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    #173 Are errors truly errors?

    I can believe I’ve published the perfect insight – until I narrate the podcast version a couple of weeks later and suddenly notice subtle typos and, sometimes, logical flaws. The typos and flaws were always there – but did I make a mistake earlier? 

    I can believe I’ve nailed this yoga pose – until, during one session, I suddenly sense some tension in my neck I had never noticed before. The tension was always there – did I make a mistake earlier? 

    I can believe I’ve cooked the perfect dish – until one day, I notice that the sauce tastes even better with a little less salt. But, even before I noticed it, the improvement was always there – did I make a mistake earlier?

    Maybe learning is not about errors but about gaining ever more subtle awareness.

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    #41 Unaligned agendas

    Benefit and harm all depend on your perspective. The futurist John Smart suggests looking at phenomena, trends, and events through four different lenses (the “Foresight Tetrad“):

    • Personal
    • Organizational (=collective)
    • Global
    • Universal

    Every level has its own agenda, but their interests are rarely fully aligned.

    For example: for evolution and natural selection to work, a life form must have a reasonably short lifespan, reproduce quickly, and most importantly, not clone their DNA perfectly. Because small genetic reproduction errors help a species evolve and become better adapted to our environment.

    Sn an organizational/collective level (taking all of humanity together) those genetic errors are a good thing. In fact, without them, human beings in our current brain, with our current intelligence, wouldn’t even exist. Not at a species level, and not at an individual level.

    But to stumble upon a couple of beneficial “genetic errors”, evolution also needs tons of harmful genetic errors.

    That means that every newborn runs the risk of genetic errors that can cause medical conditions, pain, and suffering – on an individual level.

    We suffer individually to evolve collectively.

    Another example: in our quest to improve the condition of humanity as a whole (at the organizational/collective level), we’re harming other species and change the climate (at a global level).

    Ignoring the principles the universe and the earth as an ecosystem might well lead to collapse of that ecosystem – and result in the collapse of humanity.

    The universe has an agenda.
    Natural selection has an agenda.
    The global earth has an agenda.
    Humanity as a whole has an agenda.
    Individuals have an agenda.

    We can’t afford to ignore any.

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    #129 When the going gets tough

    When I’m inspired, I write.

    When I’m over the moon, I write.

    When I’m frustrated, I write.

    When I’m sad, I write.

    When I’m angry, I write.

    When I’m so overwhelmed I don’t want to do anything at all, I write.

    Because when the tides of life get rough, a consistent practice is your life raft.


    Writing, running, yoga, music, walking, gardening, knitting, dancing, singing, surfing…

    You not only build trust in such habits and practices to achieve lofty goals but also – even more so – to fall back on when the going gets tough, and you need a beacon of stability to keep you afloat.

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    #71 Muffled feet

    The ankle and foot complex contains 26 bones, 33 joints and over 100 muscles, tendons and ligaments.

    Considering both feet, that makes a total of 52 bones, making up about a quarter of all bones found in the mature adult body.

    https://3d4medical.com/blog/facts-about-feet

    There are more nerve endings per square centimetre in the foot than any other part of the body.

    https://www.simardfootclinic.com/feet-facts

    A wealth of sensory information – suppressed by the padding in our shoes, orthotics – until we don’t sense anything anymore.

    It’s like wearing safety ear muffs all day.

    What was walking on this earth like, before we learned not to listen?

    Muffled feet.

  • #349 Why you shouldn’t strive for the perfect day

    Habit-building isn’t about striving for “the perfect day.”

    It’s about making sure that even on the imperfect day when nothing goes your way, you still do enough things that fulfill you.

    It’s about making the hard things easier.

    And it’s about stacking the deck in your favor and making it inevitable to do things that align with who you want to be.

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