How to balance a life of artistic ambition with sanity and happiness

“Do not hold on to any one vision of what your life should look like.” – Rachel Friedman

In this episode of Deviate, Rolf and Rachel discuss perceptions of success (3:15); the upside of failure and non-linear paths to success (13:00); ordinariness and the influence of public validation (23:00); and the reconciling old and new goals and the art of quitting (36:00).

Rachel Friedman (@RachelFriedman) is a traveler, writer, and author of The Good Girl’s Guide to Getting Lost, which was chosen as a Target Breakout Book and selected by Goodreads’ readers as one of the best travel books of 2011. Her latest book, And Then We Grew Up is out now. For more about Rachel, check out https://www.rachel-friedman.com/.

Notable Links:

• At Eternity’s Gate (film)
• Vincent Van Gogh (artist)
• José Ortega y Gasset (philosopher)
• Malcolm Gladwell (author)
• The Road Not Taken, by Robert Frost (poem)
• Napoleon Dynamite (film)
• Black Mirror (television show)

This episode is also brought to you by AirTreks, an industry leader in multi-stop international travel. If you’ve ever planned a trip with multiple stops, you know that finding the right flights can be difficult. Between balancing travel logistics and cost, it often becomes impossible to build an itinerary that matches your travel goals.  AirTreks is a distributed travel company with employees working from all corners of the world to help with your flight planning, specializing in complex routes with up to 25 stops. The AirTreks website offers suggested pre-planned travel itineraries to help you get started, but can customize to fit your journey.

The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber.

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