Insights
#97 Not loneliness. Solitude.
All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone Blaise Pascal, https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/19682-all-of-humanity-s-problems-stem-from-man-s-inability-to-sit We often equate sitting quietly in a room alone with loneliness: a word with a negative emotional charge. But sitting quietly in a room can also bring solitude: the simple state of being by yourself, without any
#96 Massive addiction, minimal value
Nobody chooses to get addicted to social media. We chose to get something of value: stay connected with friends. Stay up-to-date. Discover interesting voices. Then we get addicted through features that bring little value: likes, notification signs, flashy videos hijacking our brains. That’s where the addiction creeps up to you. If the interests of social
#95 A satisfying and reverent life
You see how few things you have to do to live a satisfying and reverent life? Marcus Aurelius, Meditations But what are those few things that lead to a satisfying life? Do we decide ourselves, or let others – or society – decide for us? Envision, want, choose.
#94 Restoring Faith in the Malleable Mind
It only takes one new habit to restore faith in the malleable mind. “I’ve never been good at languages. Until I learned my first foreign language. If I can do that… what else is possible?” “I’ve never been good at public speaking. Until I gave my first speech, and then my second, and then my
#93 Second-Hand Memories and Trust Issues
Memory stores the lessons we extract from learn life experience. And to do so, it relies, modifies, adds, subtracts, highlights, and hides. What about second-hand memories? Accounts of past events we didn’t experience ourselves, wars, volcano eruptions, scientific discoveries,… For knowledge to accumulate, to stand on the shoulders of giants, we need to transmit such
#92 The true purpose of memory
Memory isn’t an objective account of the past – and that’s not its purpose either. Memory stores the lessons we extract from life experience. And to do so, it modifies, adds, subtracts, highlights, and hides. Hot soup burns my tongue – next time, I’ll remember the pain, but not if it was tomato soup or
#91 Now is not the time to negotiate
I commit to taking a cold shower. To publish a daily blog post. To do a yoga class, because these actions contribute to my vision for who I want to be. I commit, despite the knowledge that when the time has come, right before I turn the shower tap to cold, I won’t want to
#90 Envision, want, choose
First I envision a future me. Who do I want to be? Then every single day, every single moment, I choose to take actions that turn me into that person I want to be. If I don’t consciously choose my actions in the present moment that contribute to my vision, and I’m led by old
#89 Don’t get it backwards
I’m not writing because I can’t write?I’m not playing the guitar because I’m bad at music?I’m not learning a language because I’m bad at learning languages? That’s the world on its head. The truth is: you can’t write because you’re not writing.You can’t play the guitar because you’re not playing the guitar.You can’t speak the
#88 I write every day to understand what I want to say
I basically write the same song over and over, but they’re just verses of this one really long one. I’m trying to figure it out. The Tallest Man on Earth I write every day so I start to understand what I really want to say. I don’t usually get it right on the first try;
#87 AI Raises the Bar
What do we do when AI can cobble together in seconds essays that take us hours (or days) to write – not even counting years of practice? Maybe it just raises the bar for us – requiring is to make new work that continues to stand out from AI-generated content. As things stand, that’s still
#86 Practice daily, measure progress on average
The article I publish today may be worse than one I wrote 2 months ago. I may struggle today with a guitar piece I played effortlessly last week. And when I meditate today, my mind may be all over the place, even though last week it was calm as water. On any given day, I