In her seminal book, The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron sets forth a method for maintaining a dynamic creative practice. The cornerstone of her program is writing three longhand, stream of consciousness “morning pages” every morning. For the last two weeks, I have engaged in this practice while drinking my morning coffee. In all honesty, the practice has become the favorite part of my day. This morning, I was at Starbucks furiously scribbling in my journal, loving every minute of it. The sun was out and the crisp fall air provided the perfect backdrop for writing.

Unfortunately, this odd dude and his wife were sitting at the table across from me. The guy was continuously taking video of himself on his iPhone. I was trying not to listen, but he kept glaring at me and was pacing back and forth. I wrote several sentences in my journal about the weird feeling that was overcoming me. But, I just moved along in my morning pages writing about birds or unicorns or the tooth fairy. I was uncomfortable for some reason and I trust my intuition implicitly. However, I am learning to try to get outside my comfort zone when the Universe pushes me in that direction. Something was telling me to talk to this guy.

Finally, the man records himself saying something like “I’m giving away a million dollars…” So, I said to myself, “Self, either this guy is a fraud or he has to be generating more than a million dollars with his shtick.” Either way, I was intrigued. The introvert in me stuck my nose back in my journal, but I knew I would regret not being nosy. We finished our coffees at the same time. It was now or never.

I got up from my table, walked over and said, “I’m not really interested in your million dollar giveaway, but I am curious as to what you are doing.” We exchanged some small talk as we walked to our cars. He said, “hey, you should take a selfie with me, it will increase your followers.” Uh, ok, what followers? So, he takes my iPhone and cues up the camera. Then, he sprints across the parking lot, jumps into his car and speeds off. What the fuck? Just kidding. Turns out the guy is Grant Cardone (www.grantcardone.com), the “10X” internet sales guru. He was in town with is wife for the World Series. He snapped a picture of us. I’m not sure why the Universe put me in contact with this guy. But, I do know there are no coincidences. I have been thinking about sales and business strategy. So, I am sure it has meaning.

I am saying “yes” now when my inclination is to say “no.” I have enriched my life in many ways in the past 6 weeks by being intentional about getting outside my comfort zone. The point of my post is that you should Always Be Curious. You never know where it will take you. When I win the million dollars, I will send you an invitation to the celebration party.