Why the T-Rex Emoji? 🦖
Ancient Rome is Where it All Began
The T-Rex is a fantastic symbol for the new name for my blog:
Strong Convictions, Loosely Held.
Why?
Because a T-rex has strong legs and tiny arms. A T-rex can be firm in his stance with those ginormous legs. But at the same time, he has the reminder from his flimsy little arms that he can’t hold on to anything too tight.
Strong convictions, loosely held.
He makes bold decisions, but he constantly questions his beliefs and updates his thinking.
You might be wondering, why is the picture of T-rex in Rome’s Colosseum?
Because that was metaphorically where my life’s journey really started.
Let’s hop back in time to early 2021.
I was the most confident I’d been in my life. I was out of high school taking a gap year and going all in on this hockey thing. I had a girlfriend at the time, I took more risks playing hockey, and felt more confident and comfortable with who I really was.
Until January 31st, 2021.
That’s when I tore my ACL and MCL in Dallas during a hockey tournament. The reason this stung so much was because almost exactly one year prior, I had another season-ending injury with my shoulder.
It would also be the end of my hockey career.
I had surgery on March 4th. I was on crutches for 42 days. It was hell. My wonderful mom had to help me get breakfast or pretty much any type of food. All I wanted to do was have my health back so I could walk, go outside, and squat heavy again.
It was in this time frame that I discovered a book called Obstacle is the Way by Ryan Holiday. I heard about it through the sports world, and the title just resonated with me.
I was in a super painful period of my life, not to mention that my girlfriend shocked me with a breakup (I was definitely too attached lol).
The main message of the book was this: everything in life has an opportunity in it. Especially obstacles.
Although I couldn't go outside or do much at all, how could I make the most of being bedridden?
I said, “let’s get back into reading and learn something.” I picked up this book, which had a similar message of using obstacles to our advantage. I started reading other books.
It also introduced me to Stoicism, a highly practical and life-changing philosophy based on these ideas of what we can control and can’t.
I then subscribed to free daily emails from Ryan Holiday, listened to Ryan’s podcast, and eventually discovered many other online educators.
This was my first experience with true online education. Free and low cost materials that have an immense impact on my life.
The Stoics, like Marcus Aurelius and Seneca, were from Ancient Rome. They wrote pieces of philosophy that stand the test of time.
They’re nearly 2,000 years old.
It’s amazing to think that the Colosseum was still in use when these works were written.
But diving into Stoicism completely changed my life trajectory. Because that book led to Ryan’s podcast, which led to me following other life-changing people and their content online.
I eventually found Peter Attia, Andrew Huberman, Tim Ferriss, and many more people who have completely changed my life. Just through the reach of the Internet.
The Actual Story 🦖
Here’s the thing though: that’s actually not the story behind the T-rex.
Last summer, I worked at a catering company for special events. Mostly weddings. We set up the event, serve the food, and take care of guests for their special nights.
But in the morning before the shift began, the manager would send out a text to the group of people working that night. She’d send basic details of where the wedding is, when we’re meeting, and who are our leaders were.
To confirm that we received the text, they asked us to reply with a “Yes” or thumbs up emoji. All of us did that, except one guy. He responded with a T-rex emoji:
I had to ask him why.
He told me that it was just because everyone else was doing the same thing, so he thought it’d be funny to respond with some dinosaur emoji.
But as I got to know this guy, I associated the T-rex with a way of living: never take anything too seriously, but have discipline. Make humor out of as many things as possible, but still take yourself seriously.
He was my coworker. American. Mid 30s. Working the same job I was as a wedding waiter and event caterer. He went to college, but his life clearly hadn’t amounted to much. Not being judgmental here, just something that I observed in my mind.
He was a hilarious guy. Made jokes out of everything, and definitely made me laugh and helped me to stop being so serious. I think at that time I knew that I didn’t want to be a doctor or maybe even be in college, but that’s a book for a different time.
He was funny. He had ambitions of doing stand–up comedy, which I totally encouraged him to do. Even if it was just for fun.
But I also learned why he didn’t drink alcohol. He used to be an alcoholic, or at least a bad drunk. He made a few bad professional decisions with alcohol, which I didn’t get the full details on.
That summer, I was having fun asking a lot of my coworkers a question: what’s one piece of advice you’d give to your 20 year old self?
He told me that you shouldn’t waste your money in your 20s on travel so that you have to spend your 30s working for it.
But now that I’ve traveled, I have a different perspective on this.
I think he was a bit blindsided. He blamed travel, when really it was probably alcohol and his reputation that got him nowhere. Travel probably grew him, but he wasn’t serious enough about having a solid reputation and having professional success.
He was a funny guy, but maybe he never took himself seriously enough.
So the T-rex emoji is a reminder of a few things:
Never be afraid to go against the grain.
Make as many jokes as you can and turn situations into something funny.
You have to take yourself seriously. Take your reputation seriously. The worst thing that could happen being drunk is significantly worse than the best thing that could happen when you’re sober. You could make an irreversible decision like my coworker did. This isn’t saying I’m not going to drink, but just drinking in moderation and being careful.
As the great billionaire Warren Buffet once said:
“It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently.”
Have a great Sunday,
- Baxter 🦖
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