with certainty that Hannibal and the Carthaginians had summoned demons.

In reality, as the fire burned down the horns and eventually the backs of the Oxen, it sent them into a total panic, causing them to break their line, cry out and run wild across the face of the mountain.

In the midst of the chaos, Hannibal and his army made their escape.

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