Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Nick Halaris. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Nick , love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
My name is Nick Halaris and I am the author of the Profit+ Newsletter, the host of The Nick Halaris Show, and the founder and President of Metros Capital, a real estate investment company. My mission is to inspire a rebirth of civic virtue in the world and help people learn how the demands of citizenship can unlock a new meaning of success in life. I believe that business can and should be a force for good and am dedicated to pursuing a vision of success that prioritizes the well-being of the community over individual achievement.
With both the Profit+ Newsletter and The Nick Halaris Show I explore big ideas at the crossroads of entrepreneurship, finance, and politics and offer actionable insights on success, service, and fulfillment. My goal is to help people learn how becoming an impactful citizen can unlock a new meaning of success.
I believe firmly that all creative work, for it to really mean anything, must emerge out of an acceptance of a greater responsibility. In other words, you cannot just decide to be creative or will your way to a creative act. It sounds strange to say this but authentic creativity seems to manifest almost like a call from someplace beyond yourself.
For me, writing emerged in my life as a kind of compulsion. Something about our culture really bothered me, so much so that it produced a kind of moral discomfort. As I looked out on our world and the extent to which we worship at the altar of success and prioritize the individual over all else, I started to believe I had something important to say. I felt in my soul that I had a message that could serve as an antidote to a culture sick with a kind of narcissistic blindness. How can we all so blindly pursue our individual dreams and just forgot about all the people suffering and all those left behind?
My creative journey started rather slowly. I would write in fits and starts, taking small steps that felt, more or less, compelled. What’s so fascinating is that each time I said “yes,” rather than “no,” new creative energy emerged into my life. That’s why I believe the creative impulse comes from someplace beyond the self. Over a period of years, I produced hundreds of pages of work, all stored in neatly organized folders on my computer, benefiting precisely no one. Then, when the COVID crisis struck and I saw our world turn even further in on itself, I realized that not only did I have something to share but also that I better share it! I felt called to be a voice offering a different vision for what success looks like.
I’m several years into this journey now and couldn’t be more excited about my work. Instead of focusing only on the self, I want to challenge people to start thinking bigger and broader. For I have come to believe that it is only when you start living for others that you can find true success. My newsletter, Profit+, and my podcast, The Nick Halaris Show, are all about helping people learn how to unlock this new meaning of success by becoming more impactful citizens. The citizenship I’m talking about goes far beyond the idea of engaging in democratic processes, although that is certainly a big part. I have a vision for an expansive understanding of citizenship that covers all aspects of life and is fundamentally about how things like meaning and fulfillment can only come when you learn how to start living and working for something greater than yourself.
Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?
What I’m hoping to do with the Profit+ Newsletter and the Nick Halaris Show Podcast is:
• Help people understand the connection between service, success, and a fulfilling life.
• Show people how business can be a force for good.
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• Inspire a revitalization of the American civic spirit.
My work is ultimately a reaction against our cultural obsession with the self and a call to a different kind of life, one that prioritizes meaning over consumption and fulfillment over achievement. If the philosophers are right that we are political and social animals, then citizenship is our highest calling. And as modern citizens we have 4 duties:
1. We must become effective members of our society.
2. We must keep our financial houses in order.
3. We must dedicate ourselves to making authentic contributions to our communities.
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4. We must accept all of the responsibilities of democratic life.
My mission as a creator is to help as many people as possible understand what these duties are, learn how to use them to become impactful citizens and unlock a new meaning of success.
In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?
We are living in pretty incredible times when it comes to creativity. Technology and the Internet have driven down the costs of both production and distribution, even for the most complex artforms, and opened up a massive, global audience for artists. Never before has so much been possible for so many. But with the potential for good, there’s also the chance for the bad. For every great work you can find online, there is a bunch of garbage.
People interested in supporting the positive side of this explosion in creativity should be very thoughtful and intentional about the types of content they consume. Not only should they prioritize quality but also they should withdraw their support, whether express of complicit, from anything that is obviously bad or wrong. This is no easy task and requires a fair bit of self-awareness but overcoming the deliberately manipulative algorithms of attention capture is a big part of the mission here. Also, people should take every chance they can to support creatives who are putting out good work in the world. Many artists may look they are thriving based on their follower counts and subscribers but most are struggling and could use the financial support.
So, for the things you love, sign-up, subscribe, donate, join membership groups, pay for premium content, leave nice reviews, and spread the word!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.nickhalaris.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nickhalaris/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nhalaris/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nick-halaris-4a25b93/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/NickHalaris
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@nickhalaris4590
- Others: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-nick-halaris-show/id1685043900