How a Rubik’s Cube Helped Honor My Friend’s Memory

At some point, we’ve all picked up a Rubik’s cube, twisted it around, maybe solved a side, then given up. 

When I was younger, I believed the cube revealed a simple truth: you either had the kind of mind that could solve it, or you didn’t. If the solution didn’t come quickly, then clearly you weren’t “one of those people.” I might have carried that mindset forever, if not for what happened next.

One day, my friend Daniel came over to my house and pulled out a Rubik’s cube out of his backpack and started twisting it around like he knew what he was doing. It turned out, he did know what he was doing. He solved it in less than a minute.

Color me impressed.

He then said, “Hey, you want to see a neat trick?” Without hesitation, I said, “Sure, let’s see it”. He then took the solved cube, and with just a few moves turned the whole thing into a checkered pattern, then by reversing what he did, solved the cube again. He handed me the cube and asked if I wanted to try it.

Color me intrigued.

So, he patiently showed me how to do it myself. It really was simple and easy to do, and honestly, it felt pretty good to have a solved cube, turn it into a checker pattern, and then make it solved again.

However, his visit was short lived, the next day he told me that he wasn’t feeling well, so I encouraged him to head back home and get some rest. However, what we didn’t know is that he was in the beginning stages of leukemia.

Tragically, at only 25 years old, my friend passed away just weeks later.

A New Mindset

Years went by before I would ever touch a Rubik’s cube again. Then one day, I picked up Carol Dweck’s book on mindset and I started to learn about fixed mindsets and growth mindsets. Around the same time, I read Kevin Horsley’s Unlimited Memory, full of techniques on how to remember long sequences and how to improve your memory.

I then started to think, Why not apply these to the cube and finish what my friend had shown me all those years ago?

So I did.

I started carrying one everywhere—backpack, car, desk. Anytime I had a spare minute, I’d practice.

I began learning algorithms: specific sequences of moves that look complicated but follow predictable patterns.

For example: Up, Right, Up-inverted, Right-inverted, Up-inverted, Front-inverted, Up, Front.

That single algorithm enabled me to solve the second layer of the cube. (By the way, if you want to solve a Rubik’s cube, you have to solve it one layer at a time, not one side at a time)

So, step by step—one color, one layer, one algorithm at a time—I slowly built more confidence in my ability to solve it. Like Neo from the Matrix, I started to believe.

It wasn’t always smooth, sometimes I would do a wrong turn and would have to start from the beginning, but I stayed patient. Each solved piece felt like a win.

That fixed mindset cracked open. I wasn’t “bad at this.” I was learning.

When I finally solved the cube for the first time, it was proof. It was proof of what I had been reading was true. With the right mindset, you can rewrite your beliefs, and thus your abilities.  

Honoring A Friend

I wanted to honor Daniel by carrying forward what he sparked in me.

At the elementary school where I worked, kids noticed the cube on my desk.

“How do you do that?” they asked, eyes wide.

I always began with Daniel’s checkered trick—and their faces lit up just as mine had years earlier. From there, I showed them how to solve one color, then a layer, then an algorithm.

I told them the kids that “you don’t have to be good at the start. It’s not about talent—it’s about effort and a growth mindset.

Soon, cubes were everywhere. Kids traded tips, taught what they learned, raced to solve a side, and pushed each other to improve. By year’s end, several of them had learned to solve the cube from memory, and a few were able to do it in just a minute or two.

The Lesson

It wasn’t just about cubes. It was about belief.

For me, solving one rewrote limiting beliefs. For my students, it proved they could learn hard things. And for Daniel, it was my way of honoring his memory, passing on what he once passed to me.

The Rubik’s Cube became more than a puzzle. It became a reminder:

We all have the capacity to do hard things.

And sometimes, all it takes is one spark, one person sharing something with us, to unlock what we never thought was possible.