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# Is Be
- URL: https://www.3dproductivity.com/is-be/
- Published: 2024-06-25T15:50:46.000Z
- Updated: 2026-08-19T03:02:17.000Z
- Description: On an evening flight home from a deeply rewarding trip, I caught a confounding mix of exhaustion and pulsing energy. I started writing, and words coalesced into verse.
- Author: Ryan Pavel
- Tags: creativity, identity, attention, #Migrated-1767551753908, #wp, #wp-post, #Import 2026-01-04 18:35

On an evening flight home from a deeply rewarding trip, I caught a confounding mix of exhaustion and pulsing energy. I started writing, and words coalesced into verse:

*In times I cannot see the path, I find my way to peace* 
*By stepping through the woods without concern for every tree* 
*Some leaves clear and others blurred, some noticed, others not* 
*For every branch that I remember, hundreds more that I forgot*

*And then there’s times I lose myself in worry — troubled doubt* 
*Thinking less on what I have, more on what I’m without* 
*The berries glisten, flowers bloom - none of it holds attention* 
*I want more and more and more, more and more, and then some*

*It’s funny, no? How far we’ll go predicting every turn* 
*With furled brow, intensive gaze, determined to discern* 
*What may or may not lie ahead and what’s the consequence* 
*Of asking or not asking; it’s soothing in a sense*

*And in another way it is most terrifying of all* 
*To hurdle on, with head in song, heeding the ancient call* 
*To stop and breath and look and see* 
*The thing I truly have to do?* 
*Is Be.*

I am sprinting this summer. Every engagement with a student, a professor, a team member, a colleague adds to the swirl of ideas in my head. And sometimes, when I’m most drained, I find this strange impulse to create.

I hesitate to share the end result. The bar for good poetry is high, and I suspect I’ll never believe I’ve met it.

In a very real way, the end result is what this blog is meant to be about: the intersection of productivity and identity. I write about Todoist and Obsidian and [the Eisenhower Prioritization Matrix](https://www.3dproductivity.com/eisenhower-and-you/), yes, but hopefully without losing sight of the humanity of it all.

One last note. I create an Instagram Reel corresponding to every Tuesday blog post. If you want to hear the poem read aloud, [you can do so here.](https://www.instagram.com/reel/C8pObTsRtUd/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fweb%5Fcopy%5Flink&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==)