0. Format

16 November 2021 10:50

Have a document with random thoughts and ideas that I can browse through and connect my thinking. The default place for brief notes about topics I am interested in.

1. Law of Requisite Complexity

17 November 2021 07:54

Law of Requisite Complexity: in order to be efficaciously adaptive, the internal complexity of a system must match the external complexity it confronts.

A continuous coevolutionary process that reconciles top-down ‘rational designs’ and bottom-up ‘emergent processes’.

Ashby’s Law is generally treated as a statement about the internal variety a control system needs to effectively control an external system, or to navigate an environment. The basic idea is the control system has to have at least as much variety as the system it controls — in other words, it is a statement about the sufficiency of a system in dealing with another system.What actually ends up happening is that the human cognitive system searches for a source of variety that is a good fit for its own variety, and in doing so attention is shifted away from the task and engaged in another (or, perhaps, sleep). In short, the cognitive system is seeking Good Varietal Fit, and the consequence is that if a task is not a good fit for not possessing enough variety, the cognitive system will engage elsewhere.

This shift can induce a kind of figure-ground reversal in thinking, which I love. In this case, it is the task that needs to meet requisite variety in order to maintain continuous engagement with the controller. This insight extends well beyond driving, and into any domain in which the continuous engagement of a cognitive agent is desired or needed. Education, for instance, often suffers from insufficient variety for some, causing them to disengage entirely. Varietal Fit can extend Ashby’s Law of Requisite Variety to capture the issues, characteristics, and dynamics of cognitive coupling in the real-world. (Joe Norman)

Which is faster, a maserati or a goat? Depends on the terrain. (Joe Norman)

2. You can’t get what you want by forcing it

17 November 2021 08:25

The shift we need is from build to grow, from command and control to nurture and select, from directly forcing the system to indirectly enabling it. (Joe Norman, The Big Blurry Picture)

In the face of complexity power can disrupt much more than it can control. When faced with overwhelming complexity, Variety/Options is always the answer. Focus on the fuel, not the spark. Simplicity and Complexity are not at odds. They need one another. (Joe Norman)

In creative work, there is a big difference between having a regular deadline to produce something vs a specific thing. Shipping/publishing regularly keeps you honest. Pre-determining direction is harmful: it sets constraints right at the moment when you know the least. (Jason Crawford)

3. The Whole is Greater & Different than the Sum of its Parts

18 November 2021 15:20

Emergence occurs when an entity is observed to have properties its parts do not have on their own. The emergent is unlike its components insofar as these are incommensurable, and it cannot be reduced to their sum or their difference. The ability to reduce everything to simple fundamental laws does not imply the ability to start from those laws and reconstruct the universe. At each level of complexity entirely new properties appear. Psychology is not applied biology, nor is biology applied chemistry. We can now see that the whole becomes not merely more, but very different from the sum of its parts. (Wikipedia)

4. In the Service of others

18 November 2021 16:04

Service Dominant Logic: All exchanges can be viewed in terms of service-for-service exchange. Focus on service (singular) steers attention to the process, patterns, and benefits of exchange, rather than the units of output that are exchanged. Value is always co-created through collaboration by the exchange. Money represents rights to future service. (Wikipedia)

Everybody can be great...because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.

(Martin Luther King Jr.)

I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service was joy.

(Tagore)

The best antidote I know for worry is work. The best cure for weariness is the challenge of helping someone who is even more tired. One of the great ironies of life is this: He or she who serves almost always benefits more than he or she who is served.

(Gordon B. Hinckley)

The first question which the priest and the Levite asked was: 'If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?' But...the good Samaritan reversed the question: 'If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?

(Martin Luther King Jr.)

In the end, the number of prayers we say may contribute to our happiness, but the number of prayers we answer may be of even greater importance.

(Dieter F. Uchtdorf)

The soldier is the Army. No army is better than its soldiers. The Soldier is also a citizen. In fact, the highest obligation and privilege of citizenship is that of bearing arms for one’s country

(George S. Patton Jr.)

I don't know what your destiny will be, but one thing I know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought and found how to serve.

(Albert Schweitzer)

Life is for service.

(Fred Rogers)

I cannot do all the good that the world needs. But the world needs all the good that I can do.

(Jana Stanfield)

Though my work may be menial, though my contribution may be small, I can perform it with dignity and offer it with unselfishness. My talents may not be great, but I can use them to bless the lives of others... The goodness of the world in which we live is the accumulated goodness of many small and seemingly inconsequential acts.

(Gordon B. Hinckley)

When you are able to shift your inner awareness to how you can serve others, and when you make this the central focus of your life, you will then be in a position to know true miracles in your progress toward prosperity.

(Wayne W. Dyer)

If you can't do great things, Mother Teresa used to say, do little things with great love. If you can't do them with great love, do them with a little love. If you can't do them with a little love, do them anyway.

Love grows when people serve.

(John Ortberg)

Service is a smile. It is an acknowledging wave, a reaching handshake, a friendly wink, and a warm hug. It's these simple acts that matter most, because the greatest service to a human soul has always been the kindness of recognition.

(Richelle E. Goodrich)

Lord Ram gave Hanuman a quizzical look and said, "What are you, a monkey or a man?" Hanuman bowed his head reverently, folded his hands and said, "When I do not know who I am, I serve You and when I do know who I am, You and I are One.

Tulsidas, Ramcharitmanas ( Indrajal Comics No. 209 )

If you were born with the ability to change someone’s perspective or emotions, never waste that gift. It is one of the most powerful gifts God can give—the ability to influence.

(Shannon L. Alder)

Service which is rendered without joy helps neither the servant nor the served. But all other pleasures and possessions pale into nothingness before service which is rendered in a spirit of joy.

(Mahatma Gandhi)

The greatest joys in life are found not only in what we do and feel, but also in our quiet hopes and labors for others.

(Bryant McGill)

Helping, fixing, and serving represent three different ways of seeing life. When you help, you see life as weak. when you fix, you see life as broken. When you serve, you see life as whole. Fixing and helping may be the work of the ego, and service the work of the soul.

(Rachel Naomi Remen)

The two obvious secrets of every service business

every one…

1. Take responsibility

2. Pay attention to detail

The thing that’s so surprising is how little attention is paid to these two, how often we run into people (business to business or b2c) who are totally clueless about them.

You’d be stunned to see a hotel clerk stealing money from the till or a bartender smashing bottles or a management consultant drawing on the client’s wall with a magic marker. But every single day, I encounter "that’s not my job" or "our internet service is outsourced, it’s their fault." More subtle but more important are all the little details left untended.

All the magazine ads in the world can’t undo one lousy desk clerk.

All businesses are service businesses and experience is the product… (Seth Godin)

5. The Vast and Endless Sea

19 November 2021 08:41

“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.” (Antoine de Saint-Exupéry)

"Every human being is a puzzle of need. You must learn to intuit what is missing, become the missing piece, and they will give you anything." (Red Sparrow)

6. Think in Inequalities

19 November 2021 11:55

The Russian school of probability [P.L. Chebyshev, A.A. Markov, A.M. Lyapunov, S.N. Bernshtein (ie. Bernstein), E.E. Slutskii, N.V. Smirnov, L.N. Bol'shev, V.I. Romanovskii, A.N. Kolmogorov,Yu.V. Linnik, and the new generation: V Petrov, S.V. Nagaev, A.V. Nagaev, A. Shyrayev, etc.] thought in inequalities, not equalities. They used bounds, not estimates.

A world apart from the new generation of users who think in terms of precise probability. It accommodates skepticism, one-sided thinking: A is >x, A O(x) [Big-O: "of order" x], rather than A=x.

Working on integrating the rigor in risk bearing. We always know one-side, not the other.

(Nassim Taleb)

I think the truth lies in bounds. Is God real? Any answer is an estimate or guess. Is the idea of God useful? Now we're talking bounds. So I believe God exists.

7. The Non-survival of the Not-fit-enoughs

19 November 2021 12:18

Not everything that happens happen for a reason, but everything that survives survive for a reason (Nassim Taleb)

Evolution properly understood is not the survival of the fittest, but the non-survival of the not-fit-enoughs. (Joe Norman)

8. Anti-optimization

19 November 2021 12:28

Evolution is anti-optimization first and foremost. It is about finding failure boundaries and failure boundaries are dynamic and emergent. What is the least favorable, maximum displacement that will not cross the threshold? The stoics applied this philosophy to life.

A Stoic is someone who transforms fear into prudence, pain into transformation, mistakes into initiation, and desire into undertaking. (Nassim Taleb) One finds limits by pushing them. (Herbert A. Simon)

9. F(x) vs x

19 November 2021 13:08

Some people talk about f(x) thinking they are talking about x. This is the problem of the conflation of event and exposure. One can become antifragile to x without understanding x, through convexity of f(x).

The answer to the question “what do you do in a world you don’t understand?” is, simply, work on the undesirable states of f(x). It is often easier to modify f(x) than get better knowledge of x. (In other words, the robustification rather than forecasting Black Swans).

The main thread is that while there is inordinate uncertainty about what is going on, there is great certainty about what one should do about it.

(Nassim Taleb)

10. Imagination vs Will

21 November 2021 10:39

When the imagination and will power are in conflict, are antagonistic, it is always the imagination which wins, without any exception. (Emile Coue)

11. Paleolithic Emotions, Medieval Institutions, and Godlike Technology

23 November 2021 11:24

The real problem of humanity is the following: We have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions and godlike technology. And it is terrifically dangerous, and it is now approaching a point of crisis overall. (Edward O. Wilson)

12. There is no Truth beyond Magic

23 November 2021 19:48

"I must know the truth, the truth beyond magic."

"There is no truth beyond magic," said the king.

The prince was full of sadness. He said, "I will kill myself."

The king by magic caused death to appear. Death stood in the door and beckoned to the prince. The prince shuddered. He remembered the beautiful but unreal islands and the unreal but beautiful princesses.

"Very well," he said, "I can bear it."

"You see, my son," said the king, "you, too, now begin to be a magician." (John Fowles)

13. Our Models of Reality

23 November 2021 20:27

We as human beings do not operate directly on the world. Each of us creates a representation of the world in which we live — that is, we create a map or model which we use to generate our behavior. Our representation of the world determines to a large degree what our experience of the world will be, how we will perceive the world, what choices we will see available to us as we live in the world.

Our experience has been that, when people come to us in therapy, they typically come with pain, feeling themselves para-lyzed, experiencing no choices or freedom of action in their lives.

What we have found is not that the world is too limited or that there are no choices, but that these people block themselves from seeing those options and possibilities that are open to them since they are not available in their models of their world.

In coming to understand how it is that some people continue to cause themselves pain and anguish, it has been important for us to realize that they are not bad, crazy, or sick. They are, in fact, making the best choices from those of which they are aware, that is, the best choices available in their own particular model. In other words, human beings' behavior, no matter how bizarre it may first appear to be, makes sense when it is seen in the context of the choices generated by their model. The difficulty is not that they are making the wrong choice, but that they do not have enough choices — they don't have a richly focused image of the world. The most pervasive paradox of the human condition which we see is that the processes which allow us to survive, grow, change, and experience joy are the same processes which allow us to maintain an impoverished model of the world — our ability to manipulate symbols, that is, to create models. So the processes which allow us to accomplish the most extraordinary and unique human activities are the same processes which block our further growth if we commit the error of mistaking the model for reality. (John Grinder, Richard Bandler)

14. Mistaking the Model for Reality

23 November 2021 20:40

Through Generalization, Deletion, and Distortion a person forms a model of reality. It is when they think that the model is reality that they become bound by the model they have created. They will then use the same tools that helped build the model to protect it.

Yet, while the techniques of these wizards are different, they share one thing: They introduce changes in their clients' models which allow their clients more options in their behavior. (John Grinder, Richard Bandler)

15. Don't cheat yourself out of the lessons of pain

24 November 2021 07:18

Pain (any pain--emotional, physical, mental) has a message. The information it has about our life can be remarkably specific, but it usually falls into one of two categories: "We would be more alive if we did more of this," and, "Life would be more lovely if we did less of that." Once we get the pain's message, and follow its advice, the pain goes away. (Peter McWilliams)

16. Therapy Metamodel

24 November 2021 19:52

This set, the set of sentences which are well formed in therapy and acceptable to us as therapists, are sentences which:

(1) Are well formed in English, and (2) Contain no transformational deletions or unexplored deletions in the portion of the model in which the client experiences no choice.

(3) Contain no nominalizations (process—»-event).

(4) Contain no words or phrases lacking referential indices.

(5) Contain no verbs incompletely specified.

(6) Contain no unexplored presuppositions in the portion of the model in which the client experiences no choice.

(7) Contain no sentences which violate the semantic condi-tions of well-formedness.

By applying these well-formedness conditions to the client's Sur-face Structures, the therapist has an explicit strategy for inducing change in the client's model. (John Grinder, Richard Bandler)

Deletions

In a step-by-step format, the procedure can be outlined as follows:

Step 1: Listen to the Surface Structure the client presents;

Step 2: Identify the verbs in that Surface Structure;

Step 3: Determine whether the verbs can occur in a sentence which is fuller — that is, has more arguments or noun phrases in it than the original.

If the second sentence has more argument nouns than the original Surface Structure presented by the client, the original Surface Structure is incomplete — a portion of the Deep structure has been deleted.

One of the ways in which Deep Structure process words may occur in Surface Structure is in the form of an adjective which modifies a noun.

Class I: Real Compared to What?

In coping with this class of deletions, the therapist will be able to recover the deleted material using two simple questions:

For comparatives:

The comparative adjective, plus compared to what? e.g.,

more aggressive compared to what? or, funnier than what?

For superlatives:

The superlative, plus with respect to what? e.g., the best

answer with respect to what? the most difficult with

respect to what?

In a step-by-step format, the procedure is:

Step 1: Listen to the client, examining the client's Surface Structure for the grammatical markers of the comparative and superlative construction; i.e., Adjective plus er, more/less plus Adjective, Adjective plus est, most/least plus Adjective.

Step 2: In the case of comparatives occurring in the client's Surface Structuring, determine whether both terms that are being compared are present; in the case of superlatives, determine whether the reference set is present.

Step 3: For each deleted portion, recover the missing material by using the questions suggested above.

Class II: Clearly and Obviously

The second class of special deletions can be identified by ly adverbs occurring in the Surface Structures the client presents. For example, the client says:

(77) Obviously, my parents dislike me.

or

(78) My parents obviously dislike me.

Notice that these Surface Structures can be paraphrased by the sentence

(79) It is obvious that my parents dislike me.

Once this form is available, the therapist can more easily identify what portion of the Deep Structure has been deleted. Specifically, in the example, the therapist asks

(80) To whom is it obvious?

Surface Structure adverbs which end in ly are often the result of deletions of the arguments of a Deep Structure process word or verb. The paraphrase test can be used by the therapist to develop his intuitions in recognizing these adverbs. The test we offer is that, when you encounter an adverb ending with ly, attempt to paraphrase the sentence in which it appears by:

(a) Deleting the ly from the Surface Structure adverb and placing it in the front of the new Surface Structure you are creating.

(b) Add the phrase “it is” in front of the former adverb.

(c) Ask yourself whether this new Surface Structure means the same thing as the client's original Surface Structure.

If the new sentence is synonymous with the client's original, then the adverb is derived from a Deep Structure verb and deletion is involved. Now, by applying the principles used in recovering

In a step-by-step procedure, therapists can handle this particular class of deletion by:

Step 1: Listen to the client's Surface Structure for ly adverbs.

Step 2: Apply the paraphrase test to each ly adverb.

Step 3: If the paraphrase test works, examine the new Surface Structure.

Step 4: Apply the normal methods for recovering the deleted material.

Class I I I : Modal Operators

These Surface Structures make the claim that something must occur — they immediately suggest to us the question, "Or what?" In other words, for us, as therapists, to come to understand the client's model clearly, we must know the consequences to the client of failing to do what the client's Surface Structure claims is necessary. These Surface Structures can be identified by the presence of what logicians call modal operators of necessity. There is a second set of important cue words, what logicians have identified as modal operators of possibility. The value of identifying and recovering deletions of this scope can hardly be overestimated, as they directly involve portions of the client's model wherein he experiences limited options or choices. In a step-by-step outline:

Step 1: Listen to the client; examine the client's Surface Structure for the presence of the cue words and phrases identified in this section.

Step 2: (a) If modal operators of necessity are present, use a question form asking for the deleted consequence or outcome of failing to do what the client's Surface Structure claims is necessary, and (b) if the modal operators of possibility are present, use a question form asking for the deleted material which makes impossible what the client's Surface Structure claims is impossible.

DISTORTION - NOMINALIZATIONS

The linguistic process of nominalization is one way the general modeling process of Distortion occurs in natural language systems. The purpose of recognizing nominalizations is to assist the client in re-connecting his linguistic model with the ongoing dynamic processes of life. True nouns will not fit into the blank in the phrase an ongoing , in a well-formed way. For example, the true nouns chair, kite, lamp, fern, etc., do not fit in a well-formed way — *an ongoing chair, *an ongoing kite, etc. However, nouns such as decision, marriage, failure, derived from Deep Structure verbs, do fit — an ongoing decision, an ongoing marriage, etc. Thus, therapists may train their intuitions using this simple test. In a step-bystep format, the therapist may recognize nominalizations by:

Step 1: Listen to the Surface Structure presented by the client.

Step 2: For each of the elements of the Surface Structure which is not a process word or verb, ask yourself whether it describes some event which is actually a process in the world, or ask yourself whether there is some verb which sounds/looks like it and is close to it in meaning.

Step 3: Test to see whether the event word fits into the blank in the syntactic frame, an ongoing ____. For each non-verb occurring in the client's Surface Structure which either describes an event which you can associate with a process or for which you can find a verb which is close in sound/appearance and meaning, a nominalization has occurred.

Since in Meta-model training seminars we have found nominalizations to be the most difficult phenomena for people to learn to recognize, we have devised the following exercise. Form a visual image from the following sentences. In each case, see if you can imagine placing each of the non-process or non-verb words in a wheelbarrow.

/ want to make a chair.

/ want to make a decision.

Notice that all the non-verb words in the first sentence (I, chair) can be placed in your mental wheelbarrow. This is not the case with the second sentence (I, decision). I can be placed in a wheelbarrow but a decision cannot. You may check the accuracy of your visual test by now applying the purely linguistic test, an ongoing in front of the nominalization. The same word

which fits into the linguistic frame —an ongoing — will not fit into your mental wheelbarrow.

17. Bed of Procrustes

26 November 2021 17:41

A host who adjusted his guests to their bed. Procrustes, whose name means "he who stretches", was arguably the most interesting of Theseus's challenges on the way to becoming a hero. He kept a house by the side of the road where he offered hospitality to passing strangers, who were invited in for a pleasant meal and a night's rest in his very special bed. Procrustes described it as having the unique property that its length exactly matched whomsoever lay down upon it. What Procrustes didn't volunteer was the method by which this "one-size-fits-all" was achieved, namely as soon as the guest lay down Procrustes went to work upon him, stretching him on the rack if he was too short for the bed and chopping off his legs if he was too long. Theseus turned the tables on Procrustes, fatally adjusting him to fit his own bed.

The “bed of Procrustes,” or “Procrustean bed,” has become proverbial for arbitrarily—and perhaps ruthlessly—forcing someone or something to fit into an unnatural scheme or pattern.

We must know something about the material we are to work upon if the education we offer is not to be scrappy and superficial. We must have some measure of a child’s requirements, not based on his uses to society, nor upon the standard of the world he lives in, but upon his own capacity and needs. (Charlotte Mason, Toward a Philosophy of Education, 1923)

18. Why you are vs For what will you change

26 November 2021 09:48

Don’t ask why the patient is the way he is, ask for what he would change. (Milton Erickson)

19. The importance of being an Enthusiast in life

26 November 2021 10:13

I began to realize how important it was to be an enthusiast in life. He taught me that if you are interested in something, no matter what it is, go at it at full speed ahead. Embrace it with both arms, hug it, love it and above all become passionate about it. Lukewarm is no good. Hot is no good either. White hot and passionate is the only thing to be. (Roald Dahl, My Uncle Oswald)

20. Everything in life is art

26 November 2021 10:14

I think everything in life is art. What you do. How you dress. The way you love someone, and how you talk. Your smile and your personality. What you believe in, and all your dreams. The way you drink tea. How you decorate your home. Or party. Your grocery list. The food you make. How you’re writing looks. And the way you feel. Life is art. (Helena Bonham Carter)

Nothing is boring except to people who aren't really paying attention. (Michael Chabon)

21. Six dimensions of humor

26 November 2021 10:17

The six dimensions of humor are naughty, clever, cute, bizarre, mean, and recognizable. The general rule is that for something to be funny, it needs at least two of the six dimensions of humor. More is better, but two is the minimum. (Scott Adams)

22. The Ultimate Project Manager

26 November 2021 10:19

The ultimate project manager manages only two things extremely well: energy and desire. Silly project managers manage resources. Masterful project managers manage resourcefulness - human ingenuity. Silly project managers manage time. Silly project managers try to predict and forecast. Silly project managers think linearly and don't understand second order effects. Silly project managers think about project completion and meeting dates. Success is inevitable if one makes failure impossible, inconsequential, or positive feedback. Masterful project managers manage energy and desire. Both energy and desire have a cadence, an ebb and flow, like waves of the ocean. The ebb gives power to the flow. Tension magnifies the release. Do you ever fully relax? Do you ever push your body to its limits? Do you have a big idea to tinker with purely for fun and play on the side and that has a nonzero probability of being successful? Do you have a mind numbing routine to switch off to? Do you get bored? Do you take walks? Do you nap? Do you ask your subconscious questions? Do you journal free-form? Do you stretch? Do you laugh? Do you do breathing exercises? Do you take multivitamins? Do you eat high protein and high fat foods? Do you have a sleep routine? Do you have a morning routine? Do you take breaks regularly? Do you do kind acts for people? Do you imagine doing fun things?

Be relentlessly resourceful.

23. Milton Erickson on Autohypnosis

26 November 2021 11:39

Set your alarm clock for 20min and look at your image in a mirror. Your unconscious mind knows an awful lot more than you do. If you trust your unconscious mind, it will do the autohypnosis that you want to do. And maybe it has a better idea than you have. No way you can consciously instruct the unconscious! In teaching people autohypnosis I tell them that their unconscious mind will select the time, place, and situation.

24. Civilizations grow by agreements

26 November 2021 11:52

Civilizations grow by agreements and accommodations and accretions, not by repudiations. The rebels and the revolutionaries are only eddies, they keep the stream from getting stagnant but they get swept down and absorbed, they're a side issue. Quiet desperation is another name for the human condition. If revolutionaries would learn that they can't remodel society by day after tomorrow -- haven't the wisdom to and shouldn't be permitted to -- I'd have more respect for them ... Civilizations grow and change and decline -- they aren't remade. (Wallace Stegner, Angle of Repose)

25. The Technium: Expansion of [Choice and not Free Will]

26 November 2021 12:57

Following the long-arc of evolution, the leading edge of life becomes more complex. The prime way that complexity is revealed is in the increasing ways that an organism can choose. A bacterium has a few choices — perhaps to slide toward food, or divide. A plankton, with more complexity, more cellular machinery, has more options. It can detect and follow more chemical gradients, move toward light, or not. A star fish can wiggle its arms, flee (fast or slow?) or fight a rival, choose a meal, or a mate. A mouse has a million choices to make in its life. Right or left? Now or later? It has a longer list of things it can move (whiskers, eyeballs, eyelids, tail, toes), and a wider range of environments to exert its will upon, as well as a longer duration of life to decide in. More complexity expands the degrees of possible choices.

New ideas, new technologies contain new freedoms —an expanded range for action. The more powerful a new technology, the greater the new freedoms. This expansion includes possible abuse as well. New technology provides new avenues for freely-chosen horror, as well as good. Present in every new technology there is the potential to make new mistakes. In fact, unless a powerful technology can be powerfully abused, it is not powerful. Nonetheless, as technology expands so does the space in which our free will operates.

Starting at the big bang, self-organization has steadily increased the range of volition from the tiny choice inherent in elemental particles, to the more visible choices made constantly by living organisms. The self-directed trajectory of evolution continues that expansion into the technium. The technium is designed to expand [choice and not free will]. First by expanding the range of possible choices, and secondly by expanding the range of agents which can make choices. (Kevin Kelly)

26. Experience influences behavior

26 November 2021 13:05

Everybody experiences far more than he understands. Yet it is experience, rather than understanding, that influences behavior. (Marshall McLuhan)

27. The future of work consists of learning a living

26 November 2021 13:06

(Marshall McLuhan)

28. How to Build Willpower for the Weak

26 November 2021 17:09

So how do you manage your limited supply of willpower? In my experience, the best way to avoid using up your willpower is to stay away from situations in which your only options are pleasure or deprivation. Given those choices, pleasure usually wins. Willpower reminds me of the empty space in art. It’s not something you manage directly; it’s the result of putting everything else where it belongs. If you organize your life to avoid any pleasure-vs.-deprivation choices, it will look to others as if you have loads of willpower. The reality is that you simply put everything else where it worked best. (Scott Adams)

29. Maximize Pride

26 November 2021 17:11

Modern thought and social science are grounded in the objective of maximizing "happiness", "utility", "utility of wealth", "pleasure", "experiences instead of possessions" or similar matters that are both selfish and over which you have little control. They turned out to be both mathematically and morally clumsy. Switch your objective to maximize "pride" and see how different --and more controllable -- things become. (Nassim Taleb)

30. Your Body is Your Brain Too

26 November 2021 17:16

Most of us believe that our brains are special because they are the center of our consciousness. Some people also believe brains are where your free will and your soul lives. We also believe brains are somewhat of a closed system when it comes to our thoughts. It feels as if your brain produces some random thoughts, wrestles with those thoughts, and turns them into bodily actions. That makes the brain a special little organ that is doing its own thing in isolation and letting the rest of the body know about it later. In other words, we put our brains in the “brain” bucket. All by itself. Doing its thing.

That’s a huge mistake.

Today I’ll tell you how the brains-is-special framework for looking at life is one of our biggest sources of unhappiness. In my worldview, also known as the Moist Robot Hypothesis, humans are wet robots that respond to programming. If you aren’t intentionally programming yourself, the environment and other people are doing it for you. Luckily you have a user interface to your brain. And that interface is your body. Your body is collecting inputs from all over and feeding them to your brain to reprogram it. But allow me to suggest another framework for viewing your brain. My claim is that this new framework will give you the means to program your brain with intention instead of letting the environment do it randomly. All you need to do is reframe your body to be part of your brain. I am sure you have noticed that your mental state is deeply influenced by diet, exercise, sleep, sex, stress, and lots more. And I’m sure you make some effort to do those things the right way when you can. But if you think those actions are influencing only how you feel, and not your actual thoughts, you don’t understand the basic nature of human beings. And this is the key takeaway: The source of your thoughts is your body, not your brain.

When I am not feeling good, I don’t ask my brain to fix things on its own. I manipulate my environment until my thoughts change. That’s because I see my body as the user interface to my brain. I don’t let my brain think whatever it randomly wants to think. I constrain it to productive thoughts by manipulating my environment. For example, any time I feel tense, I go exercise as soon as I can. It’s good for my health in general, but I do it specifically to program my thoughts from negative to positive. I do the same with sleep, diet, sex, stress, and even my choices of entertainment. I don’t let negative inputs into my brain via my body (the user interface) and my brain responds by not producing negative thoughts. (Scott Adams)

31. How to Imagine More Effectively

26 November 2021 17:27

We usually think of our imaginations as idea-fountains: wellsprings of creativity. What’s interesting, though, is how often imagination is used by highly successful performers in their practice techniques. These people channel the fountain’s energy in a very particular way: they use their imagination to build a sensory template for the action they want to learn, speeding the learning process. They focus on pre-creating the feeling of a skill, projecting themselves inside an action so they can learn it faster and better. It is highly specific and detailed. You are imagining a single move (a chunk) in the deepest possible detail. The color of the jersey, the smell of the grass, the feeling of grasping the cup. It’s visualizing in sensory HD. It has two steps. First, you stare at the target skill until you’ve built it in your mind. Then you project yourself inside that skill, focusing on what it would feel like. It’s solitary. This isn’t something that’s done in groups, but alone, in quiet places, where you can operate without distraction. It’s used in combination with intensive practice. All the vivid projecting in the world doesn’t help until it’s combined with a lot of high-quality reps. (Daniel Coyle)

32. The Gervais Principle

26 November 2021 17:37

Sociopaths, in their own best interests, knowingly promote over-performing losers into middle-management, groom under-performing losers into sociopaths, and leave the average bare-minimum-effort losers to fend for themselves. (Venkatesh Rao)

33. Exobrain

26 November 2021 17:50

I’m fascinated by the phenomenon of manipulating our environment to extend our brains. I suppose it all started with early humans carving on cave walls as a way to store historical data. Now we have ebooks, computers, and cell phones to store our memories. And we have schools to program our brains. But it goes much deeper than that. Even a house is a device for storing data. Specifically, a house stores data on how it was built. A skilled builder can study a house and build another just like it.

Everything we create becomes a de facto data storage device and brain accessory.

Humans are turning the entire planet into an exobrain. Our brains can’t hold all of the data we produce, so we look for ways to offload to books, websites, music, and architecture, to name a few storage devices. And we manipulate the environment to reprogram our brains as needed.

Years ago I worked with a young intern at Crocker Bank who believed his first step toward success was to find a place to live in a prosperous suburb. His theory was that the external environment would program his brain for the sort of success that his neighbors would have already found. I remember mocking him for his offbeat and naïve theory. Now I think he’s a genius for understanding at such an early age that his environment was a tool for programming his brain. I lost touch with him, but I’ll bet he’s a millionaire now. (Scott Adams)

34. A lack of boredom could destroy the world

26 November 2021 17:58

I read someplace that the brain needs some boredom during the day to process thoughts and generate creativity. That sounds right. My best ideas always bubble up when I’m bored. And my period of greatest creative output was during my corporate years when every meeting felt like a play date for coma patients. So what would happen if everyone in the world stopped being bored? Now let’s suppose that the people who are leaders and innovators around the world are experiencing a similar lack of boredom. I think it’s fair to say they are. What change would you expect to see in a world with declining boredom and therefore declining creativity? I’ll take some guesses.

For starters, you might see people acting more dogmatic than usual. If you don’t have time to think for yourself, and think creatively, the easiest opinion to adopt is the default position of your political party, religion, or culture. Check.

You might see more movies that seem derivative or based on sequels. Check.

You might see more reality shows and fewer scripted shows. Check.

You might see the bestseller lists dominated by fiction “factories” where ghost writers churn out work under the brand of someone famous. Check.

You might see almost no humor books on the bestseller lists except for ones built around a celebrity. Check.

You might see the economy flatline for lack of industry-changing innovation. Check.

You might see the news headlines start to repeat, like the movie Groundhog Day, with nothing but the names changed. Check.

You might find that bloggers are spending most of their energy writing about other bloggers. Check.

You might find that people seem almost incapable of even understanding new ideas. Check.

To be fair, there might be lots of reasons why the world appears to have less creativity. Some of it is simple economics. A movie studio can make more money with a sequel than with something creative. A similar dynamic is true in every industry. And also to be fair, sometimes things seem to be getting worse when in fact you’re only noticing it more. It seems as if folks are more dogmatic than ever, but maybe that’s not the case. Still, it’s worth keeping an eye on the link between our vanishing boredom and innovation. It’s the sort of thing that could literally destroy the world without anyone realizing what the hell is going wrong. If it reaches critical proportions, we probably won’t recognize the root cause of the problem. A lack of creativity always looks like some other problem. (Scott Adams)

35. Systems vs Goals

26 November 2021 18:02

The other day I put on my workout clothes and drove to the gym. But when I arrived I didn’t feel like working out. This was not a huge surprise, since I didn’t feel peppy before I even laced up my running shoes. Perhaps I hadn’t gotten enough sleep that week. I wasn’t sure what the problem was. I ate lunch in the snack bar then drove home and took a nap.

Question: Did I fail at my exercise goal?

Your answer will say a lot about you. But I’ll warn you that it’s a trick question. The trick is that I didn’t have an exercise goal in the first place, so I couldn’t have failed to reach it. What I do have is an exercise system, and I was completely successful at the system. My philosophy is that losers have goals and winners have systems.

In this case, my system is that I attempt to exercise five times a week around lunchtime. And I always allow myself the option of driving to the gym then turning around and going home. What I’ve discovered is that the routine of preparing to exercise usually inspires me to go through with it even if I didn’t start out in the mood. This particular day, my body wasn’t going to cooperate. No problem. The system of attempting to exercise worked as planned. I didn’t have a trace of guilt about driving home. I’ve used this system for my entire adult life. I see exercise as a lifestyle, not an objective.

If I had a goal instead of a system, I would have failed that day. And I would have felt like a loser. That can’t be good for motivation. That failure might be enough to prevent me from going to the gym the next time I don’t feel 100%, just to avoid the risk of another failure. (Scott Adams)

36. Random Reinforcement

26 November 2021 18:06

I read somewhere that rats become more obsessed with tasks that offer random rewards than tasks that offer rewards every time. In other words, if a rat touches a button with his nose and gets a pellet every time, he’ll like the task, but if he only gets a reward now and then, he’ll be addicted to it. It’s counterintuitive. I have a hypothesis that for alcoholics and drug addicts, the thing called “hitting bottom” isn’t real. We observe that addicts have to experience the near-death bottom before they have the will power (another illusion) to beat their habits. But suppose what’s really happening is that once an addict manages to stay high or drunk for 24 hours a day, for enough days in a row that there is no randomness to the reward, the addict starts to lose the addiction naturally. That would look exactly like hitting bottom, since a person’s life would disintegrate under those conditions, but the hitting bottom would simply be a coincidence and not a contributing cause of the ultimate recovery.

The practical application of this idea is that perhaps you could keep an alcoholic mildly inebriated for 24 hours a day in a controlled clinical setting, for as long as it took for randomness to be removed from the equation. Would that lead to just as much recovery as the so-called “hitting bottom”? This is where I caution you not to take health advice from cartoonists who can’t be bothered to find links to back up their speculation. All I’m suggesting is that random rewards might be controlling our lives in more ways than we imagine. (Scott Adams)

37. Manage your energy first

26 November 2021 18:08

We humans want lots of things: good health, financial freedom, success in whatever matters to us, a great social life, love, sex, recreation, travel, family, career and more. The problem is that the time you spend maximizing one of those dimensions usually comes at the expense of time you could have spent on another. So how do you organize your time to get the best result?

The way I approach the problem of multiple priorities is by focusing on just one main goal: energy. I make choices that maximize my personal energy because that makes it easier to manage all of the other priorities. Maximizing my personal energy means eating right, exercising, avoiding unnecessary stress, getting enough sleep, and all of the obvious steps. But it also means having something in my life that makes me excited to wake up. When I get my personal energy right, the quality of my work is better, and I can complete it faster. That keeps my career on track. And when all of that is working, and I feel relaxed and energetic, my personal life is better too. When I talk about high energy, I don’t mean the frenetic, caffeine-fueled, bounce-off-the-walls type. I’m talking about a calm, focused energy. To others, it will simply appear that you are in a good mood. And you will be. (Scott Adams)

38. Rewarding Work

26 November 2021 18:13

Whenever you see the x-factor in someone’s output – that little extra something that turns the good into the awesome – it’s a marker for intrinsic motivation. Monetary motivation plateaus at the point you think your work equals your pay. For most people, that happens when the product is good but not awesome. To get to awesome you need to think you might be changing the world, saving lives, redeeming your reputation, attracting the mate of your dreams, or something else that is emotionally large.

One of my techniques for staying motivated is that I put everything I do in the context of how it might improve the entire world, or at least some subset of it. This brings me to your job, whatever that might be. Is there any opportunity – no matter how small – for you to change the world through your work? (Scott Adams)

39. The Music Tunes You

26 November 2021 18:16

One of the reasons I don’t listen to music throughout the day is that music changes my mood. Music is designed to manipulate your body chemistry and your mind. The songs that manipulate your emotions most effectively rise to the top and become hits. I don’t want music manipulating me in ways I haven’t planned. The one situation in which I intentionally listen to music is when I exercise. That works great because I load my iPod with only the songs that energize me. The music puts my body immediately into exercise mode. I’m like Pavlov’s dog when I get to the gym; I’m not in the mood to exercise until I put in my headphones and hit play. Three notes later I’m totally in the mood. The thing I try to avoid throughout the day is listening to random music that jerks my mood around until it doesn’t fit with whatever task is at hand. I don’t want to get pumped up before I try to sleep. I don’t want to hear a sad song before I try to work. I don’t want a song stuck in my head when I’m trying to solve a problem, and so on. The problem is not the music but the mismatch between the music and my activities. (Scott Adams)

40. Scott’s Preferred Ordinary Super Power

26 November 2021 18:24

I would nominate for my preferred ordinary superpower the ability to not feel embarrassment.

My observation is that people such as Richard Branson or Elvis, or just about anyone famous, have willingly taken on a career that promises a lot of raised eyebrows, shaming, humiliation, and ego attacks. Some people shrug off that sort of stuff. They have that ordinary super power. And it makes success more likely because they get to compete against a smaller field. My hypothesis is that people who display a lack of embarrassment are seen by others as natural leaders. I suppose a lack of embarrassment looks like a form of bravery, and we’re wired to respond to it. When someone gives a speech to thousands, and shows no signs of nervousness, their confidence affects us. We assume good things about a person who is so cool under pressure. And when someone does something monumentally embarrassing, and shrugs it off with a smirk and a twinkle in the eye, we are in awe.

The good news is that one can learn to control embarrassment. You simply need to experience it so many times that you get used to it. In my case, my natural personality is shy, and as a kid I was embarrassed easily. But I’ve learned through practice to power through most of my embarrassments. And that’s a good thing because embarrassment is a routine part of my job.

I’m not totally immune to embarrassment, but I’m working toward it. Of all the ordinary superpowers, enduring embarrassment is the one that an ordinary person can most easily develop. I will never have a radio-quality voice, or suddenly become tall and attractive. But I can learn to endure embarrassment, and that has a tremendous economic value.

Imagine being able to talk to anyone, and ask for any favor or resource, without fear of rejection or embarrassment. 99% of people you talk to could give you the stink-eye and you’d still become a billionaire because of the few that cooperated. (Scott Adams)

41. The Glorious Advantages of Low Self-Esteem

27 November 2021 13:37

I see my inflated sense of self-worth as more of a strategy for happiness than a flaw. And by that I mean I know how to dial-back my self-esteem but I choose not to. Just moments ago I was reading the five-star reviews for my new book (How to Fail…) for no other reason than boosting my morning energy. I manipulate my self-esteem the same way I manage my intake of coffee. When I need a jolt of feel-good, I spend some time dwelling on whatever has gone well recently. And when my mind wanders to the graveyard of my many failures, I change the mental channel as quickly as I can.

There’s no such thing as the right level of self-esteem. Everyone who interacts with you will have a different idea of how much is too much for you. So I intentionally err on the side of too much. The benefits simply outweigh the costs. Some of you will be quick to point out the difference between quiet inner-confidence and being an arrogant dick all over the Internet. But if you think high self-esteem can be masked, you probably don’t understand what it is. The moment you feel high self-esteem, you lose the filter. In other words, if you feel you need to hide your high self-esteem, you don’t have high self-esteem. That’s how self-esteem works.

So I ask the following question in all seriousness: If you think I’m too full of myself (which I am), how is the alternative strategy working out for you? Are there some additional benefits of low-to-moderate self-esteem that are not obvious to me? (Scott Adams)

42. I Do or Think, Therefore I am

27 November 2021 13:49

The common view of human behavior is that thinking causes doing. In recent years science has discovered this situation to be more of a bi-directional thing. For example, studies show that forcing a smile can lead to greater happiness. Most of you already knew that factoid. And obviously you understand that events in your environment and various sensations in your body can influence your mood and your thinking.

But I’ll bet most of you hold the view that for the most part your thoughts lead to actions and that’s 95% of the story of you. Lately I’ve come to the opposite view. I think our actions are the things that matter and our so-called minds are nothing but some executive control and a chemistry experiment. I’ve been experimenting in the past year with the idea that I can control my thoughts by what I do with my body. Obviously my mind has to get the ball rolling to make me act in the first place. But instead of acting based on how I feel, I act based on how I WANT to feel. In other words, I use my body to control my future thoughts. For example, when feeling down, many people will curl up with some junk food and watch bad television shows until the feeling passes or some other duty calls. That’s an example of letting your mind control your actions.

What I do in that situation is ask myself what is likely to cause a chemical improvement in my brain. Then I do that thing. An hour ago I was in a funk. These days I recognize that situation as being no more than my brain chemistry being temporarily out of whack. In my younger years I would have cursed the world for serving up so much crappy luck, even if my luck was perfectly normal. Today I went and hit some tennis balls for an hour. Now I feel just fine. My body fixed my brain.

There’s a tendency to think of the brain as the decision-making master of your person while the rest of your body is a slave. I see my body as an experience collector and my brain as the central depository of the experiences. When my brain chemistry is out of whack I use my body to collect the types of experiences that will correct the situation. My observation of other people is that what I am describing (the moist robot view) is far from a universal approach. I think most people feel that their emotions and thoughts are somehow spontaneously generated, almost like magic, thanks to our souls and our free will and other things that aren’t real.

The problem with that view of your own mind is that when things go bad you don’t have a tool to fix things. Bad moods cause you to do self-destructive things which make your life worse which in turn keeps you in a bad mood. And repeat. So the next time you’re not feeling the way you would like, ask yourself what you could do with your body to change your brain chemistry for the better. Then do it. You might be surprised how well it works. (Scott Adams)

43. Be Useful

27 November 2021 13:55

My entire philosophy is two words: Be useful. When you are young, the most useful thing you can do is focus on your own health, happiness, and education. The world wants you to be selfish until you don’t need to be that way. That’s what keeps the system going. But if you maintain a high level of selfishness all of your life, your friends and family might only be pretending to like you. My proposition is that you can only experience meaning in life when your selfishness trend is downward, or you are doing something (such as learning new skills) to make that happen. Life is complicated and messy, and that makes it hard to keep score. But if your selfishness levels have plateaued, you might want to consider a new plan. (Scott Adams)

44. Imagination and Emotional Intelligence

27 November 2021 14:07

I have a hypothesis that emotional intelligence is a function of imagination. In other words, your ability to imagine the future is what drives your decisions today. If your imagined future looks like a big foggy nothing, you might as well enjoy today because tomorrow is unknowable. But if you can vividly imagine your future under different scenarios, you’ll make hard choices today that will, you hope, get you to the future you imagine and want. I can imagine the future so vividly that I was planning my retirement before I was out of grade school. That’s literally true. Thanks to my clearly imagined future it seemed easy to modify what I was doing on any given day to make my dreams come true in the future. Today we call that sort of discipline emotional intelligence. At the time it felt like nothing more than a vivid imagination. Perhaps imagination and emotional intelligence are closely related.

This is an important idea because emotional intelligence is highly correlated with success, and I would be surprised if it wasn’t a primary cause. So I wonder if imagination, like most other mental processes, can be improved with practice. If so, it would seem we have a direct lever for improving a person’s emotional intelligence. If imagination is the foundation of emotional intelligence, and emotional intelligence is the biggest factor in success, shouldn’t we be training kids to better imagine their futures? I would think that generic imagination skills alone would not be enough; one needs to imagine oneself in the future. Schools could create assignments in which kids are asked to write stories about their lives in the future. Or they could be asked to draw themselves as adults with their own kids, jobs, and homes. I have a hunch that sort of exercise would make a difference.

If you subscribe to the superstition of “willpower” you might believe emotional intelligence is something that you either have or you don’t. Perhaps you think the people who succeed have more of this magic thing called will power because they make hard choices today to improve their lives tomorrow. But will power is an illusion. People simply choose the path that looks best at the moment. And the moment is partly influenced by your imagined future. If you sharpen your imagination of your future, your preferences today might change, and to observers it will seem as though you have will power and emotional intelligence.

Perhaps the link between imagination and emotional intelligence is another reason role models are so important. A role model is a proxy for your imagination. It’s easier to imagine having the life of someone you know than it is to imagine your own unknowable future.

I’ve written quite a bit about something called affirmations, which is a process in which you imagine your own preferred future at least once a day, usually by writing down your objectives multiple times. If the process of imagining your future helps you make hard choices today, it will seem to observers as if you have lots of emotional intelligence. (Scott Adams)

45. Regrets of the Dying

27 November 2021 18:45

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

2. I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

(Bronnie Ware)

46. The Top of My Todo List

27 November 2021 18:50

A palliative care nurse called Bronnie Ware made a list of the biggest regrets of the dying. Her list seems plausible. I could see myself — can see myself — making at least 4 of these 5 mistakes. If you had to compress them into a single piece of advice, it might be: don't be a cog. The 5 regrets paint a portrait of a post-industrial man, who shrinks himself into a shape that fits his circumstances, then turns dutifully till he stops. The alarming thing is, the mistakes that produce these regrets are all errors of omission. You forget your dreams, ignore your family, suppress your feelings, neglect your friends, and forget to be happy. Errors of omission are a particularly dangerous type of mistake, because you make them by default.

I would like to avoid making these mistakes. But how do you avoid mistakes you make by default? Ideally you transform your life so it has other defaults. But it may not be possible to do that completely. As long as these mistakes happen by default, you probably have to be reminded not to make them. So I inverted the 5 regrets, yielding a list of 5 commands

Don't ignore your dreams

Don't work too much

Say what you think

Cultivate friendships

Be happy

which I then put at the top of the file I use as a todo list. (Paul Graham)

47. Instead of working back from a goal, work forward from promising situations

27 November 2021 18:57

In the graduation-speech approach, you decide where you want to be in twenty years, and then ask: what should I do now to get there? I propose instead that you don't commit to anything in the future, but just look at the options available now, and choose those that will give you the most promising range of options afterward. It's not so important what you work on, so long as you're not wasting your time. Work on things that interest you and increase your options, and worry later about which you'll take.

Flying a glider is a good metaphor here. Because a glider doesn't have an engine, you can't fly into the wind without losing a lot of altitude. If you let yourself get far downwind of good places to land, your options narrow uncomfortably. As a rule you want to stay upwind. So I propose that as a replacement for "don't give up on your dreams." Stay upwind. In practice, "stay upwind" reduces to "work on hard problems." If you'd asked me in high school what the difference was between high school kids and adults, I'd have said it was that adults had to earn a living. Wrong. It's that adults take responsibility for themselves. Making a living is only a small part of it. Far more important is to take intellectual responsibility for oneself.

If I had to go through high school again, I'd treat it like a day job. I don't mean that I'd slack in school. Working at something as a day job doesn't mean doing it badly. It means not being defined by it. I mean I wouldn't think of myself as a high school student, just as a musician with a day job as a waiter doesn't think of himself as a waiter. And when I wasn't working at my day job I'd start trying to do real work. (Paul Graham)

48. Rebellion is almost as stupid as obedience

27 November 2021 19:11

In either case you let yourself be defined by what they tell you to do. The best plan, I think, is to step onto an orthogonal vector. Don't just do what they tell you, and don't just refuse to. (Paul Graham)

49. Catching the Wild Pigs

27 November 2021 19:12

In the midst of his story he looked at the professor and asked a strange question. He asked, ‘Do you know how to catch wild pigs?’ The professor thought it was a joke and asked for the punchline. The young man said this was no joke. ‘You catch wild pigs by finding a suitable place in the woods and putting corn on the ground. The pigs find it and begin to come every day to eat the free corn. When they are used to coming every day, you put a fence down one side of the place where they are used to coming. When they get used to the fence, they begin to eat the corn again and you put up another side of the fence. They get used to that and start to eat again.

You continue until you have all four sides of the fence up with a gate on the last side. The pigs, who are used to the free corn, start to come through the gate to eat; you slam the gate on them and catch the whole herd. Suddenly the wild pigs have lost their freedom. They run around and around inside the fence, but they are caught. Soon they go back to eating the free corn. They are so used to it that they have forgotten how to forage in the woods for themselves, so they accept their captivity. (Norman Wolife)

50. The putting into it IS the getting out of it

28 November 2021 12:46

An Olympic runner spends years preparing for a 100 meter sprint that lasts for 10 Seconds or less. If he wins, he stands on the podium with a gold medal around him, for a few Minutes. Jeremy Jones spends years planning a trip to remote Himalayan Peaks. He spends months traveling. He spends weeks acclimatizing. He spends days climbing. All for a ride that lasts one or two Minutes. You know the old saying, “What you put into it is what you get out of it?” Well it isn’t true. Not quite. The real Truth is “The putting into it IS the getting out of it.” If you put into it Today, in order to get something out of it Tomorrow, you’ve wasted today And tomorrow. We aren’t going to do anything Today in order to get a benefit Tomorrow. Whatever we are going to do will get you the benefit Now. NOW is my God. If I work with a pro athlete, the thing that I bring to him will allow him to see results NOW. With a CEO, the feeling is felt NOW. The Clarity dawns NOW. Certainly, it will mature over time. The understanding will become richer with time. But the taste and the feeling are experienced NOW. In every part of my life, I am engineering it in such a way that I have only the Nectar. And no “horrible normalcy.” I want Nectar even when I’m eating dinner. I have wasted so much of my life not knowing the things that I have now come to know. I must make up for lost time. I must find a way to be Permanently Lost. This is non-negotiable. And something tells me you want the very same thing. (Kapil Gupta)

51. Life can only be experienced through surrender

28 November 2021 15:14

Interestingly, these individuals attained bliss not through conquest, but through surrender. They achieved The Ultimate not by becoming something, but by becoming Nothing. Herein lies what is perhaps life’s greatest paradox. And it is also the theme which guides the heart of my work with my clients.

COMPLETE AND TOTAL SURRENDER.

We live our lives with a stubborn attachment to a particular image of ourselves. We live steadfast to our “personalities” and likes and dislikes, and name, and place of birth. But when, even for a single moment, we surrender THE WHOLE OF OURSELVES we are immediately filled with this Quiet. This unspeakable bliss . . . Herein lies the secret to life, dear friend. The question is, how bad do you want it? You will no doubt say that it is difficult to live a life of Surrender. But I ask you, how difficult is it to live a life of conquest? You will tell me that it is difficult to sever attachments to all that you have come to recognize as YOU. But I ask you, how much Joy has this “YOU” really given you in your life? It was said long ago that life is easy for a man without preferences. I will say that life is a benediction for a man without an identity. The question is, Can You Really Do It? Can you surrender all that you have come to know as your so-called self? Can you abandon your preferences? Can you retreat into Insignificance? If you do, you will be more significant than you can ever imagine. If you surrender, you will experience the bliss of the heavens in your daily life. You might consider it a major sacrifice to surrender yourself. And if you think this way, imagine for just a moment what you have Truly Sacrificed all along. (Kapil Gupta)

52. The Secret of True Practice

28 November 2021 15:26

What is true practice? In order to answer this question it is important to ask a different question. What is a human being? A human being is a prince of nature. A human being is invested with the power of the mighty oceans and is made of the particles that make up the stars in the galaxies. A human being is the most extraordinary creation that has ever come into being. And every now and again, each human being catches a glimpse of his capabilities, following which he promptly returns to his sub-mortal form. What, then, is true practice? True practice is the type of practice that befits such an extraordinary creation known as the human being. True practice leads to the procurement of every ounce of a human being’s potential. True practice leads to the everyday creation of miracles. When was the last time you received this type of practice plan? More importantly, when was the last time you encountered a player who asked for it? True practice will not benefit the vast majority of players. Why? Because the care and the honor that it requires for its nourishment is simply absent in the heart of the modern player. True practice begins with what the player brings to the practice. Not with what the practice brings to the player.

True practice is, fundamentally, a voracious and insatiable appetite for learning. What does learning mean? Learning means learning about the player himself. How he reacts in different situations. The patterns of his mental moods. How he perceives a particular type of shot. Under what situations his bodily rhythms change. What sort of things make his heart rate increase or decrease by two or three beats. What he feels when he sees another player. What time of day his mind changes its temperament. To what degree the tightness or the looseness of his grip immediately affects his confidence. True practice is about the tangibles and the intangibles. It is about breaking down the human machine and looking through its every part. It is about unraveling the contours of the brain and seeing what is hidden inside its recesses. It is about provoking the mind in order to understand its patterns. It is about becoming an engineer, a tactician, and an artist all in one. And it is about beginning in the right place.

What is the right place? The right place is the place within a player that begs to explore the intricacies of his craft. The place within him that seeks to decode the patterns that he seems to follow. Only once this prerequisite is met, can true learning take place. It is only this type of person that can know what practice truly is. And it is only this type of person that can benefit from it. (Kapil Gupta)

53. The nuances of one’s true self.

28 November 2021 15:41

You see, man lives a life of Euphemisms. That which he searches for is almost never what he is truly searching for. He chases surrogates. He follows shadows. He rarely follows the Real Thing. The thing that he really seeks. Why? Because he doesn’t really know what he truly seeks. And it is this which keeps him enslaved to a programmed path to nowhere. There are rare factions in the world, namely in the Ancient East, which created the greatest sportsmen that have never been rivaled to this day. And, for them, sport was not a commercial endeavor. It was an opportunity to refine one’s craft to such a degree that they become world class Artists and true Masters. And each and every one of these rare masters understood that in the chiseling of their artform, what was really being refined was their understanding of their own true nature. Sport was an avenue by which to understand Life. And to understand the nuances of one’s true self. And this, my friend, is why they became legends! The field upon which you play has NOTHING to give you.Give yourself to your calling, without hope or despair. Unless you arrive to the field as one who is fulfilled, you will forever leave it unfulfilled. If you understand in your heart that there is nothing to gain, you will instantly gain everything.If you understand that there is nothing to “strive for” all of your days from this day to that will be filled with equanimity. If the dangling carrot known as the trophy no longer has any meaning to you, you will gain Access to the full sum of your talent. When a smile cuts your cheeks, not because the fans are applauding you, but because you have reached a state of complete Hopelessness, you will have arrived. You will have become a living God. And all of creation will bow to your great wisdom. (Kapil Gupta)

54. The man whose source of motivation is simply a love of his craft

28 November 2021 15:49

Teaching doesn’t make anyone great. The world’s best instruction cannot “instruct” a man to greatness. Contrast this with that strange, aloof, loner of an individual who toils away at his craft in quiet seclusion. He is NOT beholden to “technology” or “science” or “gadgetry” or “coaches” or “the latest instruction” or the “latest research on ‘how the brain learns.'” He is simply lost within the bowels of his craft. He is fascinated by the inner workings of his trade. He tries this and that. Keep this, discards that. He explores. He experiments. He plays with it. He speaks to it. He portrays the image of the crazy man from the wilderness. He can be seen laughing when there is no apparent reason to laugh. He can be seen crying without impetus. He can be seen conversing with what can only be the Almighty, for there is no one else around. And one day he shows up on the grand stage and reveals before the world the masterpiece he has been working on for decades. He toiled and explored and experimented with the beauty of his craft for so many years. And somewhere along the way, he became an artist. The man for whom the only truths are the ones he has discovered for himself. The man who relies on no one. The man whose source of motivation is simply a love of his craft. The man who gives himself so completely to his craft, that only the craft remains. (Kapil Gupta)

55. How To Truly Help A Human Being

28 November 2021 18:27

Much of what comes to me COMES THROUGH ME rather than FROM ME. And perhaps the reason it comes THROUGH ME is because once a man is completely available to his ART, he becomes receptive to the subtle messages that float through the universe that surrounds him. I accept very few of the consultation requests that I receive. And those that I do accept, I enter into the relationship as a human being free of preconceptions. This allows me to be AVAILABLE to the complexities and the needs of the client before me. The fruit that blossoms on a tree comes not from the branch but from the root. No matter how much you modify or manipulate the blossoming fruit today, the very same fruit will blossom tomorrow. It is the same with behavior. The performance community centers their entire approach around behavior modification. But behavior is like the fruit that blossoms. It is only to be recognized. Not modified. The way in which to help a human being is not through his “behavior.” The way in which to help a human being is not through his “performance.” The way in which to help a human being is not through his “statistics.” For all of these things are mere side effects. And to address side effects is to leave the problem untouched. And this is the reason that it so often returns. The way in which to help a human being is through his ESSENCE. There is something within a human being that contributes to his behavior, his outlook, his perceptions, his emotions, and as a result, his “performance.” The way in which to best help him is to address and explore this NUCLEUS, this ROOT, this SPIRIT, this ESSENCE of his fundamental constitution. It is this essence which is responsible for how he feels and what he sees and how he sees. It is THIS that is at the core of his potential. It is THIS that takes him to the pinnacle of his craft. And it is THIS that both he and his advisors have neglected for his entire career. (Kapil Gupta)

56. Trust the Subconscious/Unconscious

01 December 2021 18:04

For example, where a classical hypnotist might say "You are going into a trance", an Ericksonian hypnotist would be more likely to say "you can comfortably learn how to go into a trance." In this way, he provides an opportunity for the subject to accept the suggestions they are most comfortable with, at their own pace, and with an awareness of the benefits. The subject knows they are not being hustled and takes full ownership of, and participates in, their transformation. (Wikipedia on Milton Erickson)

Your unconscious mind knows an awful lot more than you do. If you trust your unconscious mind, it will do the autohypnosis that you want to do. And maybe it has a better idea than you have. No way you can consciously instruct the unconscious! (MIlton Erickson)

57. Living Processes Help to Create Living Structure

09 December 2021 10:08

Do one small good thing; then do another small good thing; then do another good thing. Simple as this is, focusing on the creation of one good thing at a time, is already likely to work; it will make the garden better. After a person has grasped that idea, I may then point out that sometimes, the good things that we do work even better if each small good thing also helps to achieve some slightly larger good thing.

The more living patterns there are in a place - a room, a building, or a town - the more it comes to life as an entirety, the more it glows, the more it has that self-maintaining fire which is the quality without a name.

This is a fundamental view of the world. It says that when you build a thing you cannot merely build that thing in isolation, but must repair the world around it, and within it, so that the larger world at that one place becomes more coherent, and more whole; and the thing which you make takes its place in the web of nature, as you make it.

We are searching for some kind of harmony between two intangibles: a form which we have not yet designed and a context which we cannot properly describe.

We define organic order as the kind of order that is achieved when there is a perfect balance between the needs of the parts, and the needs of the whole.

But in practice master plans fail - because they create totalitarian order, not organic order. They are too rigid; they cannot easily adapt to the natural and unpredictable changes that inevitably arise in the life of a community.

The buildings that I build very often have a dreamlike reality. I don't mean by that they have a fantasy quality at all, in fact quite the reverse. They contain in some degree the ingredients that give dreams their power... stuff that's very close to us.

There is a myth, sometimes widespread, that a person need only do inner work...that a man is entirely responsible for his own problems; and that to cure himself, he need only change himself....The fact is, a person is so formed by his surroundings, that his state of harmony depends entirely on his harmony with his surroundings.

The specific patterns, out of which a building or a town is made

may be alive or dead. To the extent they are alive, they let our inner

forces loose, and, set us free; but when they are dead they keep

us locked in inner conflict.

All space and matter, organic or inorganic, has some degree of life in it, and matter/space is more alive or less alive according to its structure and arrangement.

It is possible to make buildings by stringing together patterns, in a rather loose way. A building made like this, is an assembly of patterns. It is not dense. It is not profound. But it is also possible to put patterns together in such a way that many patterns overlap in the same physical space: the building is very dense; it has many meanings captured in a small space; and through this density, it becomes profound.

The difference between the novice and the master is simply that the novice has not learnt, yet, how to do things in such a way that he can afford to make small mistakes. The master knows that the sequence of his actions will always allow him to cover his mistakes a little further down the line. It is this simple but essential knowledge which gives the work of a master carpenter its wonderful, smooth, relaxed, and almost unconcerned simplicity.

There is one timeless way of building. It is a thousand years old, and the same today as it has ever been. The great traditional buildings of the past, the villages and tents and temples in which man feels at home, have always been made by people who were very close to the center of this way.

I believe that all centers that appear in space - whether they originate in biology, in physical forces, in pure geometry, in color - are alike simply in that they all animate space. It is this animated space that has its functional effect upon the world, that determines the way things work, that governs the presence of harmony and life.

When you make something, cleaning it out of structural debris is one of the most vital things you do.

All matter/space has some degree of "self" in it, and this self, or anyway some aspect of the personal, is something which infuses all matter/space and everything we know as matter but now think to be mechanical.

We must face the fact that we are on the brink of times when man may be able to magnify his intellectual and inventive capability, just as in the nineteenth century he used machines to magnify his physical capacity. Again, as then, our innocence is lost. And again, of course, the innocence, once lost, cannot be regained. The loss demands attention, not denial.

One begins to think with that new building block, rather than with littler pieces. And finally, the things which seem like elements dissolve, and leave a fabric of relationships behind, which is the stuff that actually repeats itself, and gives the structure to a building or a town.

It is a common experience that attempts to solve just one piece of a problem first, then others, and so on, lead to endless involutions. You no sooner solve one aspect of a thing, than another point is out of point. And when you correct that one, something else goes wrong. You go round and round in circles, unable to produce a form that is thoroughly right.

I believe the personal feeling I have touched on in this chapter, which is directly connected to order and life, is a mobilization in which my vulnerable inner self becomes connected to the world. It increases my feeling of connection and participation in all things. It is feeling, not emotion. It does not — directly — have to do with happiness, or sadness, or anger. Rather, it is the feeling of being part of the ocean, part of the sky, part of the asphalt on the road.

In each of the examples I have given, the essence was that at each step of a living process one must be able to feel, ahead of time, the feeling which will later exist in the finished object, without yet knowing its form in detail. We are able, somehow, to identify and carry in ourselves, this feeling which must be in the finished thing — and we can carry it in us eloquently enough, and specifically enough, so that as we move forward in the creative task, we can constantly check to see if the next action, the emerging form, this detail or that, does have that feeling and not some other. The very specific nature of this feeling — when accurately experienced — can be remarkable. But it is very difficult to explain just what this feeling is like in character. It is not verbal, it is not visual, it is not auditory. Yet it is articulate and highly specific, very particular, unique each time that it occurs. It is so articulate, and so specific, that it allows us to use it with great accuracy. When it is understood and felt clearly enough, it is so specific that it will allow me to consider 100 possible ways to make a roof, and reject them all, because they do not have this feeling, then to accept the 101st because it does have it. (Christopher Alexander)

58. All space and matter has some degree of life in it and some degree of “self” in it

09 December 2021 11:41

All space and matter, organic or inorganic, has some degree of life in it and matter/space is more alive or less alive according to its structure and arrangement.

All matter/space has some degree of “self” in it, and this self, or some aspect of the personal, is something which infuses all matter/space and everything we know as matter but now think to be mechanical. (Christopher Alexander)

59. Order is profoundly functional and profoundly ornamental

09 December 2021 11:54

There is no difference between ornamental order and functional order. We learn to see that while they seem different, they are really only different aspects of a single kind of order.

As we learn to understand it, we shall see that our own feeling, the feeling of what it is to be a person, rooted, happy, alive in oneself, straightforward, and ordinary, is itself inextricably connected with order. Thus order is not remote from our humanity. It is that stuff which goes to the very heart of human experience. We resolve the Cartesian dilemma, and make a view of order in which objective reality “out there” and our personal reality “in here” are thoroughly connected.

60. Wholeness

09 December 2021 12:02

Wholeness is not merely a way of focusing on the gestalt of the thing, but is instead a real structure, an actual “thing” in itself. It is a structure which exists in the world that includes what we intuitively perceive as the gestalt, the overview, the broad nature of a thing. It is the source of the coherence which exists in any part of the world.

A crucial feature of the wholeness is that it is neutral: it simply exists. Determination of its details may be made by neutral methods, yet at the same time […] the relative harmony of “life” of a given building may be understood […] without reference to opinion, prejudice or philosophy, merely as a consequence of the wholeness which exists.

I have not yet emphasized the enormous power of the wholeness, W. This structure catches the overall character in a way which is almost mysterious, but goes to the heart of many things not easily explained. This happens because it is an overall field-like structure, a global, overall effect. It is distinct, completely distinct, from the elements or “parts” which appear in that wholeness; it is unusual in our experience, yet catches what we have often thought of as the artistic intuition about the whole.

The degree of life which exists at that place and time also comes from the wholeness, and only from the wholeness. The neutral wholeness spawns characteristics which are far from neutral — characteristics which indeed go to the very origin of right and wrong.

Life comes from the particular details of the ways the centers in the wholeness cohere to form a unity, the ways they interact, and interlock, and influence each other. The academic and difficult task of grasping the nature of this wholeness will pay us back, by giving us the origin of life.

Wholeness is a structure of great subtlety which is induced in the whole. It cannot easily be predicted from the parts, and it is useless to think of it as a relationship “among the parts”. The wholeness is an autonomous and global structure, which is induced by the details of the configuration. It is a real physical and mathematical structure in space — but it is created indirectly, by symmetries and other relationships which are induced by the geometry.

Present-day conventional wisdom (perhaps Cartesian and mechanistic in origin) tells us that everything is made of parts. In particular, people believe today that every whole is made of parts. The key aspect of this belief is the idea that the parts come “before” the whole: in short, the parts exist as elements of some kind, which are then brought into relationship with one another, or combined, and a center is “created” out of these parts and their combinations as a result.

When we understand what wholeness is really like as a structure, we see that in most cases it is the wholeness which creates its parts. The center is not made from parts. Rather, it would be more true to say that most of the parts are created by the wholeness. They settle out from the wholeness, and are created by all of it. […] This is fundamentally different from the idea that wholes are made up from elements or built from parts.

I propose a view of physical reality which is dominated by the existence of this one particular structure, W, the wholeness. In any given region of space, some subregions have higher intensity as centers, others have less. Many subregions have weak intensity or none at all. The overall configuration of the nested centers, together with their relative intensities, comprise a single structure. I define this structure as “the” wholeness of that region. This structure exists everywhere in the world. It exists in nature; it exists in buildings; it exists in works of art. It is a fundamental structure in space which not only encompasses the wholeness or gestalt of the thing; it also encompasses the obvious parts, or elements, from which this thing is made.

Centers are the building blocks of Wholeness.

What makes a center “centered” is that it somehow functions as an organized field of force in space. It has a structure of centrality, it communicates centrality, it creates a spatial feeling of centrality.

To be more realistic, we need to imagine space as filled with such centers, all helping each other, all created by other centers, but all field-like, all radiating centeredness. How might we imagine this structure? We may imagine, in this space, an overall field in which, at each point there is an intensity — the life of that field at that point — together with vectors describing the impact of these centers on one another.

The main coherent centers which exist in a place determine what it is like there, what kind of life it has. The centers are the most fundamental things we notice in what is happening. They affect us most.It straddles conceptual boundaries. The difference is deeply functional, not just a matter of visual perception. The centers we see when we look at the thing in its wholeness are the ones which are responsible for its real behavior. The centers we notice when we see the situation in its wholeness are not only more dominant to the eye. They control the real behavior of the thing, the life which develops there, the real human events which happen, and the feelings people have about living there.

Centers are always made of other centers. A center is not a point, not a perceived center of gravity. It is rather a field of organized force in an object or part of an object which makes that object or part exhibit centrality. This field-like centrality is fundamental to the idea of wholeness.

[T]he wholeness is made of parts; the parts are created by the wholeness. To understand wholeness we must have a conception in which “parts” and wholes work in this holistic way.

Wholeness and “deep structure” are enormously difficult to see. Especially in a complex, real-world case, the task of finding the most structure-enhancing step available is therefore, in practice, extremely hard. Our current modes of perception are not always tuned to seeing wholeness in the world around us; and the exact definition of the structure of wholeness — the system of centers at all scales, with their attendant degrees of life and coherence — is cumbersome and hard to grasp when we try to grasp it by analytical means.

The living process can therefore be steered, kept on course towards the authentic whole, when the builder consistently uses the emerging feeling of the whole as the origin of his insight, as the guiding light at the end of the tunnel by which he steers. I am suggesting that if the builder, at each step of a living process, takes that step which contributes most to the feeling coming from the work, always chooses that which has the more profound feeling, then this is tantamount — equivalent — to a natural process in which the step-wise forward-moving action is always governed by the whole.

Roughly this, I am almost certain, is what traditional builders did. They paid attention to the feeling of the emerging structure: and thus were able to stay within the guidelines of the existing and transforming whole. Guided by feeling, they were able to function almost like nature: They were able to make each small step count in the emergence of a new unfolding whole.

For us, in our era, it is not so easy. The word “feeling” has been contaminated. It is confused with emotions — with feelings (in the plural) such as wonder, sadness, anger — which confuse rather than help because they make us ask ourselves, which kind of feeling should I follow? The feeling I am talking about is unitary. It is feeling in the singular, which comes from the whole. It arises in us, but it originates in the wholeness which is actually there. The process of respecting and extending and creating the whole, and the process of using feeling, are one and the same. Real feeling, true feeling, is the experience of the whole.

Being guided by the whole, and being guided by feeling, are therefore nearly synonymous. What I call feeling is the mode of perception and awareness which arises when a person pays attention to the whole. When people pay attention to the whole, they are experiencing feeling.

It may seem far-fetched to suggest that all questions of city planning, engineering, transportation — not to speak of building — should be decided by feeling, by the feeling of the whole. But that is, indeed, what I am proposing. It is an intelligent and practical way forward.

In any living process, or any process of design or making, the way forward, the next step which is most structure-enhancing, is that step which most intensifies the feeling of the emerging whole.

Feeling thus gives us human beings our access to structure-preserving transformations. It is the process of intensifying deep feeling in the whole which gives us direct access to the core of living process.

Although extraordinary, if judged by the standards of 20th-century positivism, this process is nevertheless sober and exact. (Christopher Alexander)

What is the next most simple thing to do to make the "whole" better?

To specify what a phenomenology of wholeness might entail, I turn to the insightful hermeneutic-phenomenological work of physicist Henri Bortoft (1996; also 1971, 1985; Stefanovic 1991, 2000), who argues that the whole cannot be explained through some sequential, analytical approach that breaks the whole into a set of parts and then reassembles them piecemeal by cerebral effort as might, for example, a systems approach to ecology. Instead, the whole can only be understood by entering further into its parts through a mode of careful, intuitive encounter uniting perception, feeling, and thinking. In other words, there is a way to see how the whole is present throughout its parts, so that, in any one of the parts, the whole can be found, sometimes more clearly, sometimes less. As one finds ways to better understand the parts, so the whole to which they belong becomes better defined; in turn, this progressive clarity of the whole sheds additional light on the parts, which become yet more understandable and say more about the whole. There is a process of reciprocal insight—a virtuous circle resonating between parts and whole. The great difficulty, however, is finding a way to move into and encounter the parts as they are in themselves so that the whole will be foreshadowed and seen, more and more fully. How do we encounter the parts most advantageously so that we can better see and understand the whole? How can one avoid describing the parts in an unfaithful way or arbitrarily constructing a counterfeit whole unfaithful to the parts? In this sense, any act of understanding or doing is revealing the right parts in their right relationship as they mark out the larger whole. Bortoft explains: If a part is to be an arena in which the whole can be present, it cannot be any old thing. Parts are not bits and pieces, because a part is only a part if it is such that it can bear the whole. There is a useful ambivalence here: “to bear,” in the sense of “to pass through” and “to carry”; and “to bear” in the sense of “to suffer,” where this is taken in the sense of “to undergo.” By itself the part is nothing, not even a part, but the whole cannot be whole without the part. The part becomes significant itself through becoming a bearer of the whole (Bortoft 1971, p. 54). (David Seamon)

61. What does it mean for something to be personal?

09 December 2021 12:22

In our present world-view, the word “personal” is often taken to mean “idiosyncratic“. Something is personal if it reflects the peculiarities of a given individual. […]

To my mind, this is a very shallow interpretation of what “personal” really means. A thing is truly personal when it touches us in our humanity.

The trivialization of the word “personal” is part of our present popular culture, immersed in mechanistic cosmology. But from the point of view of the world-picture in this book, “personal” is a profound objective quality which inheres in something. It is not idiosyncratic but universal. It refers to something true and fundamental in a thing itself.

The existence of a personal feeling in a thing or system is not a subjective quality of limited validity, but an objective quality whose existence is as fundamental to any given situation as the more mechanical facts to which we are accustomed.

The process of producing and responding to centers is one of the most fundamental of all human processes. It is completely natural in the most ordinary way.

The personal is something inherent in the nature of order and in the universe — not a late comer to blind matter as scientists have thought, but rather, since the origins of time, a vital substrate underlying matter.

I believe the personal feeling I have touched on in this chapter, which is directly connected to order and life, is a mobilization in which my vulnerable inner self becomes connected to the world. It increases my feeling of connection and participation in all things. It is feeling, not emotion. It does not — directly — have to do with happiness, or sadness, or anger. Rather, it is the feeling of being part of the ocean, part of the sky, part of the asphalt on the road.

It is personal, even when it occurs in nature, because somehow it awakens “person-stuff”; we may even sense that it is made of person-stuff, and that it connects with the person-stuff in us. To understand order, we must understand that it is profoundly like this. Life is the person-stuff. Recognizing this life in things is equivalent to saying, “The universe is made of person-stuff. I always thought it was made of machine-stuff, but now I see that it is not.”

Once we recognize that feeling and life are somehow one and the same thing, and that the structure we call wholeness is connected with a ground where matter becomes personal, then we begin to see the depth of the revolution in thought to which the idea of wholeness leads. The external phenomenon we call wholeness or life in the world and the internal experience of personal feeling and wholeness within ourselves are connected. They are, at some level, one and the same thing.

Now we begin to see that the idea of a center is something which unites objective life — as a quality which exists in space — and the personal feeling that can occur in us. When the center occurs, is intensified, we shall see […] that the space there begins to resemble the human self, begins to be connected to the personal. A structure which has life becomes more and more personal as it reaches more and more wholeness, because it becomes more and more deeply imbued with self, with the feeling of which my experience of self is made. Thus the very odd thing which happens is that space itself becomes more deeply functional — more well organized — as it begins to resemble more and more deeply the human person.

The ultimate criterion for whether something works in nature, just as in buildings, therefore also depends on the extent to which it resembles the healthy human self. This extraordinary conclusion will give us a clear and succinct summary of the vast gulf between Cartesian mechanics and the view of the universe which I put firmware in this book. It also points to the inspiring depths which may exist in the making of a building, and shows us why art is not a trivial, interesting practice — but something utterly fundamental to our human existence, and to the nature of things as they are.

The connection between order and feeling is fundamental. In some fashion, profound order makes us feel our own existence: it causes deep feeling in us when we come in contact with it. It has deep feeling within itself. Wholeness, even though it is an external phenomenon, is inseparable from our own reality which is presumably internal.

Wholeness and feeling are two sides of a single reality. Within the modern era, we have become used to the idea that feeling is something we experience subjectively — while life, if it exists, is something that exists objectively out there in the world of mechanics. In such a mental framework, the idea that feeling and wholeness are two sides of a single thing can hardly even be understood.

But as we study the phenomenon of wholeness, as I’m trying to do, it teaches us to change our understanding, and to reach a reorganization of our ideas about the world in which this equivalence of living structure and deep personal feeling not only makes sense but is also the most fundamental fact of our existence.

When we experience something which has deep wholeness, it increases our own wholesomeness. The deeper the wholeness or life which we meet in the world, the more deeply it affects our own personal feeling. Centers which have life increase our own life because we ourselves are centers too. We feel more wholesome in the presence of things which have wholesomeness in them, because we, like other centers, are intensified by them. (Christopher Alexander)

62. To Truly Like

09 December 2021 12:36

We live in an era where people’s likes and dislikes are controlled by dubious intellectual fashions — often supported by the media. This is only a more extreme form of the way that in all human societies people’s likes and dislikes have always been controlled by the opinions of their supposed betters. It is only with maturity that we learn to listen to our own heart and recognize what we truly like.

I assert, as a matter of fact, that the things which people truly and deeply like are precisely these things which have the mirror-of-the-self property to a very high degree. This implies further that as we mature, and as we get rid of the idiosyncrasies and fears of youth, we gradually converge in our liking and disliking. We find out that what is truly likable is a deep thing that we share with others.

The life in things, or the wholeness in things, is not merely an abstract, functional, or holistic life. The things which are alive are the things we truly like. Our apparent liking for fashions, post-modern images, and modernist shapes and fantasies is an aberration, a whimsical and temporary liking at best, which has no permanence and no lasting value. It is wholeness in the structure that we really like in the long run, and that establishes in us a deep sense of calmness and permanent connection.

This is not a process in which our subjective preferences are merely shifting (though that can happen too). It is a process in which you gradually find out which one of a group of things is the most alive.

Our own minds are confused by opinions, images, and thoughts. Because of these, we often fail to see accurately the relative life or degree of wholeness in different things. Nevertheless, their degree of life may be gauged by the degree to which the thing resembles our own self. However, even in making this judgement, we can again be confused, because our idea of our own self is also confused by images, thoughts, and opinions. Gradually, as we mature, we learn to recognize our own mind or self as merely a part of some greater thing or self.

As I try to perform this test, as I look at things and ask to what extent they are pictures of my self, as I encounter the contradictions and difficulties which this test exposes in me, gradually I start to get rid of all the things which seem good because of images and opinions — and retain only those which really are full of life. As this process continues, it sandpapers away my opinionated conceptions of my self and replaces them, slowly, with a truer version of what my self really is.

I am profoundly aware of the differences which arise from culture to culture, climate to climate, place to place, and have built buildings which reflect these differences hugely. I have no doubt at all that these things must be understood and that the most elementary rules of architecture are (1) ask people what they want and (2) give it to them almost without question, so that the dignity of their inner response is recognized, preserved.

But, when all is said and done, it is my view that this matter of the self, the mirror of the self, lies still deeper. I believe that, in all contemporary cultures, people have been robbed of their heritage, not so much because ancient culture has been destroyed, but more because today’s prevailing culture robs people of the feeling that is inherent in them, their true feeling, their true liking.

The fact is that the worldwide advance of money-based democracy has created a profound sameness which is (so far) based on falsehood, on a denial of what it really means to be human. The proper acceptance of what it means to be human, the work of creating living structure which respects that true inner structure of human beings, is a deeper and more serious matter, by far, than the minor variations which culture creates.

If we get this inner truth right, we can then afford to introduce cultural variation — indeed, it will come naturally, just because when people do what seems like “self” to them, it does come automatically. But following the mechanical objective criteria of modern participatory democracy, or of technical society, or of the money-based economy that has driven out true value from our hearts — that is only cant and hyperbole, something dressed up as good to mask something that is deeply bad.

I mean that we ask, specifically, which of the two things generates, in the observer, the most wholesome feeling?

My experiments show that, in general, people agree to a remarkable extent about which objects are more, or less, like their best, or better, or most whole selves. Very surprisingly, it appears that this judgement is independent of person-to-person differences, and independent of culture.

What is more, this form of the question creates the opportunity for growth. Even if an observer is at first confused by the question (and perhaps also by the question, “Which of the two is more alive?”), it allows him to teach himself and to grow in his ability to judge the matter.

The question forces a kind of internal development and growth in the observer, so that he or she gradually comes face to face with what wholeness really is, and is able, step by step, slowly to give up his or her own idiosyncratic ideas about what is beautiful, and replace them with a lasting accuracy of judgement.

There is an awareness of the beauty of potential that lies in each one of us which is crucial to the question. If we seek a thing which reflects this potential as well as what we have achieved, it is entirely different from choosing a thing which merely reflects the one-sided imperfection of the present idea we have of ourselves.

A thing about which we choose to say, “That looks like me” or “That looks just the way I feel”, is always one-sided, has our peculiarity in it. It will be in no sense universal and this is because, in our immaturity, we try to forget the so-called bad things about our selves, our incapacities, our weakness.

But when we look for a thing which reflects everything, both our weakness and our happiness, our vulnerability and our strength, then we enter an entirely different domain. The question takes on a different meaning, and we find that different people do usually choose the same things.

However, the surprising, and the important, thing is that the mirror-of-the-self test does not correspond to our everyday sense of what we like. When we really concentrate on the life in things by checking how much self they have, we find that sometimes, yes, the test does confirm our liking, or our preference. But at other times, it gives us quite different results, which are not stereotypes of good design but which surprise us, shock us out of our complacency, and make us recognize that we are confronted here with an autonomous phenomenon, that has a great deal to teach us.

This life or self in things is surprising, and it takes an enormous amount of attentiveness to be constantly awake to it and to keep it clear and distinct as something different from stereotyped liking or preference.

What we do as artists, in the realm of building, really depends on what we like. What society builds depends on ideas that are shared about what people like. But contemporary ideas of what is likable are extremely confused.

It is a current dogma that you may like what you wish, and that it is an essential part of democratic freedom to like whatever you decide to like. This occurs at a time when the mass media have taken over our ideas of what is likable to an extent unknown in human history. Thus if one were pessimistic, one might even say that there is very little authentic liking in our time. What people like can often not be trusted, because it does not come from the heart.

Liking something from the heart means that it makes us more whole in ourselves. It has a healing effect on us. It makes us more human. It even increases the life in us. Further, I believe that this liking from the heart is connected to perception of real structures in the world, that it goes to the very root of the way things are, and that it is the only way in which we can see structures as they really are.

The essential thing is that, when we really like something, we generally agree on it. This is so shockingly different from modern ideas that it needs to be discussed very carefully.

The main breakthrough in understanding will come when we are able to distinguish the everyday kind of liking (where we obviously do not agree about what we like) from the deeper kind of liking where […] we do agree. Ultimately it will be this deeper kind of liking, where we agree, that forms the basis for good judgement in the realm of architecture.

The crux of my argument will be to show that the deeper kind of liking not only exists but also corresponds exactly to the presence of living structure, and to objective and structural life.

Nowadays, since use of this empirical method has become the cornerstone of my method of practice, my colleagues and I do not exclusively use the mirror-of-the-self test. It is a little too exotic for daily use, a little too eyebrow-raising for everyday professional work. In recent years, when making comparisons between possible building designs, we are more likely to ask ourselves which fills us with the greatest feeling of our own life, which has the most life, which touches the soul most deeply, which one creates the greatest sensation of wholeness in us. It is this, above all, which is the cornerstone of the test, the observation that the systems with the most life have the greatest impact on our own wholeness.

I find that for daily use, the [test] that works best is the question: “Comparing A and B, which one makes me feel the most wholeness in myself, which allows me to come closest to my own life, which makes me experience life most deeply?” It is not always easy to answer this question, but it is usually possible.

The key to this method, as practiced by Buddhists, is to recognize the inner states which are wholesome, and then to move toward those phenomena in the inner and outer world which cause or tend to create this state of wholesomeness in the observer and in which wholesomeness is considered to be the most important and most fundamental internal condition.

The idea is that our feeling is not merely a subjective and changing thing, but that it itself is a reliable instrument — and that the condition, or state of this feeling, is a source of objective truth. It is, in the end, this measuring technique that provides one mainstay of the claim that degree of life is an empirically observable quality in the world.

1. Which of the two seems to generate a greater feeling of life in me?
2. Which of the two makes me more aware of my own life?
3. Which of the two induces a greater harmony in me, in my body and in my mind?
4. Which of the two makes me feel a greater wholesomeness in myself?
5. Considering my self as a whole that embraces all my dimensions and many internal opposites, I then ask which of the two is more like my best self, or which of the two seems more like a picture of my eternal self?
6. Which of the two makes me feel devotion, or inspires devotion in me?
7. Which of the two makes me more aware of God, or makes me feel closer to God?
8. When I try to observe the expanding and contracting of my humanity, which of the two causes a greater expansion of my humanity?
9. Which of the two has more feeling in it or, more accurately, which of the two makes me experience a deeper feeling of unity in myself?
   

All these tests have in common the fact that they ask observers to be very truthful indeed about the extent to which they are experiencing greater or lesser wholeness in themselves, while they are in the presence of the systems being measured or compared. The observer is thus asked to report an interior experience while in the presence of the things being compared.

One nicely unassuming and straightforward version, still essentially of the same test, was described by Michael N. Corbett in A Better Place to Live: “I became keenly aware of a pleasant feeling and, at that time, realized that architecture should be judged by how people feel when they are using the space for what it is designed for…”

It is not only human situations which cause the expanding and contracting of my humanity. It is everything in my surroundings, my experience, the physical world I pass through, the activities and actions I encounter. Even architectural details are like this. They support me, or they deny me, in varying degrees. An ordinary iron railing may be very positive. It is no big thing, but as I look at it, as I am aware of being with it, very, very slightly I feel more of a person, a little bit more valuable. Or, on another occasion, I may be looking at a thermostat on the wall, I may feel the opposite. The thermostat itself — the box — is not ugly. It is just ordinary. But when I contemplate it, and contemplate the state I am in as a result of being with that thing in that box, very, very slightly I feel less of a person, and my humanity is falling off again.

A thing with more living structure makes me more of a person, another thing with less living structure makes me less of a person. All the time, as I go through the world, I feel the expanding and diminishing of my humanity. Of course it comes from me and is caused by me, but it is caused, too, by my interaction with the world; and it is different for the different things which I encounter. (Christopher Alexander)

63. The living structure of the world and the very nature of our human self

09 December 2021 13:59

The living structure of the world is not only real and objective, but also tied inextricably, it seems, to the very nature of our human self.

One can hardly doubt, then, that the physical structure of the world, and especially the world of buildings where we spend most of our time, has a massive effect on us; that our good fortune, our future, our very ability to live, is profoundly tied up with the presence or absence of living structure in the world around us.

I shall argue that the geometry of the physical world — its space — has the most profound impact possible on human beings: it has impact on the most important of all human qualities, our inner freedom, or the sense of life each person has. It touches on internal freedom, freedom of the spirit.

I shall argue that the right kind of physical environment, when it has living structure, nourishes freedom of the spirit in human beings. In the wrong kind, lacking living structure, freedom of the spirit can be destroyed or weakened.

Our emotional freedom, our spirit, is nurtured and supported by those environments which are themselves alive. In an environment which has living structure each of us tends, more easily, to become alive. (Christopher Alexander)

64. A Living Environment

09 December 2021 14:06

A living environment is one which encourages, allows, each person to react appropriately to what happens, hence to be free, hence to encourage the most fruitful development in each person. This is an environment which goes as far as possible in allowing people’s tendencies, their inner forces, to run loose, so that they can take care, by themselves, of their own development. It is an environment in which a person is free to grow, if she wishes to grow, and to do so where, and how, she chooses.

This environment will be, by character and in structure, something far less ordered in the superficial sense than we architects may imagine. It will be more rambling, with a deeper kind of order than we have come to expect from our profession, something more like the rock pool with its hundreds of species, a subtle biological order containing vast structure, but seeming, on the surface and geometrically, almost disorderly. (Christopher Alexander)

65. The essence of life is patterns that persist in the face of fluctuations.

15 December 2021 16:01

We don’t need “the global village”; we need a “globe of villages”.

And when I say need here I don’t mean it in an ethical, or moral, or aesthetic sense. I mean it in the most practical sense: in order to survive we must re-localize.

The global village idea is a non-starter. It misses that complex adaptive systems of a certain class typically have a characteristic scale. That is, a certain size at which they necessarily are realized. Nearly every adult human being you will ever meet will be between five and seven feet tall. And you will not find a land mammal larger than an elephant. Simply, a bigger elephant can’t exist — it would collapse on itself.

So it is with the village. You can’t just inflate it to arbitrary proportions and get the same kind of thing, or expect to get something that works at all, that doesn’t collapse on itself. In attempting to create a massive village, you destroy everything that makes something a “village” to begin with.

But it’s not just the “global village” that won’t work. It’s all of the global designs that those with large-scale agendas are trying to shove us into. They won’t work because they can’t work — something that would dissuade their architects if they understood it.

The essence of life is patterns that persist in the face of fluctuations.

The demand for a global order is often framed in a way that acknowledges this simple truth: for instance calls that we must act in unison at the global scale to combat climate change.

The problem is that most of our problems are not global, but much more local. And the danger of committing to a global order to address the large problems, are the constraints that make it impossible to address the smaller-but-no-less-crucial ones. Locally, we must be free to address problems that arise, including those that that no one foresaw. If we are over-constrained by a large-scale design we will not be able to do that.

And this is why localism is coming, whether we want it or not. And we can do this the easy way, or the hard way.

Problems don’t come in a single size: some are very small, some are very large, and crucially, many are in-between. Libertarians recognize the very-small; those who demand a global order recognize the very-large; the medium-sized problems demand that we act as local communities — relatively free from the demands of a global order but in a way that coordinates local actors for addressing threats to local sociocultural persistence.

In technical terms what we need is multiscale variety. We need to be able to respond to the myriad challenges we face, and in order to do that we need a variety of possible responses, and we need their scale to match the scales of the problems themselves.

In political speak we often hear of the need for diversity. But this is typically framed as something that occurs only at the resolution of the individual. That is, “diversity” is meant to imply diverse individuals as part of some larger common aggregate. The ideological battle line becomes “diversity of background” vs. “diversity of thought”. But both of these notions, while perfectly valid to strive for in various setting, miss that in order to have “diversity” at any scale larger than the individual, we need patches of humans that are “less diverse” locally. Diversity at one scale only is an impoverished kind of diversity.

We don’t only want diverse individuals, we need diverse cultures, diverse ways of life, diverse villages. (Joe Norman)

66. When the best leader leads, the people say we did it ourselves.

15 December 2021 16:13

My experience as a manager – and in particular, as the leader of a company – has been shaped by two quotes that have helped frame my thinking about that role. One is from Harold Geneen, who oversaw the growth of ITT into the first modern conglomerate:

“The skill of management is achieving your objectives through the efforts of others.”

This view of management suggests the classic manager, somebody who figures out what needs to be done and who needs to do it. I appreciate this concept -- because the skill of management is indeed achieving your objectives through the effort of others. But I’ve also worked within the framing of another quote, this one from Edwin Schlossberg, about writing.

“The skill of writing is to create a context in which other people can think.”

The idea behind this – that leadership entails a responsibility to create an opportunity for others -- has really shaped my thinking because most of my leadership experience has been in running a company. And that role is largely about seeing the potential in people and projects, and creating a context where creativity can happen.

So how do you go about creating a context where people can think and work, where they can be creative and productive? Anyone who’s ridden a horse knows that the secret to success is getting the horse to think that it’s doing what it wants. I believe that when people feel like somebody else is telling them what to do, they’re likely to resist. Whereas, if they think it’s what they themselves want, they’re more likely to sign up. Lao Tzu said something like this 2,500 years ago: when the best leader leads, the people say we did it ourselves.

This is particularly true in our business – which is primarily publishing and conferences -- because most of our products are created by people who don’t work for us. Our books, for example, are written by users. We put out a plausible idea of something we want to get done, and we have to find someone who likes that idea and wants to do it, too. We manage the process, we give them coaching, and we bring in people to review their work. And we try to keep in mind that, in a loose structure like this, there will be differing viewpoints about the right approach. I like Larry Wall’s Perl slogan, “There’s more than one way to do it,” because I don’t think there’s only one answer.

Take the book Programming Perl. When I first reviewed it, I thought, I could spend six months remaking this book to be the book I would have written. Or, I could say, “Wow, it’s really good just the way it is. Even though it’s not the book I’d have done myself.” So I blessed it and sent it through. And it’s gained a reputation as one of the best-written programming books out there.

I remember another situation where the editor was really fixated on putting out a certain kind of book. She spent two years working with the authors, hoping to cajole them into doing something other than what they were originally imagining. She just couldn’t let go. I finally said to her, “There’s a book here, but it’s a different one than you’re imagining.” I was able to help her see that that her role now was to help the authors tell their story as best we could.

Of course, this doesn’t mean you give up your vision for what’s true. Indeed, maintaining that perspective on what’s true is a crucial factor in leadership and intelligence. There are different kinds of intelligence. One kind is essentially algorithmic and manipulative. People with this kind of intelligence are good at manipulating large volumes of data. Then there are other people who aren’t as good at manipulating symbols, but they’re geniuses at looking at a situation and understanding what’s really going on. The smartest people have both these qualities. They can look at the world fresh, they can look at something and say, “Wow, I see what this can be.”

Some of the best leaders, people who have both of these types of intelligence, are able to lead by describing their vision of what something could be and then enlisting others to pursue that goal with them. Steve Jobs is one such leader. He’s a testament to the power of the aesthetic. Many people have thought, time and again, that Jobs screwed up because Apple didn’t go with the dominant paradigm. Each time, he’s been able to come back again because he has a compelling vision that he’s been able to sell to people. Some people call this the “Steve Jobs reality distortion field,” but it’s really about him creating a compelling vision that others are willing to follow.

I’ve experienced some of that at my own company. One of my key employees told me that in meetings with me, she would find herself agreeing with the things I said. But after going away and thinking about it, she would realize she didn’t really agree with me at all. But in person, I had been able to persuade her of my vision.

That was an effective tactic when my company was small and we all worked closely together. However, when my company grew beyond about 50 people, I realized I had to change the way I managed because the group was getting too large to hold everyone in my “reality distortion field.” The feeling of letting go reminded me of when I was in high school, and I used to sneak out at night in my father’s car. So that he wouldn’t hear me, I would push it out of the driveway and down the block before I started the engine. I would be pushing the car, and there would be this feeling that I was pushing on this thing, and gradually it would start to roll on its own. That’s like the feeling I had with the people in my company: Once the momentum was going, I had to let go and let people move on their own.

Now, as head of a larger organization, I check in with people and set them free to do their own thing with the expectation that their trajectory will bring them to a place we both want to be. There’s a science fiction book I read early in my career that was very influential in my thinking on this, a book called Rissa Kerguelen by F. M. Busby. One of the key concepts is that as you get closer to the speed of light, one of the Einsteinian paradoxes is that the inertial frame is different and time goes much more slowly for the person traveling at high speed. Many science fiction stories deal with this, where the traveler returns and everybody else is so old. So in this book, Rissa Kerguelen, there’s a part on interstellar voyages, and the characters have to plan that they’re going to show up 15 years later by planetary time. So the idea is you have to set something in motion and then meet up with it later. And there’s something very powerful in that image, the fact that you can set something in motion and then rendezvous with it later.

This independent effort can be very good for the company, and often the role of the leader is to let people run with it. I’ve had that relationship with Dale Dougherty. A great many things that are attributed to me, he played a major role in. He was the guy who originally got us into the World Wide Web. He was the guy who came up with the name “Web 2.0.” He’s currently the publisher of MAKE magazine. The way we work together sometimes feels like a dance in which Dale goes off and does his own thing, and then we come back together again to make it a central part of the business. Sometimes it feels like a sibling relationship where we’re struggling over who’s driving the bus. Other times we’re really in harmony. And ultimately, I believe this tension is very good for a company. You want people who have their own vision, people who will occasionally argue with you, but who agree on a shared vision of the truth. And then you set people free to pursue that idea on their own. (Andrew Stellman and Jennifer Greene)

67. Creating Rituals

15 December 2021 16:34

Making your own rituals is a powerful way to claim your spirituality. But for some of us it’s new territory, and a scary place to dip our feet.

Intention

There are four broad intentions that encompass most (not all) rituals:

Release - Do you need to let something go? A person, event, season of life, expectation, fear, grief?

Summoning - Do you need to call something to you? Courage, your power, money, wisdom? This can also be called manifestation.

Connection - Do you have a deity or ancestor you want to connect with? (Think of this one like date night with the divine. You’re just there to get to know one another.)

Remembering - Is there an important date or time of year you want to honor?

Other - Whatever your intention, describe it to yourself as best you can. It may help to write it down.

If you pick up other people’s energy and emotions like I do, or if you work in a field like tarot reading or reiki, developing a releasing ritual is especially important. For example, I light a candle for each client when I start a tarot reading, symbolizing making a connection. Then, when I’m done, I blow it out to symbolize severing the connection and any lingering feelings that went along with it.

Place

It can be helpful to choose a place that’s conducive to your intention. We tend to know where we need to perform the ritual, so if you’re not sure, take a walk or a drive and see where it leads you (even if it leads you back home).

Choosing the place - Do you need privacy? Would you like to be indoors or outdoors? Is there a special place that has spiritual significance for you or relates to your intention? Or a place where you feel particularly at peace?

Creating sacred space - This is where you make a physical home for what you’re about to do in the spiritual realm. You can mark this space with crystal points, rope, salt, smoke, or even just your imagination.

I usually practice ritual at home, where I have privacy to say whatever weird things come out of my mouth. Occasionally, when my feelings are too big to be contained indoors, I go to a lake and draw my sacred space in the dirt beside the water.

Time

Here are some cycles that affect some people’s rituals. Feel your way around them and find out if they are right for you.

Lunar cycle - Do you experience changes in energy around the new or full moon? (This is a big one for me.)

Menstrual cycle - Is there a time in your cycle when it feels right to slow down and perform a ritual?

Astrological calendar - Are you affected by retrogrades, eclipses, or other astrological events? (I particularly pay attention to Mercury retrogrades.)

Religious calendar - Is there a traditional religious calendar you’d like to honor, like the Wheel of the Year or the Church Calendar?

Personal calendar - Are there any personal dates during the year that are important to you, like birthdays or anniversaries? (I celebrate J.R.R. Tolkien’s birthday every year, usually by smoking pipe tobacco, because his stories have played such a central role in my life.)

Natural calendar - How do the seasons affect your energy?

It may be helpful for you to mark these events on a calendar so you can gauge your energy around them. No two people react the same.

Words

You don’t have to use words, but they can be powerful in helping you focus your intention.

Compose your own words - What is your intention? How can you best express this in words? (It may help to write them down.)

Say what comes in the moment - Does it feel right to spontaneously speak instead of compose words?

Use old words - Is there something that expresses your intention better than you could put it in your own words? Are there words so old and well used that you feel they have additional power behind them?

Names - If you are remembering someone after their death, it may help to say their name aloud.

Hybrid - Does it feel right to include several of these elements?

One weird tip here: Whatever words you decide to use, I’d recommend speaking out loud. It feels really weird, and is why I do most of my rituals at home. But there are two reasons I do it anyways:

The first is that it makes my intention seem more real in the breathing world after I speak it aloud. The second is that, especially when saying what comes in the moment, I’ve surprised myself with what comes out of my mouth. The barriers between spirit and body tend to be thinner during ritual, so you can bring out some pretty rich stuff.

Sound

Sound can help build a mood, focus your thoughts, or put you in a different state of mind.

Music - Are there any songs that help build your intention - a religious song that connects you to your deity or a song that reminds you of the person you’re honoring?

Sound clearing - Sound clearing is when you disperse built up energy using sound waves. Is there a point in the ritual, like the beginning or end, where you’d like to break the energy? What would you like to use to do this - a chime, clapping your hands, an instrument? (This is particularly useful in releasing rituals.)

Ambient sounds - Do you need sounds in the background to help you focus, like wind in the trees, running water, or soft music?

I tend to gravitate towards old Christian hymns when I’m performing ritual. My family has sung them to me since I was a baby, so they are familiar, and I think there is a buildup of power in a song that’s been sung for centuries. (One of my favorites, Be Thou My Vision, can trace its tune back about 1300 years.)

Sacred Objects

There are no wrong objects to bring into a ritual. The only requirement is that they are meaningful to you.

Props - These set the mood. Are there any candles, crystals, or decorative elements you’d like to include? Not everything has to mean something - beauty can be reason enough on its own.

Talismans - Are there any objects that remind you of your intention - something that comforts you, an icon of your deity or power, a picture of a loved one? Or, is there a tarot or oracle card that represents your intention? (For example, I’ve used the Ace of Pentacles as a talisman during a ritual to bless someone in their new job.)

Traditional elements - Are there any traditional religious elements you’d like to include, like salt or bread and wine?

Body Language

Body language doesn’t just communicate with the people around us. It also communicates how we want to feel to ourselves.

Posture - Does is feel right to stand, sit on the floor or in a chair, kneel, bow your forehead to the earth, or lie down?

Hand motions - Are there hand motions you hold as sacred, such as palms together or the sign of the cross? Are there any hand motions that would help you express your intention, like palms to the sky to indicate receiving whatever you’re summoning?

During my rituals, I usually kneel. I see this as a sign of surrender to Spirit, who is greater than me, and acceptance of my own vulnerability in that moment. The only time I kneel in my life is during ritual or prayer, so using that posture helps focus my mind on the task at hand.

Smells

Smell can help focus you in the moment and build memories that make your practice richer over time.

Sage - Traditionally used as an energy cleansing herb. You can use the oil, a sage-scented mist, or smoke.

Essential oils - Is there a scent that helps you with your intention, like lavender for calming emotions?

Incense - Used for centuries to indicate sacred presence or purpose. I never burn incense to scent my home - I only use it for ritual so my brain will equate the smell of incense with focusing on spiritual things.

Plants - Are there certain plants you use for sacred or healing purposes? Plants can function as both talismans and scents in rituals.

Smudging - Smudging is the practice of using fragrant smoke to represent intention. You may want to waft smoke over yourself, your space, or certain objects to purify them. I usually do this with incense before drawing cards for a client to clear anything that could negatively impact the reading.

A few final notes:

Breathe - Breathe. Be present. This ritual is for you, so there’s no chance of getting it wrong.

Be safe- Make sure you don’t put open flame near fabric or carpet. Turn on fans if you’re burning incense or sage indoors. Have a plan for extinguishing fires before you begin, just in case.

Respect the environment - If you’re performing a ritual outdoors, put the space back the way you found it. Don’t leave anything behind, and be especially careful with open flame in wooded areas.

(When performing a ritual outside, I try to use objects around me so I don’t accidentally leave something. When I’m done I brush out circles I’ve made in the dirt.)

Make space for doubt- If thoughts like “This is stupid” come up, make space for them. Doubt is not a hindrance - in fact, it can be the tool on which you sharpen your spirituality.

(And you’d better believe I feel stupid when I’m holding a stick of incense in a crystal circle and babbling out loud about whatever I’m releasing. Whatever. I’ll do it anyways, because it helps.)

Make space for whatever feelings arise - Sometimes unexpected feelings come up during rituals. Give yourself space to process them afterward.

It’s ok to try things that don’t work for you - How else will you know what does work?

Be patient- Remember, ritual is just stating an intention. That’s a powerful thing, but it doesn’t mean that you’ll immediately be able to, for example, release grief. It just means you’ve started the process with focus and intention.

I know a little more about what I’m doing when it comes to ritual, but I’m still changing, growing, learning about what works and what doesn’t work for me. My hope in writing this is that you’ll also start experimenting and finding out what practices feed your soul.

May your rituals bring you peace, purpose, growth, and power. (Trish Finley)

68. Vanity Runs, Love Digs

16 December 2021 12:17

You feel you are hedged in; you dream of escape; but beware of mirages. Do not run or fly away in order to get free: rather dig in the narrow place which has been given you; you will find God there and everything. God does not float on your horizon, he sleeps in your substance. Vanity runs, love digs. If you fly away from yourself, your prison will run with you and will close in because of the wind of your flight; if you go deep down into yourself it will disappear in paradise. (Gustave Thibon)

69. The wall of the artery is no prison to the blood

16 December 2021 12:28

Our limitations are inseparable from all that is deepest in us, from our resources, from our life: it is by means of them that we breathe, that we exist at all. When we overstep them, we think to enrich ourselves, but all we do is to lose our way. It is our limitations that guard our strength and our unity. We live within them as blood in the arteries; the wall of the artery is no prison to the blood and we don’t open an artery to ‘liberate’ the blood. But there is a way of emancipating humanity, politically & scientifically, that is uncommonly like the opening of an artery. (Gustave Thibon, Back to Reality)

70. Men did not love Rome because she was great. She was great because they had loved her.

16 December 2021 12:39

Let us suppose we are confronted with a desperate thing—say Pimlico. If we think what is really best for Pimlico we shall find the thread of thought leads to the throne of the mystic and the arbitrary. It is not enough for a man to disapprove of Pimlico; in that case he will merely cut his throat or move to Chelsea. Nor, certainly, is it enough for a man to approve of Pimlico; for then it will remain Pimlico, which would be awful. The only way out of it seems to be for somebody to love Pimlico; to love it with a transcendental tie and without any earthly reason. If there arose a man who loved Pimlico, then Pimlico would rise into ivory towers and golden pinnacles… If men loved Pimlico as mothers love children, arbitrarily, because it is theirs, Pimlico in a year or two might be fairer than Florence. Some readers will say that this is mere fantasy—I answer that this is the actual history of mankind. This, as a fact, is how cities did grow great. Go back to the darkest roots of civilization and you will find them knotted round some sacred stone or encircling some sacred well. People first paid honour to a spot and afterwards gained glory for it. Men did not love Rome because she was great. She was great because they had loved her. (G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy)

“Do you ever think,” he asked reflectively, “what it must mean to a woman to know that her husband has met with her father to settle the lowest price for which she can be bought? And then later, when all the women talk, as women do, they boast of what their husbands paid for them. One says four cows, another maybe six. How does she feel, the woman who was sold for one or two? This could not happen to my Sarita.” “I wanted Sarita to be happy of course. But I wanted more than that. You say she’s different from the way they remember her back on the island. This is true. Many things change a woman. Things that happen inside, things that happen outside. But the thing that matters most is what she thinks about herself. Back home, Sarita believed she was worth nothing. Now she knows she is worth more than any other woman on the islands.” “Don’t get me wrong. I wanted to marry Sarita. I loved her and no other woman.” “But,” he finished softly, “I wanted an EIGHT-COW wife.” (Johnny Lingo and his 8 Cow Wife)

71. The man that lives in a small community lives in a much larger world

16 December 2021 13:08

(G.K. Chesterton)

72. Only the spiritual man, striking his roots deep in infinite and eternal life, can be a true creator.

16 December 2021 14:09

It must be recognised that man in his limited and relative earthly life is capable of bringing about the beautiful and the valuable only when he believes in another life, unlimited, absolute, eternal. That is a law of his being. A contact with this mortal life exclusive of any other ends in the wearing-away of effective energy and a self satisfaction that makes one useless and superficial. Only the spiritual man, striking his roots deep in infinite and eternal life, can be a true creator. (Nikolai Berdyaev)

73. Act as does the creator of a statue that is to be made beautiful

16 December 2021 14:12

Withdraw into yourself and look. And if you do not find yourself beautiful yet, act as does the creator of a statue that is to be made beautiful: he cuts away here, he smoothes there, he makes this line lighter, this other purer, until a lovely face has grown upon his work. So do you also: cut away all that is excessive, straighten all that is crooked, bring light to all that is overcast, labour to make all one glow of beauty and never cease chiselling your statue, until there shall shine out on you from it the godlike splendour of virtue, until you shall see the perfect goodness surely established in the stainless shrine. (Plotinus, The Enneads)

74. The baby and the dragon

17 December 2021 19:03

Fairy tales, then, are not responsible for producing in children fear, or any of the shapes of fear; fairy tales do not give the child the idea of the evil or the ugly; that is in the child already, because it is in the world already. Fairy tales do not give the child his first idea of bogey. What fairy tales give the child is his first clear idea of the possible defeat of bogey. The baby has known the dragon intimately ever since he had an imagination. What the fairy tale provides for him is a St. George to kill the dragon. (G.K. Chesterton)

75. Little communities are the only way that human society will be able to survive

17 December 2021 19:09

Think of the waves in the ocean. They are not controllable, so if we want security, we carve out a little land and make a harbor. As a result, the same body of water that throws out huge waves in the open sea adjusts their dimensions to the size of the body it encounters, and thus there are only little waves in the harbor. So the answer to the oceanic magnitudes of our great powers is to adopt the harbor philosophy—to create, as the Dutch have done with their dikes, not a dam but a small wall, a harbor, a refuge; to try, bit by bit, to live in little communities, which is the only way that human society will be able to survive. (Leopold Kohr)

Wherever something is wrong, something is too big. If the stars in the sky or the atoms of uranium disintegrate in spontaneous explosion, it is not because their substance has lost its balance. It is because matter has attempted to expand beyond the impassable barriers set to every accumulation. Their mass has become too big. If the human body becomes diseased, it is, as in cancer, because a cell, or a group of cells, has begun to outgrow its allotted narrow limits. And if the body of a people becomes diseased with the fever of aggression, brutality, collectivism, or massive idiocy, it is not because it has fallen victim to bad leadership or mental derangement. It is because human beings, so charming as individuals or in small aggregations, have been welded into overconcentrated social units such as mobs, unions, cartels, or great powers. (Leopold Kohr)

76. To be rooted is perhaps the most important and least recognized need of the human soul

17 December 2021 19:13

(Simone Weil)

77. Grow more = growing up

21 December 2021 13:22

It’s nothing we can build. We can only grow it. Set conditions. Tend and nurture. Weed when necessary. (Joe Norman)

After almost forty years of growing all manner of plants, I have almost learned how to garden. I am convinced that gardening is the most difficult of the arts. Not only must the gardener master the elements of design and color, she must also study and learn the features and requirements of plants and come to understand the idiosyncrasies of her particular piece of land and the climate in which she gardens. As if that weren't enough, the ficklenesses of weather-the hailstorm that shreds the irises, the wind that takes down ancient trees, the drought that shrivels the corn, the frost that wipes out the tomatoes are a constant source of frustration. Neglect the garden for a season and it all but disappears in a sea of weeds. At times it seems just too difficult. And, of course, it can be devilishly expensive, Better to abandon the whole garden and take an extended trip.

But, the garden provides such an intriguing challenge and is such a source of wonder and joy that not to garden is unthinkable. Every year features many unexpected delights-self-sown plant combinations that, in addition to being incredibly beautiful, are humbling, as they are usually far more successful than the gardener's most carefully planned efforts. The morning walk through the garden to see what has emerged from the soil or come into bloom is a perfect start to the day. And even weeding, which many people (usually nongardeners) consider a tedious chore, can be an immensely absorbing and satisfying way to spend an afternoon. Those of us fortunate enough to live in the north have the winter in which to recover and dream about next year's garden. I know that as long as I can clutch a trowel I will be a gardener. In the words of a Chinese proverb, "If you would be happy for life, plant a garden." (MARY AZARIAN)

It takes a while to grasp that not all failures are self-imposed, the result of ignorance, carelessness or inexperience. It takes a while to grasp that a garden isn't a testing ground for character and to stop asking, what did I do wrong? Maybe nothing. (Eleanor Perenyi)

I have spoken to plants myself, and if pressed for conclusions would have to say that those I threatened did better than those I - well, I wouldn't say prayed over, but pleaded with, cajoled. A rhododendron that hadn't bloomed for six years was flatly told it would be removed the following year if there were no flowers. Need I say that it has bloomed profusely ever since? (Eleanor Perenyi)

Americans resent the vagaries of weather to a degree unknown to other peoples. ... Weather is a force we have lost touch with. We feel entitled to dominate it, like everything else in the environment, and when we can't are more panic-stricken than primitives who know that when nature is out of control they can only pray to the gods. (Eleanor Perenyi)

There's no one size fits all answer. Read what inspires you, and don't wait to start doing. Don't fall prey to analysis paralysis. Start gardening in containers in an apartment window if you need to. Feel the joy of your first seedlings sprouting in egg cartons. Whatever it takes. (Joe Norman)

Every single tomato I grow feels much more like an f u to the ruling regime than any amount of bitcoin I could acquire. (Joe Norman)

I think you also "grow" happiness. It's an indirect process. (Joe Norman)

78. I love the paths that I invent

27 December 2021 13:23

It's the money that forces you to live like everyone else, that pushes you on the beaten track, in popular places, among the same people that you have not chosen. I love the paths that I invent, the useless relationships, the things without fame, and all that is only valid for me. (Jacques Chardonne)

79. Sleep

29 December 2021 11:27

Common Wisdom Invariants

If you have trouble sleeping, I’m sure you’ve heard these all before. In my experience they are necessary but not sufficient.

1. Exercise regularly.
2. Limit caffeine and alcohol consumption.
3. Don’t eat late at night.
4. Don’t nap.
5. Wind down an hour before bed.
6. Invest in your bed. Keep your bedroom dark and cool.
   

Unintuitive New Invariants

The gist here is: “don’t force it and don’t hang out in bed.”

1. Never get in bed and try to sleep because “it’s bedtime”. Only get in bed when you are dying to go to bed.
2. If you’re in bed for more than 20 minutes and haven’t fallen asleep yet, get out and do something else.
3. Get out of bed right away when you wake up in the morning. Don’t linger and don’t try to sleep in.
4. Don’t change your day based on your quality of sleep. No matter how bad it was, don’t deviate from your normal routine — don’t cancel meetings, don’t skip a workout, don’t try to sleep earlier the following evening.

The Algorithm

The gist here is: “sleep a lot less before you can sleep more.”

1. Start out by setting a wake up time that leaves you plenty of time in the morning. For me, this was 6 a.m.
2. Pick a target sleep time that leaves you with about two hours of sleep less than you think you need. For me, this was midnight.
3. Treat the target sleep time as a goalpost to get past. That is, don’t sleep, nap, or get in bed before it — no matter what. And make sure to strictly abide by all the invariants above.
4. When you wake up, jot down the following:
5. When you went to bed
6. When you fell asleep
7. How long you spent awake in the middle of the night
8. When you woke up
9. When you got out of bed
10. At the end of every week, calculate the average of your time spent asleep divided by your time spent in bed each night. Like so: efficiency = average(time asleep/time in bed)
11. If efficiency < .8, push your target sleep time back even later by 20 minutes.
12. If .9 ≤ efficiency < .95, push your target sleep time up earlier by 20 minutes.
13. Otherwise, stay the course.
14. Go back to step #3. Repeat forever.
    

You are effectively running a search algorithm to find your body’s optimal schedule. The algorithm starts by finding an aggregate level of sleep low enough that your body’s need for it overpowers your mind’s obstructionism. Finding this lower bound is painful but it definitely exists. Once you’ve found it, you relax the constraint gradually as your mind builds confidence that it can indeed sleep well and that the bed is a relaxing oasis. Eventually the algorithm converges and you have a schedule that works without any of the bookkeeping. You still need to stick to the invariants so as not to trip up the rhythm you’ve locked in. If you do get knocked off track by a spike in stress or long term travel, just restart the algorithm. (Ilya Sukhar)

80. Types of Hypnotic Inductions

29 December 2021 11:54

There are many different types of hypnotic inductions. Here are 10 possibilities. Note that a single induction may utilize several combined approaches. These categories could also be broken up in different ways than I have here and I may have missed some things.

Progressive Muscle Relaxation

Goals: relax the muscles, release chronic tension (armoring)

Why: relaxation increases feeling making experiential learning easier, also literally eliminates “resistance” to suggestion/change

Advantages: teaches stress-relief skills, comfortable, memory consolidation (similar to sleep)

Disadvantages: slow (10-30 minutes) compared to instant and rapid inductions (0-4 minutes), not flashy

Examples: tense and release muscles, directly feel muscles relaxing, autogenic training, Vipassana (S.N. Goenka’s), yoga asana/stretching

Eye Fixation

Goals: focus the attention and/or tire the eyes to induce a sleepy feeling

Why: focused attention can be directed towards change, sleepy feeling leads to trance

Advantages: focuses attention, bliss

Disadvantages: difficult for some people to focus sufficiently

Examples: pick a spot on the wall, watch a candle flame, look at this moving pocket watch, look me in the eye, zazen, Dzogchen, Prajna Paramita, Shamatha-Vipassana (in Shambhala tradition), gazing into a fireplace in a dark room, light and sound machines, hypnotic spirals, television

Mental (Visual) Imagery

Goals: create a relaxed and/or focused, dream-like state of mind

Why: focused attention can be directed towards change, imagery can lead to relaxation making experiential learning easier, imagery content can itself lead to changes

Advantages: can create powerful emotional responses, great for visual thinkers, memory consolidation (similar to dreaming)

Disadvantages: hard for some people to get good visuals

Examples: imagine walking on the beach, walk down a staircase going deeper with each step, mandala visualization, psycho-cybernetics, image streaming, Metaphors of Movement, WOOP, storytelling, novels, movies and television

Auto-suggestion

Goals: repeat word or phrase to focus or dull attention, and/or generate emotion, give direct suggestions

Why: focused attention can be directed towards change, generating emotion can lead to experiential learning

Advantages: minimalist approach, easy to remember

Disadvantages: repetitive/mind-numbing, affirmations can sometimes backfire, slow compared to some methods (10-20+ minutes)

Examples: Transcendental Meditation, mantra recitation, chanting, affirmations, autogenic training

Fractionation

Goal: go in and out of trance over and over

Why: deepen trance through learning effect

Advantages: deepen trance quickly, useful for stage hypnosis and medical/dental hypnosis, or any context in which time is limited

Disadvantages: can be uncomfortable or make you feel loopy

Examples: Vogt’s fractionation, Elman induction, countdown deepeners that go back up numbers (“10, 9, 8, 9, 8…”), stage hypnosis where participants are brought into an open-eyed state then dropped back into trance, repeatedly doing rapid inductions with awakening

Overload

Goal: overwhelm the 7 +/- 2 items the conscious mind can track

Why: bypass conscious objections to create experiential learning or involve your whole being

Advantages: useful for overly analytical or distracted minds

Disadvantages: can be uncomfortable or create unresourceful feelings of overwhelm

Examples: double (or more) induction, double embedded metaphor or complex stories with open loops, some NLP New Code Games, light and sound machines, Chöd (as practiced by Lama Tsultrim Allione’s community), any complex religious or magickal ritual, some yoga instruction (following many pointers at once) and sports instruction (e.g. golf swing), LSD-25

Confusion

Goals: create a state where a person seeks meaning

Why: bypass rational and critical thinking, or deconstruct existing meanings

Advantages: useful for overly analytical minds, can be humorous/absurd

Disadvantages: people hate feeling confused, can be extremely uncomfortable or used for manipulative ends (social engineering)

Examples: ambiguous language, puns, kinesthetic ambiguity (handshake induction), all pattern interrupts, countdown deepeners that skip numbers, most television commercials, many natural negative imprint experiences (harmful hypnosis), Zen koans, Provocative Change Works, glossolalia, paradoxical and absurd tasks (e.g. prescribing the symptom, shaking medicine tasks), psychedelics, how politicians dodge difficult questions

Shock

Goal: create a PGO spike (startle response)

Why: rapid learning via “neurological superhighway”

Advantages: extremely quick induction (seconds), good for immediate action, flashy, good for stage/street hypnosis

Disadvantages: mildly stressful, not ideal for long-term memory consolidation

Examples: all instant inductions, any induction where you shout “Sleep!,” evangelical Christian ministers who facilitate being “slain in the Spirit,” many television commercials, many natural negative imprint experiences (harmful hypnosis)

Hypnotic Phenomena

Goal: induce symptoms of trance directly

Why: "Anything that assumes trance causes trance." --Clark L. Hull, Hypnosis and Suggestibility, 1933

Advantages: fast and effective, flashy, good for stage/street hypnosis, good convincer

Disadvantages: often involves touch which can make some people uncomfortable, can be too “weird” for some people

Example: little shelf, single finger catalepsy, autogenic training, REM induction, (some) deep breathing, “Hypnosis Without Trance,” Automatic Imagination Model, sitting for long periods in meditation or holding particular postures (e.g. horse stance), and anything that induces catalepsy (waxy immobility of the muscles), heaviness or warmth, harmless visual hallucinations, negative hallucinations, perceptual changes, selective amnesia, time distortions, involuntary (ideomotor) movement, or other trance phenomena

Flow

Goal: induce a spontaneous, creative flow state and/or make new connections between things

Why: creative solutions can spontaneously present themselves in a flow state, catharsis, or making connections provides new insight

Advantages: often involves moving the body (unlike virtually all other inductions), good exercise, flow state is highly creative, feel alive

Disadvantages: many people find spontaneous expression awkward or embarrassing, catharsis by itself is not very effective, may require specialized instruction, can be manic, energy released can be unfocused

Examples: seiki jutsu, spontaneous qigong (zi fa gong), 5 rhythms, authentic movement, Animal Flow, TACFIT Warrior, tai chi, NLP New Code Games, the flow arts (juggling, poi, devil’s sticks, etc.), Andrey Lappa’s Dance of Shiva, glossolalia, “soul singing,” automatic writing, “morning pages,” freestyle rap, automatic drawing, improvisational jazz, improv comedy, religious practices of the Kalahari Bushmen, kids under age 5

Other potential possibilities:

Breathing: can be “symptoms of trance,” but could also be its own thing.

Precision: similar to overload, doing anything very precisely can induce trance. Submodality changes, Iyengar yoga, precise practicing of a musical instrument, etc. fit this category.

Awareness: sometimes overlaps with PMR, but also can be its own thing, especially with various meditations including verbal noting of experience (Shinzen Young’s 5 Ways, Kenneth Folk’s techniques, etc.).

Emotion or any strong feeling: overlaps with many of the above, but creating a strong emotional response is sort of its own category and can be induced with storytelling, visual imagery (tv and movies or visualization), sex, accessing memories, etc.

Exhaustion: many old religious practices use exhaustion as the gateway to trance (e.g. desert vision quests, sweat lodges, etc.), and do some contemporary religious groups and cults, and military “boot camps” too. Also shows up in all-night dance parties, multi-day backpacking trips, ultra-marathons, fasting, sleep deprivation, excessive work, etc. The downside is it takes a long time (hours or days) which means it can’t be used effectively for most therapy or coaching. Also it can create extreme group bonding — for better or worse — and sometimes be harmful to health.

Rhythm/entrainment: music is possibly the oldest trance induction, especially drumming and singing. Dancing to electronic music remains a powerful trance induction, especially when combined with trippy visuals, spontaneous dancing, exhaustion, and/or drugs. Binaural beats, isochronic tones, light and sound machines, and other such contemporary uses of tone and rhythm utilize this principle.

Progressive or repetitive obedience: get a person to do something small, then bigger, then bigger still, or alternatively do something arbitrary over and over again and this will increase obedience or willingness to follow direction as well as possibly inducing a trance state. An old punishment for children of writing a single sentence over and over again utilized this as well as auto-suggestion. Most education utilizes this, as do cults like Scientology, bad managers in large organizations (arbitrary authority), and the military. More positively, practicing anything over and over may utilize this, as does healthy, mutual dating (involving escalating commitments up to marriage and child-rearing).

Methods that don’t seem to fit any of the above categories:

Core Transformation: clearly has pre-talk, induction, deepener, suggestions, but doesn’t fit any of the above except perhaps “awareness” category. Possibly need a “wholeness” or “self-compassion” category. Self-compassion might also fit “emotion” category.

Aligning Perceptual Positions: perhaps fits “precision” and “awareness” categories, but none of the other 10 seem to fit.

The Wholeness Methods: completely different goals than any of the above methods, but clearly induces a type of trance experience, or perhaps anti-trance. Probably fits “awareness” category, and perhaps need a “wholeness” category.

81. Study hard what interests you the most in the most undisciplined, irreverent, and original manner possible.

01 January 2022 17:07

(Richard Feynman)

82. There is a kind of love called maintenance

01 January 2022 17:09

For Want of a Nail

For want of a nail the shoe was lost.

For want of a shoe the horse was lost.

For want of a horse the rider was lost.

For want of a rider the message was lost.

For want of a message the battle was lost.

For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.

And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.

Mending Wall (BY ROBERT FROST)

Something there is that doesn't love a wall,

That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,

And spills the upper boulders in the sun;

And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.

The work of hunters is another thing:

I have come after them and made repair

Where they have left not one stone on a stone,

But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,

To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,

No one has seen them made or heard them made,

But at spring mending-time we find them there.

I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;

And on a day we meet to walk the line

And set the wall between us once again.

We keep the wall between us as we go.

To each the boulders that have fallen to each.

And some are loaves and some so nearly balls

We have to use a spell to make them balance:

‘Stay where you are until our backs are turned!’

We wear our fingers rough with handling them.

Oh, just another kind of out-door game,

One on a side. It comes to little more:

There where it is we do not need the wall:

He is all pine and I am apple orchard.

My apple trees will never get across

And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.

He only says, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.’

Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder

If I could put a notion in his head:

‘Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't it

Where there are cows? But here there are no cows.

Before I built a wall I'd ask to know

What I was walling in or walling out,

And to whom I was like to give offense.

Something there is that doesn't love a wall,

That wants it down.’ I could say ‘Elves’ to him,

But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather

He said it for himself. I see him there

Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top

In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.

He moves in darkness as it seems to me,

Not of woods only and the shade of trees.

He will not go behind his father's saying,

And he likes having thought of it so well

He says again, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.’

Atlas (U.A. Fanthorpe)

There is a kind of love called maintenance

Which stores the WD40 and knows when to use it;

Which checks the insurance, and doesn’t forget

The milkman; which remembers to plant bulbs;

Which answers letters; which knows the way

The money goes; which deals with dentists

And Road Fund Tax and meeting trains,

And postcards to the lonely; which upholds

The permanently rickety elaborate

Structures of living, which is Atlas.

And maintenance is the sensible side of love,

Which knows what time and weather are doing

To my brickwork; insulates my faulty wiring;

Laughs at my dry rotten jokes; remembers

My need for gloss and grouting; which keeps

My suspect edifice upright in air,

As Atlas did the sky.

The Gas Man Cometh

'Twas on a Monday morning

The gas man came to call

The gas tap wouldn't turn, I wasn't getting gas at all

He tore out all the skirting boards to try and find the main

And I had to call a carpenter to put them back again

Oh, it all makes work for the working man to do!

'Twas on a Tuesday morning

The carpenter came round

He hammered and he chiselled and he said:

"Look what I've found!

Your joists are full of dry-rot

But I'll put them all to rights."

Then he nailed right through a cable and out went all the lights

Oh, it all makes work for the working man to do!

'Twas on a Wednesday morning

The electrician came

He called me "Mr Sanderson", which isn't quite me name

He couldn't reach the fuse box without standing on the bin

And his foot went through a window so I called a glazier in

Oh, it all makes work for the working man to do!

'Twas on the Thursday morning

The glazier came along

With his blowtorch and his putty and his merry glazier's song

He put another pane in

It took no time at all

But I had to get a painter in to come and paint the wall

Oh, it all makes work for the working man to do!

'Twas on a Friday morning

The painter made a start

With undercoats and overcoats he painted every part

Every nook and every cranny

But I found when he was gone

He'd painted over the gas tap and I couldn't turn it on!

Oh, it all makes work for the working man to do!

On Saturday and Sunday they do no work at all

So 'twas on a Monday morning that the gas man came to call!

The End and the Beginning (BY WISŁAWA SZYMBORSKA)

After every war

someone has to clean up.

Things won’t

straighten themselves up, after all.

Someone has to push the rubble

to the side of the road,

so the corpse-filled wagons

can pass.

Someone has to get mired

in scum and ashes,

sofa springs,

splintered glass,

and bloody rags.

Someone has to drag in a girder

to prop up a wall.

Someone has to glaze a window,

rehang a door.

Photogenic it’s not,

and takes years.

All the cameras have left

for another war.

We’ll need the bridges back,

and new railway stations.

Sleeves will go ragged

from rolling them up.

Someone, broom in hand,

still recalls the way it was.

Someone else listens

and nods with unsevered head.

But already there are those nearby

starting to mill about

who will find it dull.

From out of the bushes

sometimes someone still unearths

rusted-out arguments

and carries them to the garbage pile.

Those who knew

what was going on here

must make way for

those who know little.

And less than little.

And finally as little as nothing.

In the grass that has overgrown

causes and effects,

someone must be stretched out

blade of grass in his mouth

gazing at the clouds.

Naming of Parts (1942)Henry Reed

Today we have naming of parts. Yesterday,

We had daily cleaning. And tomorrow morning,

We shall have what to do after firing. But to-day,

Today we have naming of parts. Japonica

Glistens like coral in all of the neighbouring gardens,

And today we have naming of parts.

This is the lower sling swivel. And this

Is the upper sling swivel, whose use you will see,

When you are given your slings. And this is the piling swivel,

Which in your case you have not got. The branches

Hold in the gardens their silent, eloquent gestures,

Which in our case we have not got.

This is the safety-catch, which is always released

With an easy flick of the thumb. And please do not let me

See anyone using his finger. You can do it quite easy

If you have any strength in your thumb. The blossoms

Are fragile and motionless, never letting anyone see

Any of them using their finger.

And this you can see is the bolt. The purpose of this

Is to open the breech, as you see. We can slide it

Rapidly backwards and forwards: we call this

Easing the spring. And rapidly backwards and forwards

The early bees are assaulting and fumbling the flowers:

They call it easing the Spring.

They call it easing the Spring: it is perfectly easy

If you have any strength in your thumb: like the bolt,

And the breech, and the cocking-piece, and the point of balance,

Which in our case we have not got; and the almond-blossom

Silent in all of the gardens and the bees going backwards and forwards,

For today we have naming of parts.

Huswifery BY EDWARD TAYLOR

Make me, O Lord, thy Spining Wheele compleate.

Thy Holy Worde my Distaff make for mee.

Make mine Affections thy Swift Flyers neate

And make my Soule thy holy Spoole to bee.

My Conversation make to be thy Reele

And reele the yarn thereon spun of thy Wheele.

Make me thy Loome then, knit therein this Twine:

And make thy Holy Spirit, Lord, winde quills:

Then weave the Web thyselfe. The yarn is fine.

Thine Ordinances make my Fulling Mills.

Then dy the same in Heavenly Colours Choice,

All pinkt with Varnisht Flowers of Paradise.

Then cloath therewith mine Understanding, Will,

Affections, Judgment, Conscience, Memory

My Words, and Actions, that their shine may fill

My wayes with glory and thee glorify.

Then mine apparell shall display before yee

That I am Cloathd in Holy robes for glory.

83. We shall see

05 January 2022 09:46

A farmer had only one horse. One day, his horse ran away.

His neighbors said, “I’m so sorry. This is such bad news. You must be so upset.”

The man just said, “We’ll see.”

A few days later, his horse came back with twenty wild horses following. The man and his son corralled all twenty-one horses.

His neighbors said, “Congratulations! This is such good news. You must be so happy!”

The man just said, “We’ll see.”

One of the wild horses kicked the man’s only son, breaking both his legs.

His neighbors said, “I’m so sorry. This is such bad news. You must be so upset.”

The man just said, “We’ll see.”

The country went to war, and every able-bodied young man was drafted to fight. The war was terrible and killed every young man, but the farmer’s son was spared, since his broken legs prevented him from being drafted.

His neighbors said, “Congratulations! This is such good news. You must be so happy!”

The man just said, “We’ll see.”

84. Detecting Circularity

05 January 2022 14:03

The best training you can offer yourself is detecting circularity. It teaches you to think not just forward in 2nd, 3rd steps, but backward in minus 1st, 2nd steps, etc.

Modernity is full of circularities (education, citation rings, journalism, classifications, IQ, psychology...) (Nassim Taleb)

85. Falling in Love with your Work

06 January 2022 08:30

Once you decide on your occupation you must immerse yourself in your work. You have to fall in love with your work. Never complain about your job. You must dedicate your life to mastering your skill. That's the secret of success and is the key to being regarded honorably. (Jiro Ono)

All I want to do is make better sushi. I do the same thing over and over, improving bit by bit. There is always a yearning to achieve more. I'll continue to climb, trying to reach the top but no one knows where the top is. Even at my age, after decades of work I don't think I have achieved perfection. But I feel ecstatic all day. I love making sushi. That's the spirit of the shokunin. (Jiro Ono)

We are picky about who we sell to. We want customers who appreciate good fish. Even at my age I'm discovering new techniques. But just when you think you know it all, you realize that you're just fooling yourself and then you get depressed.

These days, the first thing people want is an easy job. Then, they want lots of free time. And then, they want lots of money. But they aren't thinking of building their skills. When you work at a place like Jiro's you are committing to a trade for life.

Selfless surrender after earnest effort

One who is obedient to nature receives the blessings of nature. When the craft lacks this inevitability, so does it lack strength and beauty. Rich qualities seen in folk craft are gifts from nature. When we see the beauty in them, we hear nature speak. ―Sōetsu Yanagi

Although Yanagi, as quoted above, focused more on the beauty drawn from nature through the obedience of the shokunin that appears in the craft, it is rather their positive attitude toward nature that I constantly sympathize with. Those people spend a lifetime familiarizing themselves entirely with their chosen natural materials. They ‘listen to’ the materials to understand their unique condition. Whether utilizing clay, wood, fire, or water, they build a diplomatic relationship to bring the natural elements together. But then at the end, of course, no one ever has complete control over nature. Each time is different. Each time, a surprise. When nature insists, they step back with profound respect: ‘Okay, if you say so’.

Devotion over a lifetime, and over a millennium

What makes the work of a shokunin different from that of an artist, is that such one-time creations are really the result of endless repetitions of splitting, planing and so on. It is not just from practice of my own lifetime, but from the experience handed down to me from my ancestors in a perpetual line of accumulated wisdom from ancient times. －Shuji Nakagawa

When I take guests to visit shokunin at their studios, they often ask how long it takes to make one item. The shokunin, sometimes annoyed by the question, answers: ‘A lifetime’.

What they have in common is that they have equally devoted themselves through repetitive and meditative movements over millions of times. They have become intimately connected with their natural materials and achieved the highest efficiency and elaboration.

But moreover, regardless of their background, they have both received wisdom from past generations. With every repetition, shokunin lay another thin layer of wisdom on what has been accumulated by their predecessors over thousands of years. The work of shokunin continues to evolve as each generation contributes to the tradition.

Beyond the notion of individualism

The shokunin exist as shokunin because others exist in community with them. At Asahi-yaki where I belong, there are six other shokunin. Although I can do my work all by myself, it is, after all Asahi-yaki pottery as a whole that carries on the techniques and wisdom from the past. I think shokunin are kind of people that care about what “WE” make, instead of what “I” make. – Hōsai Matsubayashi

At the end the day, shokunin make products that serve people. Whether they serve the need of their local community or work with renowned clients who have recognized their work for generations, their role in the society has not changed. In any scale or unit of the community, shokunin inherit the wisdom and techniques to master the craft for their people. It is the altruistic attitude, or ‘non-individualistic’ attitude that ties all these essence of shokunin together. (Sachiko Matsuyama)

86. Conversations

07 January 2022 10:38

In a recent conversation with Vulture’s great interviewer David Marchese, the actor and comedian Martin Short talked a bit about the process he goes through when preparing to be a guest on a late-night talk show. “What I do for a typical talk-show appearance, and I’m not exaggerating, is I’ll send in something like 18 pages ahead of time,” Short said, adding that he then spends at least ninety minutes speaking with a show’s producer, cutting down his proposed material and shaping it into a conversation he’ll have with the host. What looks almost like an organic chat on TV is really a tightly choreographed two-man bit, with Short doing, as he puts it, “an impersonation of myself being relaxed.”

He’s not alone in preparing meticulously. During his last appearance on the “Late Show with David Letterman,” in 2015, Short told a story about how his friend Steve Martin would call him, from time to time, to tell him a joke that he was readying for a “Letterman” appearance that was still months away. (And less fastidious guests are compelled by most late-night shows to at least have their material vetted before they appear.) Yet one gets the sense that, of all his peers, Short is the hardest-working talk-show guest in the business—and, as a result, he may also be the greatest. He has starred in movies, sitcoms, variety shows, and stage performances, and he even, for a season, hosted his own talk show. He’s won Emmys and a Tony and nearly every award that Canada gives out. Yet, despite his wide success, some of his greatest comedic triumphs have come while yakking with talk-show hosts.

YouTube is full of Short’s talk-show appearances, dating back to his first spot on “Letterman,” in 1982, and regularly I find that I’ve killed half an hour or so watching his old clips. Short, who is now sixty-seven, has always been tirelessly boyish and energetic, and has made several generations of hosts lean back in their chairs and laugh. He cracked up Carson. He’s cracked up Leno. And Conan. And Fallon. He’s funny anywhere, even in places where laughter is hard-won, like on “Regis and Kelly” or Chevy Chase’s short-lived talk show. He’s even funny when he’s hiking. Of all the truly great modern talk-show guests—a list that includes Amy Sedaris, Norm Macdonald, and just a handful of others—it is Short whose clips I return to time and again. Mostly, I think, it’s because his talk-show persona is the purest, the most attuned to and at ease with the restrictions and comedic traditions of the genre. Nobody tells a vacation story, or a holiday story, or an awards-show story, or a recollection of some industry folly better than Short does. He sings; he dances; he does broad physical comedy; he tells the best one-liners.

Short has always understood that being a talk-show guest is itself a performance, a role to cultivate and refine. The persona he has settled into is that of a self-assured but ever so slightly bitter show-business insider, a breezy phony, a Hollywood jerk. He walks onstage wearing a little smirk, and then makes a show of basking in the applause of the audience. He repeatedly refers to the “Daytime Oscars” he’s won, and makes passive-aggressive jokes about the fact that the show didn’t send a car for him, or about the cash bars that his rich Hollywood friends have at their parties. Sometimes he channels the louche vibe of a lesser Rat Packer. Other times, he drifts off into a Norma Desmond, faded-grande-dame kind of thing. He often seems to be doing two or three impressions at once. He likes to open his appearances with a series of rim-shot jokes made at the expense of the host, in the style of Don Rickles. “You look sensational,” he tells Letterman. “Is it the kale enemas?” To Jimmy Kimmel: “Every time I’m in your company, I’m whelmed.” To Conan O’Brien: “You look like the film negative of ‘Django Unchained.’ ” To Jimmy Fallon: “I bet you’re the only late-night host that goes to a pediatrician.” The jokes, rehearsed and not always original, nonetheless always kill, and they provoke glee from the hosts, who take obvious delight in being roasted by Marty, as they all call him.

Short’s bluster is tempered by what, one senses, is his realer personality, characterized by Canadian self-deprecation and downright decency. In 2012, during Short’s appearance on the boozy fourth hour of the “Today” show, the host Kathie Lee Gifford asked Short how he and his wife, Nancy Dolman, kept the spark alive in their marriage, and went on to ask several more questions referring to Dolman in the present tense—unaware that she had died of ovarian cancer, two years earlier. Short appeared briefly taken aback, but managed to smile while answering the questions as best he could—waiting to correct Gifford until they were off the air.

Nowhere was Short in better form than in his fifty-plus appearances on “Letterman.” This owed, in part, to his longtime relationship with Letterman’s bandleader, his fellow-Canadian Paul Shaffer, whom he would relentlessly tease. (“Paul looks like the maître d’ on a spaceship.”) But mostly his Letterman appearances thrill because he so clearly has the number of the host, a notoriously hard nut to crack. Short makes Letterman laugh—really laugh, that great cackle—and this endorsement spurs the audience to even greater laughter. The talk-show guest is, in a way, a supplicant—seated lower than the host, with just a few minutes, between commercial breaks, to make a good impression and plug whatever he came to plug. It’s a frankly ridiculous situation, and faintly demeaning—a dynamic that Short at once embraces and mocks. Being a guest suits his seeming need to impress, to relentlessly wear down an audience, to paw at a person sitting a few feet away until he forces a laugh. Short is endlessly charming, but the characters he plays are often pests or interlopers, grating and bizarre, and this friction, packed into a few minutes, yields a perfect whirlwind of knowing wit and wild abandon.

The last thing Short ever did on “Letterman” was sing a song. With his body arched back and his legs spread wide, he belted out, “It’s the end, my pretend show-biz friend, farewell! We’ll meet again, someday, in hell.” Short told the audience that he had planned to deliver the number as a eulogy at Letterman’s funeral. But since Letterman was quitting television, he added, he probably wouldn’t show up when Dave actually died—“unless, of course, I have something to promote.”

ARE

Anchor. This is an observation on your “mutual shared reality” that extends the first little thread of connection between you and another person — the lightest of pleasantries about something you’re both seeing or experiencing.

- Dr. Landis is hilarious.

- The set list tonight has been fantastic.

- This weather is perfect.

Don’t get caught up thinking that such comments are too superficial, and search in vain for something truly clever to say. Fleming calls such exchanges “friendly noises,” and you both know they’re not meaningful, but just a gradual and polite way to segue into a “real” conversation.

Reveal. Next, disclose something about yourself that is related to the anchor you just threw out.

- I’ve tried to get into Dr. Landis’ class for three semesters, and this is the first time I was able to land a spot.

- There’s a much bigger crowd here than there was at their show last year.

- I’ve been waiting for a break in the heat to go hike Mt. Whilston for the first time.

By opening up a little more, we extend to the other person a few more threads of connection and trust, while at the same time providing them fodder to which to respond.

Encourage. Now you hand off the ball to them by asking a question:

- Did you have a hard time getting into the class?

- Did you see that show?

- Have you ever done that hike?

Keep building the conversation. By employing the effective ARE method, you’ll successfully have exchanged a few pleasantries, but these tender threads of small talk can easily disintegrate and blow away at this point…when the dreaded awkward pause shows up.

So you want to weave those light threads into an increasingly sturdy rope. You do this by offering follow-up comments and questions that continue to build the conversation. Let’s take a look at how our three example conversations might progress:

You: Dr. Landis is hilarious. I’ve tried to get into his class for three semesters and this is the first time I was able to land a spot. Did you have a hard time getting into the class?

Person: Yeah, I actually sat on the stairs for the first few classes, and just hoped some people would drop out. Luckily they did, and he added me.

87. The critical role of struggling through fundamental details plays in the building of intuition

21 January 2022 09:07

Joe Haskeller is trying to learn about monads. After struggling to understand them for a week, looking at examples, writing code, reading things other people have written, he finally has an “aha!” moment: everything is suddenly clear, and Joe Understands Monads! What has really happened, of course, is that Joe’s brain has fit all the details together into a higher-level abstraction, a metaphor which Joe can use to get an intuitive grasp of monads; let us suppose that Joe’s metaphor is that Monads are Like Burritos. Here is where Joe badly misinterprets his own thought process: “Of course!” Joe thinks. “It’s all so simple now. The key to understanding monads is that they are Like Burritos. If only I had thought of this before!” The problem, of course, is that if Joe HAD thought of this before, it wouldn’t have helped: the week of struggling through details was a necessary and integral part of forming Joe’s Burrito intuition, not a sad consequence of his failure to hit upon the idea sooner.

But now Joe goes and writes a monad tutorial called “Monads are Burritos,” under the well-intentioned but mistaken assumption that if other people read his magical insight, learning about monads will be a snap for them. “Monads are easy,” Joe writes. “Think of them as burritos.” Joe hides all the actual details about types and such because those are scary, and people will learn better if they can avoid all that difficult and confusing stuff. Of course, exactly the opposite is true, and all Joe has done is make it harder for people to learn about monads, because now they have to spend a week thinking that monads are burritos and getting utterly confused, and then a week trying to forget about the burrito analogy, before they can actually get down to the business of learning about monads. (Of course, certainly not all monad tutorials are like this, and I don’t even have any particular ones in mind, just a general impression left over from reading many of them, but if the shoe fits…)

What I term the “monad tutorial fallacy,” then, consists in failing to recognize the critical role that struggling through fundamental details plays in the building of intuition. This, I suspect, is also one of the things that separates good teachers from poor ones. If you ever find yourself frustrated and astounded that someone else does not grasp a concept as easily and intuitively as you do, even after you clearly explain your intuition to them (“look, it’s really quite simple,” you say…) then you are suffering from the monad tutorial fallacy. (Brent Yorgey)

88. Kevin Kelly’s Unsolicited Advice

25 January 2022 08:30

• That thing that made you weird as a kid could make you great as an adult — if you don’t lose it.
• If you have any doubt at all about being able to carry a load in one trip, do yourself a huge favor and make two trips.
• What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals. At your funeral people will not recall what you did; they will only remember how you made them feel.
• Recipe for success: under-promise and over-deliver.
• It’s not an apology if it comes with an excuse. It is not a compliment if it comes with a request.
• Jesus, Superman, and Mother Teresa never made art. Only imperfect beings can make art because art begins in what is broken.
• If someone is trying to convince you it’s not a pyramid scheme, it’s a pyramid scheme.
• Learn how to tie a bowline knot. Practice in the dark. With one hand. For the rest of your life you’ll use this knot more times than you would ever believe.
• If something fails where you thought it would fail, that is not a failure.
• Be governed not by the tyranny of the urgent but by the elevation of the important.
• Leave a gate behind you the way you first found it.
• The greatest rewards come from working on something that nobody has a name for. If you possibly can, work where there are no words for what you do.
• A balcony or porch needs to be at least 6 feet (2m) deep or it won’t be used.
• Don’t create things to make money; make money so you can create things. The reward for good work is more work.
• In all things — except love — start with the exit strategy. Prepare for the ending. Almost anything is easier to get into than out of.
• Train employees well enough they could get another job, but treat them well enough so they never want to.
• Don’t aim to have others like you; aim to have them respect you.
• The foundation of maturity: Just because it’s not your fault doesn’t mean it’s not your responsibility.
• A multitude of bad ideas is necessary for one good idea.
• Being wise means having more questions than answers.
• Compliment people behind their back. It’ll come back to you.
• Most overnight successes — in fact any significant successes — take at least 5 years. Budget your life accordingly.
• You are only as young as the last time you changed your mind.
• Assume anyone asking for your account information for any reason is guilty of scamming you, unless proven innocent. The way to prove innocence is to call them back, or login to your account using numbers or a website that you provide, not them. Don’t release any identifying information while they are contacting you via phone, message or email. You must control the channel.
• Sustained outrage makes you stupid.
• Be strict with yourself and forgiving of others. The reverse is hell for everyone.
• Your best response to an insult is “You’re probably right.” Often they are.
• The worst evils in history have always been committed by those who truly believed they were combating evil. Beware of combating evil.
• If you can avoid seeking approval of others, your power is limitless.
• When a child asks an endless string of “why?” questions, the smartest reply is, “I don’t know, what do you think?”
• To be wealthy, accumulate all those things that money can’t buy.
• Be the change you wish to see.
• When brainstorming, improvising, jamming with others, you’ll go much further and deeper if you build upon each contribution with a playful “yes — and” example instead of a deflating “no — but” reply.
• Work to become, not to acquire.
• Don’t loan money to a friend unless you are ready to make it a gift.
• On the way to a grand goal, celebrate the smallest victories as if each one were the final goal. No matter where it ends you are victorious.
• Calm is contagious.
• Even a foolish person can still be right about most things. Most conventional wisdom is true.
• Always cut away from yourself.
• Show me your calendar and I will tell you your priorities. Tell me who your friends are, and I’ll tell you where you’re going.
• When hitchhiking, look like the person you want to pick you up.
• Contemplating the weaknesses of others is easy; contemplating the weaknesses in yourself is hard, but it pays a much higher reward.
• Worth repeating: measure twice, cut once.
• Your passion in life should fit you exactly; but your purpose in life should exceed you. Work for something much larger than yourself.
• If you can’t tell what you desperately need, it’s probably sleep.
• When playing Monopoly, spend all you have to buy, barter, or trade for the Orange properties. Don’t bother with Utilities.
• If you borrow something, try to return it in better shape than you received it. Clean it, sharpen it, fill it up.
• Even in the tropics it gets colder at night than you think. Pack warmly.
• To quiet a crowd or a drunk, just whisper.
• Writing down one thing you are grateful for each day is the cheapest possible therapy ever.
• When someone tells you something is wrong, they’re usually right. When someone tells you how to fix it, they’re usually wrong.
• If you think you saw a mouse, you did. And, if there is one, there are more.
• Money is overrated. Truly new things rarely need an abundance of money. If that was so, billionaires would have a monopoly on inventing new things, and they don’t. Instead almost all breakthroughs are made by those who lack money, because they are forced to rely on their passion, persistence and ingenuity to figure out new ways. Being poor is an advantage in innovation.
• Ignore what others may be thinking of you, because they aren’t.
• Avoid hitting the snooze button. That’s just training you to oversleep.
• Always say less than necessary.
• You are given the gift of life in order to discover what your gift *in* life is. You will complete your mission when you figure out what your mission is. This is not a paradox. This is the way.
• Don’t treat people as bad as they are. Treat them as good as you are.
• It is much easier to change how you think by changing your behavior, than it is to change your behavior by changing how you think. Act out the change you seek.
• You can eat any dessert you want if you take only 3 bites.
• Each time you reach out to people, bring them a blessing; then they’ll be happy to see you when you bring them a problem.
• Bad things can happen fast, but almost all good things happen slowly.
• Don’t worry how or where you begin. As long as you keep moving, your success will be far from where you start.
• When you confront a stuck bolt or screw: righty tighty, lefty loosey.
• If you meet a jerk, overlook them. If you meet jerks everywhere everyday, look deeper into yourself.
• Dance with your hips.
• We are not bodies that temporarily have souls. We are souls that temporarily have bodies.
• You can reduce the annoyance of someone’s stupid belief by increasing your understanding of why they believe it.
• If your goal does not have a schedule, it is a dream.
• All the greatest gains in life — in wealth, relationships, or knowledge —come from the magic of compounding interest — amplifying small steady gains. All you need for abundance is to keep adding 1% more than you subtract on a regular basis.
• The greatest breakthroughs are missed because they look like hard work.
• People can’t remember more than 3 points from a speech.
• I have never met a person I admired who did not read more books than I did.
• The greatest teacher is called “doing”.
• Finite games are played to win or lose. Infinite games are played to keep the game going. Seek out infinite games because they yield infinite rewards.
• Everything is hard before it is easy. The day before something is a breakthrough, it’s a stupid idea.
• A problem that can be solved with money is not really a problem.
• When you are stuck, sleep on it. Let your subconscious work for you.
• Your work will be endless, but your time is finite. You cannot limit the work so you must limit your time. Hours are the only thing you can manage.
• To succeed, get other people to pay you; to become wealthy, help other people to succeed.
• Children totally accept — and crave — family rules. “In our family we have a rule for X” is the only excuse a parent needs for setting a family policy. In fact, “I have a rule for X” is the only excuse you need for your own personal policies.
• All guns are loaded.
• Many backward steps are made by standing still.
• This is the best time ever to make something. None of the greatest, coolest creations 20 years from now have been invented yet. You are not late.
• No rain, no rainbow.
• Every person you meet knows an amazing lot about something you know virtually nothing about. Your job is to discover what it is, and it won’t be obvious.
• You don’t marry a person, you marry a family.
• Always give credit, take blame.
• Be frugal in all things, except in your passions splurge.
• When making something, always get a few extras — extra material, extra parts, extra space, extra finishes. The extras serve as backups for mistakes, reduce stress, and fill your inventory for the future. They are the cheapest insurance.
• Something does not need to be perfect to be wonderful. Especially weddings.
• Don’t let your email inbox become your to-do list.
• The best way to untangle a knotty tangle is not to “untie” the knots, but to keep pulling the loops apart wider and wider. Just make the mess as big, loose and open as possible. As you open up the knots they will unravel themselves. Works on cords, strings, hoses, yarns, or electronic cables.
• Be a good ancestor. Do something a future generation will thank you for. A simple thing is to plant a tree.
• To combat an adversary, become their friend.
• Take one simple thing — almost anything — but take it extremely seriously, as if it was the only thing in the world, or maybe the entire world is in it — and by taking it seriously you’ll light up the sky.
• History teaches us that in 100 years from now some of the assumptions you believed will turn out to be wrong. A good question to ask yourself today is “What might I be wrong about?”
• Be nice to your children because they are going to choose your nursing home.
• Advice like these are not laws. They are like hats. If one doesn’t fit, try another.
• Learn how to learn from those you disagree with, or even offend you. See if you can find the truth in what they believe.
• Being enthusiastic is worth 25 IQ points.
• Always demand a deadline. A deadline weeds out the extraneous and the ordinary. It prevents you from trying to make it perfect, so you have to make it different. Different is better.
• Don’t be afraid to ask a question that may sound stupid because 99% of the time everyone else is thinking of the same question and is too embarrassed to ask it.
• Being able to listen well is a superpower. While listening to someone you love keep asking them “Is there more?”, until there is no more.
• A worthy goal for a year is to learn enough about a subject so that you can’t believe how ignorant you were a year earlier.
• Gratitude will unlock all other virtues and is something you can get better at.
• Treating a person to a meal never fails, and is so easy to do. It’s powerful with old friends and a great way to make new friends.
• Don’t trust all-purpose glue.
• Reading to your children regularly will bond you together and kickstart their imaginations.
• Never use a credit card for credit. The only kind of credit, or debt, that is acceptable is debt to acquire something whose exchange value is extremely likely to increase, like in a home. The exchange value of most things diminishes or vanishes the moment you purchase them. Don’t be in debt to losers.
• Pros are just amateurs who know how to gracefully recover from their mistakes.
• Extraordinary claims should require extraordinary evidence to be believed.
• Don’t be the smartest person in the room. Hangout with, and learn from, people smarter than yourself. Even better, find smart people who will disagree with you.
• Rule of 3 in conversation. To get to the real reason, ask a person to go deeper than what they just said. Then again, and once more. The third time’s answer is close to the truth.
• Don’t be the best. Be the only.
• Everyone is shy. Other people are waiting for you to introduce yourself to them, they are waiting for you to send them an email, they are waiting for you to ask them on a date. Go ahead.
• Don’t take it personally when someone turns you down. Assume they are like you: busy, occupied, distracted. Try again later. It’s amazing how often a second try works.
• The purpose of a habit is to remove that action from self-negotiation. You no longer expend energy deciding whether to do it. You just do it. Good habits can range from telling the truth, to flossing.
• Promptness is a sign of respect.
• When you are young spend at least 6 months to one year living as poor as you can, owning as little as you possibly can, eating beans and rice in a tiny room or tent, to experience what your “worst” lifestyle might be. That way any time you have to risk something in the future you won’t be afraid of the worst case scenario.
• Trust me: There is no “them”.
• The more you are interested in others, the more interesting they find you. To be interesting, be interested.
• Optimize your generosity. No one on their deathbed has ever regretted giving too much away.
• To make something good, just do it. To make something great, just re-do it, re-do it, re-do it. The secret to making fine things is in remaking them.
• The Golden Rule will never fail you. It is the foundation of all other virtues.
• If you are looking for something in your house, and you finally find it, when you’re done with it, don’t put it back where you found it. Put it back where you first looked for it.
• Saving money and investing money are both good habits. Small amounts of money invested regularly for many decades without deliberation is one path to wealth.
• To make mistakes is human. To own your mistakes is divine. Nothing elevates a person higher than quickly admitting and taking personal responsibility for the mistakes you make and then fixing them fairly. If you mess up, fess up. It’s astounding how powerful this ownership is.
• Never get involved in a land war in Asia.
• You can obsess about serving your customers/audience/clients, or you can obsess about beating the competition. Both work, but of the two, obsessing about your customers will take you further.
• Show up. Keep showing up. Somebody successful said: 99% of success is just showing up.
• Separate the processes of creation from improving. You can’t write and edit, or sculpt and polish, or make and analyze at the same time. If you do, the editor stops the creator. While you invent, don’t select. While you sketch, don’t inspect. While you write the first draft, don’t reflect. At the start, the creator mind must be unleashed from judgement.
• If you are not falling down occasionally, you are just coasting.
• Perhaps the most counter-intuitive truth of the universe is that the more you give to others, the more you’ll get. Understanding this is the beginning of wisdom.
• Friends are better than money. Almost anything money can do, friends can do better. In so many ways a friend with a boat is better than owning a boat.
• This is true: It’s hard to cheat an honest man.
• When an object is lost, 95% of the time it is hiding within arm’s reach of where it was last seen. Search in all possible locations in that radius and you’ll find it.
• You are what you do. Not what you say, not what you believe, not how you vote, but what you spend your time on.
• If you lose or forget to bring a cable, adapter or charger, check with your hotel. Most hotels now have a drawer full of cables, adapters and chargers others have left behind, and probably have the one you are missing. You can often claim it after borrowing it.
• Hatred is a curse that does not affect the hated. It only poisons the hater. Release a grudge as if it was a poison.
• There is no limit on better. Talent is distributed unfairly, but there is no limit on how much we can improve what we start with.
• Be prepared: When you are 90% done any large project (a house, a film, an event, an app) the rest of the myriad details will take a second 90% to complete.
• When you die you take absolutely nothing with you except your reputation.
• Before you are old, attend as many funerals as you can bear, and listen. Nobody talks about the departed’s achievements. The only thing people will remember is what kind of person you were while you were achieving.
• For every dollar you spend purchasing something substantial, expect to pay a dollar in repairs, maintenance, or disposal by the end of its life.
• Anything real begins with the fiction of what could be. Imagination is therefore the most potent force in the universe, and a skill you can get better at. It’s the one skill in life that benefits from ignoring what everyone else knows.
• When crisis and disaster strike, don’t waste them. No problems, no progress.
• On vacation go to the most remote place on your itinerary first, bypassing the cities. You’ll maximize the shock of otherness in the remote, and then later you’ll welcome the familiar comforts of a city on the way back.
• When you get an invitation to do something in the future, ask yourself: would you accept this if it was scheduled for tomorrow? Not too many promises will pass that immediacy filter.
• Don’t say anything about someone in email you would not be comfortable saying to them directly, because eventually they will read it.
• If you desperately need a job, you are just another problem for a boss; if you can solve many of the problems the boss has right now, you are hired. To be hired, think like your boss.
• Art is in what you leave out.
• Acquiring things will rarely bring you deep satisfaction. But acquiring experiences will.
• Rule of 7 in research. You can find out anything if you are willing to go seven levels. If the first source you ask doesn’t know, ask them who you should ask next, and so on down the line. If you are willing to go to the 7th source, you’ll almost always get your answer.
• How to apologize: Quickly, specifically, sincerely.
• Don’t ever respond to a solicitation or a proposal on the phone. The urgency is a disguise.
• When someone is nasty, rude, hateful, or mean with you, pretend they have a disease. That makes it easier to have empathy toward them which can soften the conflict.
• Eliminating clutter makes room for your true treasures.
• You really don’t want to be famous. Read the biography of any famous person.
• Experience is overrated. When hiring, hire for aptitude, train for skills. Most really amazing or great things are done by people doing them for the first time.
• A vacation + a disaster = an adventure.
• Buying tools: Start by buying the absolute cheapest tools you can find. Upgrade the ones you use a lot. If you wind up using some tool for a job, buy the very best you can afford.
• Learn how to take a 20-minute power nap without embarrassment.
• Following your bliss is a recipe for paralysis if you don’t know what you are passionate about. A better motto for most youth is “master something, anything”. Through mastery of one thing, you can drift towards extensions of that mastery that bring you more joy, and eventually discover where your bliss is.
• I’m positive that in 100 years much of what I take to be true today will be proved to be wrong, maybe even embarrassingly wrong, and I try really hard to identify what it is that I am wrong about today.
• Over the long term, the future is decided by optimists. To be an optimist you don’t have to ignore all the many problems we create; you just have to imagine improving our capacity to solve problems.
• The universe is conspiring behind your back to make you a success. This will be much easier to do if you embrace this pronoia.
  

89. Whatever you make must be a being

25 January 2022 12:39

While you are making something you must always arrange things, or work things out, in such a way that all the elements you make are self-like beings, and the elements from which the elements you made are beings, and the spaces between these elements are beings, and the largest structures are beings, too. Thus your effort is directed toward the goal that everything, every portion of space, must be made a being. (Christopher Alexander)

Humanity was originally made in the image and likeness of God, and it is in this image and likeness we must return to through our making and expression of our beings, through our nurturing and maintaining of life in all the world, for this is our daily living. We must live in everything and everything must be alive in us.

90. Obsessive Interests

28 January 2022 13:03

Everyone knows that to do great work you need both natural ability and determination. But there's a third ingredient that's not as well understood: an obsessive interest in a particular topic.

To explain this point I need to burn my reputation with some group of people, and I'm going to choose bus ticket collectors. There are people who collect old bus tickets. Like many collectors, they have an obsessive interest in the minutiae of what they collect. They can keep track of distinctions between different types of bus tickets that would be hard for the rest of us to remember. Because we don't care enough. What's the point of spending so much time thinking about old bus tickets?

Which leads us to the second feature of this kind of obsession: there is no point. A bus ticket collector's love is disinterested. They're not doing it to impress us or to make themselves rich, but for its own sake.

When you look at the lives of people who've done great work, you see a consistent pattern. They often begin with a bus ticket collector's obsessive interest in something that would have seemed pointless to most of their contemporaries. One of the most striking features of Darwin's book about his voyage on the Beagle is the sheer depth of his interest in natural history. His curiosity seems infinite. Ditto for Ramanujan, sitting by the hour working out on his slate what happens to series.

It's a mistake to think they were "laying the groundwork" for the discoveries they made later. There's too much intention in that metaphor. Like bus ticket collectors, they were doing it because they liked it.

But there is a difference between Ramanujan and a bus ticket collector. Series matter, and bus tickets don't.

If I had to put the recipe for genius into one sentence, that might be it: to have a disinterested obsession with something that matters.

Aren't I forgetting about the other two ingredients? Less than you might think. An obsessive interest in a topic is both a proxy for ability and a substitute for determination. Unless you have sufficient mathematical aptitude, you won't find series interesting. And when you're obsessively interested in something, you don't need as much determination: you don't need to push yourself as hard when curiosity is pulling you.

An obsessive interest will even bring you luck, to the extent anything can. Chance, as Pasteur said, favors the prepared mind, and if there's one thing an obsessed mind is, it's prepared.

The disinterestedness of this kind of obsession is its most important feature. Not just because it's a filter for earnestness, but because it helps you discover new ideas.

The paths that lead to new ideas tend to look unpromising. If they looked promising, other people would already have explored them. How do the people who do great work discover these paths that others overlook? The popular story is that they simply have better vision: because they're so talented, they see paths that others miss. But if you look at the way great discoveries are made, that's not what happens. Darwin didn't pay closer attention to individual species than other people because he saw that this would lead to great discoveries, and they didn't. He was just really, really interested in such things.

Darwin couldn't turn it off. Neither could Ramanujan. They didn't discover the hidden paths that they did because they seemed promising, but because they couldn't help it. That's what allowed them to follow paths that someone who was merely ambitious would have ignored.

What rational person would decide that the way to write great novels was to begin by spending several years creating an imaginary elvish language, like Tolkien, or visiting every household in southwestern Britain, like Trollope? No one, including Tolkien and Trollope.

The bus ticket theory is similar to Carlyle's famous definition of genius as an infinite capacity for taking pains. But there are two differences. The bus ticket theory makes it clear that the source of this infinite capacity for taking pains is not infinite diligence, as Carlyle seems to have meant, but the sort of infinite interest that collectors have. It also adds an important qualification: an infinite capacity for taking pains about something that matters.

So what matters? You can never be sure. It's precisely because no one can tell in advance which paths are promising that you can discover new ideas by working on what you're interested in.

But there are some heuristics you can use to guess whether an obsession might be one that matters. For example, it's more promising if you're creating something, rather than just consuming something someone else creates. It's more promising if something you're interested in is difficult, especially if it's more difficult for other people than it is for you. And the obsessions of talented people are more likely to be promising. When talented people become interested in random things, they're not truly random.

But you can never be sure. In fact, here's an interesting idea that's also rather alarming if it's true: it may be that to do great work, you also have to waste a lot of time.

In many different areas, reward is proportionate to risk. If that rule holds here, then the way to find paths that lead to truly great work is to be willing to expend a lot of effort on things that turn out to be every bit as unpromising as they seem.

I'm not sure if this is true. On one hand, it seems surprisingly difficult to waste your time so long as you're working hard on something interesting. So much of what you do ends up being useful. But on the other hand, the rule about the relationship between risk and reward is so powerful that it seems to hold wherever risk occurs. Newton's case, at least, suggests that the risk/reward rule holds here. He's famous for one particular obsession of his that turned out to be unprecedentedly fruitful: using math to describe the world. But he had two other obsessions, alchemy and theology, that seem to have been complete wastes of time. He ended up net ahead. His bet on what we now call physics paid off so well that it more than compensated for the other two. But were the other two necessary, in the sense that he had to take big risks to make such big discoveries? I don't know.

Here's an even more alarming idea: might one make all bad bets? It probably happens quite often. But we don't know how often, because these people don't become famous.

It's not merely that the returns from following a path are hard to predict. They change dramatically over time. 1830 was a really good time to be obsessively interested in natural history. If Darwin had been born in 1709 instead of 1809, we might never have heard of him.

What can one do in the face of such uncertainty? One solution is to hedge your bets, which in this case means to follow the obviously promising paths instead of your own private obsessions. But as with any hedge, you're decreasing reward when you decrease risk. If you forgo working on what you like in order to follow some more conventionally ambitious path, you might miss something wonderful that you'd otherwise have discovered. That too must happen all the time, perhaps even more often than the genius whose bets all fail.

The other solution is to let yourself be interested in lots of different things. You don't decrease your upside if you switch between equally genuine interests based on which seems to be working so far. But there is a danger here too: if you work on too many different projects, you might not get deeply enough into any of them.

One interesting thing about the bus ticket theory is that it may help explain why different types of people excel at different kinds of work. Interest is much more unevenly distributed than ability. If natural ability is all you need to do great work, and natural ability is evenly distributed, you have to invent elaborate theories to explain the skewed distributions we see among those who actually do great work in various fields. But it may be that much of the skew has a simpler explanation: different people are interested in different things.

The bus ticket theory also explains why people are less likely to do great work after they have children. Here interest has to compete not just with external obstacles, but with another interest, and one that for most people is extremely powerful. It's harder to find time for work after you have kids, but that's the easy part. The real change is that you don't want to.

But the most exciting implication of the bus ticket theory is that it suggests ways to encourage great work. If the recipe for genius is simply natural ability plus hard work, all we can do is hope we have a lot of ability, and work as hard as we can. But if interest is a critical ingredient in genius, we may be able, by cultivating interest, to cultivate genius.

For example, for the very ambitious, the bus ticket theory suggests that the way to do great work is to relax a little. Instead of gritting your teeth and diligently pursuing what all your peers agree is the most promising line of research, maybe you should try doing something just for fun. And if you're stuck, that may be the vector along which to break out.

I've always liked Hamming's famous double-barrelled question: what are the most important problems in your field, and why aren't you working on one of them? It's a great way to shake yourself up. But it may be overfitting a bit. It might be at least as useful to ask yourself: if you could take a year off to work on something that probably wouldn't be important but would be really interesting, what would it be?

The bus ticket theory also suggests a way to avoid slowing down as you get older. Perhaps the reason people have fewer new ideas as they get older is not simply that they're losing their edge. It may also be because once you become established, you can no longer mess about with irresponsible side projects the way you could when you were young and no one cared what you did.

The solution to that is obvious: remain irresponsible. It will be hard, though, because the apparently random projects you take up to stave off decline will read to outsiders as evidence of it. And you yourself won't know for sure that they're wrong. But it will at least be more fun to work on what you want.

It may even be that we can cultivate a habit of intellectual bus ticket collecting in kids. The usual plan in education is to start with a broad, shallow focus, then gradually become more specialized. But I've done the opposite with my kids. I know I can count on their school to handle the broad, shallow part, so I take them deep.

When they get interested in something, however random, I encourage them to go preposterously, bus ticket collectorly, deep. I don't do this because of the bus ticket theory. I do it because I want them to feel the joy of learning, and they're never going to feel that about something I'm making them learn. It has to be something they're interested in. I'm just following the path of least resistance; depth is a byproduct. But if in trying to show them the joy of learning I also end up training them to go deep, so much the better.

Will it have any effect? I have no idea. But that uncertainty may be the most interesting point of all. There is so much more to learn about how to do great work. As old as human civilization feels, it's really still very young if we haven't nailed something so basic. It's exciting to think there are still discoveries to make about discovery. If that's the sort of thing you're interested in.

Notes

[1] There are other types of collecting that illustrate this point better than bus tickets, but they're also more popular. It seemed just as well to use an inferior example rather than offend more people by telling them their hobby doesn't matter.

[2] I worried a little about using the word "disinterested," since some people mistakenly believe it means not interested. But anyone who expects to be a genius will have to know the meaning of such a basic word, so I figure they may as well start now.

[3] Think how often genius must have been nipped in the bud by people being told, or telling themselves, to stop messing about and be responsible. Ramanujan's mother was a huge enabler. Imagine if she hadn't been. Imagine if his parents had made him go out and get a job instead of sitting around at home doing math.

On the other hand, anyone quoting the preceding paragraph to justify not getting a job is probably mistaken.

[4] 1709 Darwin is to time what the Milanese Leonardo is to space.

[5] "An infinite capacity for taking pains" is a paraphrase of what Carlyle wrote. What he wrote, in his History of Frederick the Great, was "... it is the fruit of 'genius' (which means transcendent capacity of taking trouble, first of all)...." Since the paraphrase seems the name of the idea at this point, I kept it.

Carlyle's History was published in 1858. In 1785 Hérault de Séchelles quoted Buffon as saying "Le génie n'est qu'une plus grande aptitude à la patience." (Genius is only a greater aptitude for patience.)

[6] Trollope was establishing the system of postal routes. He himself sensed the obsessiveness with which he pursued this goal.

It is amusing to watch how a passion will grow upon a man. During those two years it was the ambition of my life to cover the country with rural letter-carriers.

Even Newton occasionally sensed the degree of his obsessiveness. After computing pi to 15 digits, he wrote in a letter to a friend:

I am ashamed to tell you to how many figures I carried these computations, having no other business at the time.

Incidentally, Ramanujan was also a compulsive calculator. As Kanigel writes in his excellent biography:

One Ramanujan scholar, B. M. Wilson, later told how Ramanujan's research into number theory was often "preceded by a table of numerical results, carried usually to a length from which most of us would shrink."

[7] Working to understand the natural world counts as creating rather than consuming.

Newton tripped over this distinction when he chose to work on theology. His beliefs did not allow him to see it, but chasing down paradoxes in nature is fruitful in a way that chasing down paradoxes in sacred texts is not.

[8] How much of people's propensity to become interested in a topic is inborn? My experience so far suggests the answer is: most of it. Different kids get interested in different things, and it's hard to make a child interested in something they wouldn't otherwise be. Not in a way that sticks. The most you can do on behalf of a topic is to make sure it gets a fair showing — to make it clear to them, for example, that there's more to math than the dull drills they do in school. After that it's up to the child. (Paul Graham)

91. God is a Verb

03 February 2022 08:03

I live on Earth at present, and I don’t know what I am. I know that I am not a category. I am not a thing — a noun. I seem to be a verb, an evolutionary process – an integral function of the universe.”

If the success or failure of this planet and of human beings depended on how I am and what I do... HOW WOULD I BE? WHAT WOULD I DO?

Only the free-wheeling artist-explorer, non-academic, scientist-philosopher, mechanic, economist-poet who has never waited for patron-starting and accrediting of his co-ordinate capabilities holds the prime initiative today.

How often I found where I should be going only by setting out for somewhere else.

God is a verb.

Wealth is a person’s ability to survive a certain number of days forward. (R. Buckminister Fuller)

92. The greatest victory is that which requires no battle

03 February 2022 08:05

• The greatest victory is that which requires no battle.
• Thus we may know that there are five essentials for victory:

1. He will win who knows when to fight and when not to fight.
2. He will win who knows how to handle both superior and inferior forces.
3. He will win whose army is animated by the same spirit throughout all its ranks.
4. He will win who, prepared himself, waits to take the enemy unprepared.
5. He will win who has military capacity and is not interfered with by the sovereign.

• Treat your men as you would your own beloved sons. And they will follow you into the deepest valley.
• When you surround an army, leave an outlet free. Do not press a desperate foe too hard.
• Opportunities multiply as they are seized.
• To win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill.
• Build your opponent a golden bridge to retreat across.
• One mark of a great soldier is that he fights on his own terms or fights not at all.
• If the mind is willing, the flesh could go on and on without many things.
• Attack is the secret of defense; defense is the planning of an attack.
• Ultimate excellence lies not in winning every battle, but in defeating the enemy without ever fighting.
• Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win
• The skillful tactician may be likened to the shuai-jan. Now the shuai-jan is a snake that is found in the Ch'ang mountains. Strike at its head, and you will be attacked by its tail; strike at its tail, and you will be attacked by its head; strike at its middle, and you will be attacked by head and tail both.
• In battle, there are not more than two methods of attack--the direct and the indirect; yet these two in combination give rise to an endless series of maneuvers.
• Foreknowledge cannot be gotten from ghosts and spirits, cannot be had by analogy, cannot be found out by calculation. It must be obtained from people, people who know the conditions of the enemy.
• Know thyself, know thy enemy. A thousand battles, a thousand victories.
• If those who are sent to draw water begin by drinking themselves, the army is suffering from thirst. [One may know the condition of a whole army from the behavior of a single man.]
• Deep knowledge is to be aware of disturbance before disturbance, to be aware of danger before danger, to be aware of destruction before destruction, to be aware of calamity before calamity. Strong action is training the body without being burdened by the body, exercising the mind without being used by the mind, working in the world without being affected by the world, carrying out tasks without being obstructed by tasks.
• The principle on which to manage an army is to set up one standard of courage which all must reach.
• We are not fit to lead an army on the march unless we are familiar with the face of the country -- its mountains and forests, its pitfalls and precipices, its marshes and swamps.
• The skillful employer of men will employ the wise man, the brave man, the covetous man, and the stupid man. For the wise man delights in establishing his merit, the brave man likes to show his courage in action, the covetous man is quick at seizing advantages, and the stupid man has no fear of death.
• All warfare is based on deception.
• A leader leads by example not by force. (Sun Tzu)

93. Person Centered Productivity

03 February 2022 15:01

First Things First: Your Personhood Precedes Your Productivity.

I’m a big fan of Newport’s philosophy of productivity. He emphasizes that a good productivity system is a tool to serve the whole person. Your personhood comes first! Your productivity system is there to serve you, not the reverse. Therefore it did not surprise me to learn that Newport also keeps what I would call a personal framework. He doesn’t call it that, but he bases his productivity system on a written list of his values and habits, which he reviews weekly.

Keeping your values at the foundation is the heart of person-centered productivity. I think his approach is useful, so let’s walk through it:

Identify Your Roles, and the Values You Associate with Them. Newport keeps a document he calls “Roles and Values.” He identified some of his roles as a parent and a spouse; as a professional; as a member of communities; and as a “spiritual/philosophical being”.

Write Down the Values-Related Actions that Your Roles Point You Toward. A list of roles and values is nice, but it can only make a difference in your life (and others’ lives) when you put those values into action. Newport’s method is interesting because you can suss out your values by identifying actions related to your roles in life. He advised looking at each role and writing out sentences, a narrative, by starting with the words: “I want to be…”

“I want to be someone who X,”

“I want to be the kind of parent who does Y.”

When you write out your values like this, you make them concrete. You identify specific actions, specific habits or behaviors, that go with actually living out your values. Here’s an example from my own list of roles and values:

Roles: “I want to be the kind of mother, wife and friend who …”

A values-based behavior related to the role: “…who listens when the people I love want to have a conversation with me.”

So I wrote this concrete values-based action, “When people I love want time with me, and I am just fiddling on the computer or my phone, I lock or shut down the tech toys and walk away, so I can be truly present with them.” (If I am working intensely on something, I might ask that we talk a little later.)

The key is that I’ve expressed my value as an action, a measurable behavior: I either turn away from scrolling through my phone and turn toward my family member — I live out that values-based action — or I do not.

Use the Words “Always” and “Never” to Help You Write Down a Personal Code of Conduct. Newport also has a list he calls his “Personal Code of Conduct.” I have a list like that, too, which I call my “Personal Policies” list. In Newport’s code of conduct, he writes down sentences that start with, “I always do this…” “I never do this, I never do that…” You probably already have some of these. Recently a friend told me, “I always return the grocery cart to the store.” What do you try to always, or never do? Write those things down — that shows you how you’re already living out some of your values. Newport did not share specifics from his personal code of conduct list, but one of my personal policies is this one: “I don’t commit verbal violence toward anyone, including myself.” This is something I have to work on. Snark comes easily to me. Eventually I realized the damage verbal zingers could do in my relationships, and the damage my internal name-calling did to myself. So, I wrote that as a personal policy: “I don’t commit verbal violence toward anyone, including myself.” I still have to practice this value, but it helps that I wrote my commitment down where I can review it and work on it. Which leads us to…

Make a Weekly “Values Plan” and Choose an Action to Practice. Writing this stuff down is a waste of your time if you don’t act on it. The way to make sure you act on your values, live them out, is to a) write them down, and b) review them regularly. Which is something Newport does.

The last thing Cal Newport talked about in this podcast episode was how he reviews his values-related lists each week, and writes down an action that he can do over the coming week, to shore up values he feels he needs to practice. He calls this a “values plan.” I review this [roles and values list, and personal code of conduct list] each week, and I hone in on a part of my code of conduct or value that I want to focus on. This could look like making plans to deepen connections by calling people over the next week, or attending to your inner life by taking the first hour of the day for reading and journaling. Newport identifies small actions he can do during the next week to live out his values. He’ll write down a sentence about one thing he could practice the next week to shore up a value he wants to address. The podcast episode ended with Newport recommending the practice of having what he calls a root document where you have identified your values, with some of the core concrete practices you do, to live those values out. (Anna Havron)

94. The Imagination in ADHD

07 February 2022 13:57

I have ADHD. That means I have one hell of an imagination. But is having a potent imagination a blessing or a curse? Centuries ago Samuel Johnson, who had one hell of an imagination himself and also fit the profile of ADHD, wrote about “that hunger of imagination which preys incessantly upon life, and must always be appeased by some employment.” Our imagination is hungry, we who have the condition so misleadingly called Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD.) I say misleadingly because the last thing we suffer from is a deficit of attention. To the contrary, we possess an abundance of attention. Our challenge always is to control it.

The most difficult part of our mind to control is our imagination. Hungry? It’s ravenous. It must be fed. It knows no feeding schedule, but when it feels the need, it lets us know. If we can then find employment, to use Johnson’s word, for our imagination in some pleasant or constructive project, scheme, or other undertaking, then our imagination becomes our ally, even proof of our genius, our originality, our way of changing the world even. When suitably employed in creating something of value to us or to others, then we give thanks to our genes and our Creator for this gift called imagination we did nothing to earn but can never abandon.

However, when we cannot find suitable employment for this hungry faculty over which we have so little control, why then it turns on us with a ferocity others can’t understand. It sets about:

• devouring us,
• ripping away at our self regard, our
• feeling of security in the world, our
• confidence in a bountiful future, and our
• actual grip on reality, on our own sanity.
  

What happens when our imagination is not fed?

When not fed by some suitable employment, our imagination turns into an:

• untamed and vicious beast, an
• an ugly, salivating monster,
• our worst enemy, made all the worse and far, far more dangerous by being of us, in us, and always with us.
• We can do nothing to dispose of it or rip it out of our minds. To quiet it we sometimes turn to drugs, alcohol, or compulsive behaviors like gambling, spending, or sexual escapades. It is the rapacious hunger of imagination, unable to find suitable employment, that turns so many of us who have ADHD into addicts and compulsive people of all kinds.
  

But is also that hungry, never-satisfied imagination that turns so many of us into:

• artists,
• inventors,
• discoverers,
• builders, and
• creators of all stripes and types.
  

It is that hunger of imagination that drives the man with ADHD always onward in the lifelong search for something “commensurate to his capacity for wonder”. Were our capacity for wonder not so great, were we not so predisposed to imagine greater than what ordinary life offers up, we would not be driven all but mad by our need to fill that capacity for wonder–to create the perfect song, or swing, or double helix, or arc, or love, or empire. Had we punier, less intrusive imaginations, we could relax. But because we can envision the ideal, because we can imagine perfect love, perfect symmetry, perfect prose, or perfect beauty of any kind, then we can never rest easy until we create it. Which, of course, means we can never rest easy. So, tell me, does this hell of an imagination create heaven, or hell? Is it a blessing or a curse? If you ask me, it’s both. I have no choice but to live with it, allow its shabby stall in my mind, feed it best as I can, and try to stay on the sane side of life as it works its way with me. (Dr. Edward Hallowell)

95. Milton Erickson Quotes

10 February 2022 08:15

• Don’t try to imitate my voice, or my cadence. Just discover your own. Develop your own techniques. Be your own natural self. I tried to do it the way somebody else did and it was a MESS!
• You always call it hindsight. Two weeks too late to think of the right retort to make. You lead with your unconscious; you make that retort immediately…Trust your unconscious; it knows more than you do.
• Discover their patterns of happiness.
• It’s the individual responding to the individual.
• In hypnosis you are seeking to alter their body awareness, their body understandings, their body experiences, their body responses.
• You use hypnosis not as a cure but as a means of establishing a favorable climate in which to learn.
• There are so many things in human living that we should regard not as traumatic learning but as incomplete learning, unfinished learning.
• You can pretend anything and master it.
• Neurosis is a way of hanging on to things you have no right.
• I want you to discover the difference between your thinking and your doing.
• Now after 29 years of terrible anti-social behavior on Joe’s part, and 23-year-old Edie said, ‘You can if you’re a gentleman’—and that was Joe’s psychotherapy. For 29 years of sociopathic behavior and Joe became a farm man, a totally different man. And when you look over society, how many a man is ruined by being rejected by a girl, was reformed by a girl saying, ‘Yes.’ And how many people have some little incident in their life that determines how they will live.
• When I work with you I keep you in mind… Psychotherapy is the individual responding to the individual. When working with you I look for your unique attunement to life’s energy and together we make it a part of your everyday life.
• A trance state is using your brain so that you can entertain any thought and give reality to that thought, to that memory, the same way you can dream at night.
• Don’t tell them to relax; tell them to ENJOY relaxing!
• Always turn any insult—misunderstand it as a compliment.
• Change will lead to insight far more often than insight will lead to change.
• I am very confident. I look confident. I act confident. I speak in a confident way…
• You see, trance induction should not be a laborious thing. The mere confidence in your ability to induce a trance is the most important thing of all. And anybody who is human is going to get into a trance . . . . experimentally, I have determined that all patients can go into a trance state – that anybody can. Now, is it necessary to know that you are in a trance? No, it isn’t. How deep a trance is necessary? Any trance that is of sufficient level to let your unconscious mind take a look, a mental look, at what’s going on, is sufficient. In those mental looks and understandings, you learn a great deal more than you do by conscious effort. And you should use your mind at the unconscious level, even while you are using it at the conscious level.

96. μεγαλοψυχία, Humility & Pride

11 February 2022 10:11

A man is morally free when, in full possession of his living humanity, he judges the world, and judges other men, with uncompromising sincerity. (George Santayana) Is it true? How about the reverse: you do not become free by acting intransigent; those who are free have the obligation to be intransigent. Fat Tony to Nero: "Being self owned is a state of mind".

As usual I am getting a shock reading the original. The arete in Aristotle does not resemble our domestication (democratization? sissification?) of the classical qualities. My 1894 bi-glossic version of the Nichomachean ethics has “pride” for μεγαλοψυχία, what we now call magnanimity (but μεγαλοψυχία is not exactly just for forgiving: it is about being grand) –a trait for the classical upper class that did not exist in the West; but it is certainly Graeco-Arabic since شهم is the highest quality; also beyond سميح is a quality that has no equivalent “is forgetful of wrongs out of strength, not weakness” –or “one who has the option to forgive”. The portrait of the magnanimous or the grand is a little more complicated than modern versions [it is not just limited to forgiving]: it is about courage & no fake humility! ὁ γὰρ μικρῶν ἄξιος καὶ τούτων ἀξιῶν ἑαυτὸν σώφρων, μεγαλόψυχος δ᾽ οὔ· ἐν μεγέθει γὰρ ἡ μεγαλοψυχία, ὥσπερ καὶ τὸ κάλλος ἐν μεγάλῳ σώματι, οἱ μικροὶ δ᾽ ἀστεῖοι καὶ σύμμετροι, καλοὶ δ᾽ οὔ [ small temperate people cannot have “megalopsuchia”]. The megalopsuchos while merciful, cannot be humble (he would be μικρόψυχος)! ὁ μὲν γὰρ μεγαλόψυχος δικαίως καταφρονεῖ (δοξάζει γὰρ ἀληθῶς), οἱ δὲ πολλοὶ τυχόντως. The magnanimous despises others justly! (but without being puny). He does not gossip, only takes grand tasks, does not care for honors, does not work for Goldman Sachs (wearing a tie, demeaning “annual reviews”, in exchange for millions in bonuses), does not care for academic tenure & for the company of academics and other half-men (but does not hold grudges), does not kiss the clients’ behinds, does not read the NYT, etc. ἀναγκαῖον δὲ καὶ φανερομισῆ εἶναι καὶ φανερόφιλον ...καὶ ἀληθευτικός [upfront in his loves and hates! & free!] The problem is to be grand precludes psychological socialization by a milieu (say when you become part of an academic or professional collective, you no longer feel free of your opinions lest you hurt someone and become progressively domesticated].

At the core of Algazel’s idea was the notion that if you drink because you are thirsty, thirst should not be seen as a direct cause. There may be a greater scheme; in fact there is a greater scheme that is being played out, but it could only be understood by those familiar with evolutionary thinking. In that, Algazel’s critique of causality was far more advanced than Hume, though nobody could see it without grounding in evolutionary theory.

I was introduced to the distinction between different evolutionary notions of causality by my friend Terry Burnham who has a dream to make all human sciences a part of biology. Strangely something rang familiar with his distinction... it was Algazel whom I read as a teenager.

We can easily have an illusion of causality, with what I called cosmetic cause. Why do you eat? Because you are hungry? Come on, this is not the true cause! An evolutionary thinker would dislike your answer as naive and limited. He would say the following: “if your genes were not endowed with the desire to eat to consume calories, you would not have been among us today”. So hunger is not the true cause of eating; it is only some weaker cause, it is only “how” your genes manifest their goal, not the end goal, which is not the satisfaction of hunger but survival. Likewise why do you get interested in some private semi-aerobic indoor activity with someone of the opposite (or perhaps the same) gender? The answer is “for pleasure” –but you would be missing a layer of causality: you would not be here today if we humans did not have a propensity to procreate and mother nature is giving you an incentive to do so. So you are seeing the “how” and mistaking it for the “why”.

The idea becomes clearer if, like Terry, you look at humans as just animals moved by instinctive mechanisms–and rob them of the free-will that is so ingrained in our self image. The (re)originator of this idea was the evolutionary biologist Ernst Mayr. He was a colorful fellow who stayed colorful a long time; that is, he lived one hundred and one year, and kept working throughout, producing a clearly written book called What Evolution Is a few years before his death, which I read with delight, not knowing (or guessing) the age of the author. He introduced in 1961 a distinction of the different types of “causes”. The first, he called proximate, the second he called ultimate. [Note: most people refer to Niko Timbergen’s text]

The proximate is the cause directly seen here, the pseudo-cause –I drink because I am thirsty; I do not cheat because I am honorable; I will go up to your bedroom because it’s fun; I punch people on the nose because they cheat at Poker; I protect my family members because I am a good relative. Or there is the why and how –an animal’s primary objective is to transmit its genes, and what we may be seeing is “how” it does it so there is not true end explanation. This can also explain some of our activities like helping a stranger, an act that cannot be narrowly explained, and do not appear to be explainable to a narrow-minded thinker, but have an ultimate cause –altruism is what made societies exist and helped our communal survival.

In a way Algazel builds on Aristotle to attack him. Aristotle already saw the distinction in his Physics between the different layers of cause (formal, efficient, final, & material); it is just that he thought that 1) they overlapped; 2) he could observe them. He also saw that the idea was limited to physics because outside physics God could stand outside causality “unmoved mover”.

I've always wondered why males with boring professions, even when wealthy, do not attract females as much as artists do: rock stars, painters, & (in Europe) novelists & poets are more "interesting" than mathematicians, engineers, computer scientists, or physicists. Likewise men with flamboyant objects like red Ferraris or colorful clothes attract like a magnet, compared to the more conservative, but stable, plodding accountant. Same with wit compared to intelligence. Is it about the Zahavian showoff with language & artistic prowess? We have been playing with linguistic prowess and cave paintings for tens of thousand of years. Anyway, this metric can be used as a guideline to define true intelligence & relevant subjects: whatever subject is boring & unattractive in a Zahavian way will not be ancestrally fit & will be not natural to society. Painting, wit, music are more NATURAL than abstract mathematics or abstract, not exhibited wealth.

What I take is that intelligence in the sense of IQ tests and SAT scores is not as natural & ancestrally fit as wit, l'ésprit fin.

By not natural I mean not Black-Swan robust, skills we call intelligence because of a certain construction, but that are not needed ecologically. Mate selection has the right heuristics & intuitions --though in the right domain, & in the right domain only (the modern world we've constructed is quite different). So, Is "intelligence" without wit & verbal brilliance really intelligence?(Nassim Taleb)

97. How to Read

11 February 2022 10:19

I bet you already know how to read a book. You were taught in elementary school. But do you know how to read well? There is a difference between reading for understanding and reading for information. If you’re like most people, you probably haven’t given much thought to how you read. And how you read makes a massive difference to knowledge accumulation. A lot of people confuse knowing the name of something with understanding. While great for exercising your memory, the regurgitation of facts without solid understanding and context gains you little in the real world.

A useful heuristic: Anything easily digested is reading for information.

Consider the newspaper, are you truly learning anything new? Do you consider the writer your superior when it comes to knowledge in the subject? Odds are probably not. That means you’re reading for information. It means you’re likely to parrot an opinion that isn’t yours as if you had done the work. This is how most people read. But most people aren’t really learning anything new. It’s not going to give you an edge, make you better at your job, or allow you to avoid problems.

“Marking a book is literally an experience of your differences or agreements with the author. It is the highest respect you can pay him.” — Edgar Allen Poe

Learning something insightful requires mental work. It’s uncomfortable. If it doesn’t hurt, you’re not learning. You need to find writers who are more knowledgeable on a particular subject than yourself. By narrowing the gap between the author and yourself, you get smarter.

The Four Levels of Reading:

Mortimer Adler literally wrote the book on reading. Adler identifies four levels of reading:

1. Elementary Reading
2. Inspectional Reading
3. Analytical Reading
4. Syntopical Reading
   

How You Read Matches Why You’re Reading:

The goal of reading determines how you read. Reading the latest Danielle Steel novel is not the same as reading Plato. If you’re reading for entertainment or information, you’re going to read a lot differently (and likely different material) than reading to increase understanding. While many people are proficient in reading for information and entertainment, few improve their ability to read for knowledge.

Before we can improve our reading skills, we need to understand the differences in the reading levels. They are thought of as levels because you can’t move to a higher level without a firm understanding of the previous one — they are cumulative.

1. Elementary Reading

This is the level of reading taught in our elementary schools. If you’re reading this website, you already know how to do this.

2. Inspectional Reading

We’ve been taught that skimming and superficial reading are bad for understanding. That is not necessarily the case. Using these tools effectively can increase understanding. Inspectional reading allows us to look at the author’s blueprint and evaluate the merits of a deeper reading experience.

There are two subtypes of inspectional reading:

Systematic skimming — This is meant to be a quick check of the book by (1) reading the preface; (2) studying the table of contents; (3) checking the index; and (4) reading the inside jacket. This should give you sufficient knowledge to understand the chapters in the book, pivotal to the author’s argument. Dip in here and there, but never with more than a paragraph or two. Skimming helps you reach a decision point: Does this book deserve more of my time and attention? If not, you put it down.

Superficial reading — This is when you just read. Don’t ponder the argument, don’t look things up, don’t write in the margins. If you don’t understand something, move on. What you gain from this quick read will help you later when you go back and put more effort into reading. You now come to another decision point. Now that you have a better understanding of the book’s contents and its structure, do you want to understand it?

Inspectional reading gives you the gist of things. Sometimes that’s all we want or need. But sometimes we want more. Sometimes we want to understand. Read more about Inspectional Reading.

3. Analytical Reading

Francis Bacon once remarked, “some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested.”

You can think of analytical reading as doing that chewing and digesting. This is doing the work. Analytical reading is a thorough reading. If inspectional reading is the best you can do quickly, this is the best reading you can do given time. At this point, you start to engage your mind and dig into the work required to understand what’s being said. I highly recommend you use marginalia to converse with the author.

There are four rules to Analytical Reading

• Classify the book according to kind and subject matter.
• State what the whole book is about with the utmost brevity.
• Enumerate its major parts in their order and relation, and outline these parts as you have outlined the whole.
• Define the problem or problems the author is trying to solve.
  

You’ll probably notice that while those sound pretty easy, they involve a lot of work. Luckily the inspectional reading you’ve already done has primed you for this. After an inspectional read, you will understand the book and the author’s views. But that doesn’t mean you’ll understand the broader subject. To do that, you need to use comparative reading to synthesize knowledge from several books on the same subject.

4. Syntopical Reading

This is also known as comparative reading, and it represents the most demanding and difficult reading of all. Syntopical Reading involves reading many books on the same subject and comparing and contrasting ideas, vocabulary, and arguments. This task is undertaken by identifying relevant passages, translating the terminology, framing and ordering the questions that need answering, defining the issues, and having a conversation with the responses. The goal is not to achieve an overall understanding of any particular book, but rather to understand the subject and develop a deep fluency. This is all about identifying and filling in your knowledge gaps.

There are five steps to syntopical reading:

• Finding the Relevant Passages — You need to find the right books and then the passages that are most relevant to filling your needs. So the first step is an inspectional reading of all the works that you have identified as relevant.
• Bringing the Author to Terms — In analytical reading, you must identify the keywords and how they are used by the author. This is fairly straightforward. The process becomes more complicated now as each author has probably used different terms and concepts to frame their argument. Now the onus is on you to establish the terms. Rather than using the author’s language, you must use your own. In short, this is an exercise in translation and synthesis.
• Getting the Questions Clear — Rather than focus on the problems the author is trying to solve, you need to focus on the questions that you want answered. Just as we must establish our own terminology, so too must we establish our own propositions by shedding light on our problems to which the authors provide answers. It’s important to frame the questions in such a way that all or most of the authors can be interpreted as providing answers. Sometimes we might not get an answer to our questions because they might not have been seen as questions by the authors.
• Defining the Issues — If you’ve asked a clear question to which there are multiple answers then an issue has been defined. Opposing answers, now translated into your terms, must be ordered in relation to one another. Understanding multiple perspectives within an issue helps you form an intelligent opinion.
• Analyzing the Discussion — It’s presumptuous to expect we’ll find a single unchallenged truth to any of our questions. Our answer is the conflict of opposing answers. The value is the discussion you have with these authors. You can now have an informed opinion.
  

Becoming a Demanding Reader

Reading is all about asking the right questions in the right order and seeking answers.

There are four main questions you need to ask of every book:

1. What is this book about?
2. What is being said in detail, and how?
3. Is this book true in whole or in part?
4. What of it?

(Shane Parish)

*Reverse skimming: you try to read a text as slowly as you can. (Nassim Taleb)

98. It is the degree of opacity and uncertainty in a system that should drive the precautionary measures

17 February 2022 11:39

THE POLICY DEBATE with respect to anthropogenic climate-change typically revolves around the accuracy of models. Those who contend that models make accurate predictions argue for specific policies to stem

the foreseen damaging effects; those who doubt their accuracy cite a lack of reliable evidence of harm to

warrant policy action. These two alternatives are not exhaustive. One can sidestep the "skepticism" of those who question existing climate-models, by framing risk in the most straightforward possible terms, at the global scale. That is, we should ask "what would the correct policy be if we had no reliable models?" We have only one planet. This fact radically constrains the kinds of risks that are appropriate to take at a large scale. Even a risk with a very low probability becomes unacceptable when it affects all of us – there are no reversing mistakes of that magnitude. Without any precise models, we can still reason that polluting or altering our environment significantly could put us in uncharted territory, with no statistical track record and potentially large consequences. It is at the core of both scientific decision making and ancestral wisdom to take seriously the absence of evidence when the consequences of an action can be large. And it is standard textbook decision theory that a policy should depend at least as much on uncertainty concerning the adverse consequences as it does on the known effects. Further, it has been shown that in any system fraught with opacity, harm is in the dose rather than in the nature of the offending substance: it increases nonlinearly to the quantities at stake. Everything fragile has such property. While some amount of pollution is inevitable, high quantities of any pollutant put us at a rapidly increasing risk of destabilizing the climate, a system that is integral to the biosphere. Ergo, we should build down CO2 emissions, even regardless of what climate-models tell us. This leads to the following asymmetry in climate policy. The scale of the effect must be demonstrated to be large enough to have impact. Once this is shown, and it has been, the burden of proof of absence of harm is on those who would deny it. It is the degree of opacity and uncertainty in a system, as well as asymmetry in effect, rather than specific model predictions, that should drive the precautionary measures. Push a complex system too far and it will not come back. The popular belief that uncertainty undermines the case for taking seriously the ’climate crisis’ that scientists tell us we face is the opposite of the truth. Properly understood, as driving the case for precaution, uncertainty radically underscores that case, and may even constitute it. (Joseph Norman†, Rupert Read§, Yaneer Bar-Yam†, Nassim Nicholas Taleb )

99. Just try to make a beautiful thing, and gradually, the right direction will show itself, of its own force

21 February 2022 09:50

Uniqueness

Infinite variety, within deep underlying similarities that unify the whole.

Examples of what we mean by life and by good buildings are illustrated in many places on this site. All of them share, with nature, this character that every part, no matter how ordinary, and no matter how much it resembles other parts and other places, is magical, and can become an object of love for us. That happens because the uniqueness of every bush and every leaf, affirms and reaffirms, in every atom, and every cell, our underlying uniqueness.

In all traditional environments—boats, buildings, rooms, paintings, gardens, windows, roofs, materials, roof tiles—this underlying variation and sameness, combined as nature combines them—are re-affirmed. The elements are simple in appearance, but vary endlessly, and in varying as they do, like nature, they reaffirm the foundations of the human spirit.

When this is lost, as it has been lost in the 20th century—human beings are in peril, and depression, madness, anomie, despair, are not far away. They are caused, in essence, by the surrounding image of a despairing circumstance, in which hotels, houses, apartments, offices, light fixtures, McDonalds hamburger places, , bricks, windows, panels, and modules, are identically repeated, and where, people too, are then thought to be ciphers of no importance that are identically repeated—and where, then, the soul of man is in great danger of being lost.

Differentiation

At each step only one of the following very simple things can happen:

• formation of a dot
• an area is shaded
• a gradient is created
• a line is drawn to divide an existing area in two
• a symmetry is strengthened
• a space is made more convex or more positive
• a line or area or volume is divided into equal parts

At each step in an unfolding process only one of these events occurs.

Theory of generative processes.

The theory says that we can only hope to build a living world, by using generative or "genetic" means. This is an entirely new view of architecture. It says that the living environment can be created ONLY by the action of millions of people, all using a common genetic scheme, which generates the form and content of buildings in a fashion very similar to the way that genetic material or DNA generates the form of organisms.

Uniqueness of Generative Sequences

For a person who has not thought very much about it, the idea of a generative sequence might seem

Obvious

Not very interesting

After all, every recipe is a sequence of steps. Is a generative sequence anything more than a series of steps like a recipe for cake or omelets.

It is.

There is one essential ingredient to the sequences, which is perhaps their most salient feature, and which is also the feature that makes them work, and which forms the foundation of the described methodology.

A sequence works, or does not work, according to the order of the steps in the sequence. Some sequences allow unfolding, others do not allow it. For a given task, the number of possible sequences is huge compared with the number of sequences which work, that is by comparison, tiny. For example, if we have 24 steps, for generating a Japanese teahouse. There are 24! (approximately 1023) different possible sequences of 24 items, billions upon billions. The number of successful sequences, or sequences which "work" for the same 24 items is very limited, a few thousand at the most, which are all essentially variants of the same underlying sequence. In short, there are less than .00000001 percent of all possible sequences, which work.

It is not possible, at present, to give a precisely defined way of identifying the sequences which work. That is to say, we do not yet know a mathematical procedure which can identify the sequences which work. However, the sequences which work can be identified , experimentally, by a fairly well defined procedure. If one applies a sequence of steps to a given context, and if one then observes the unfolding process, it is possible to ascertain, unambiguously, whether the process engendered by this sequence at any time contradicts itself. That means, we ask whether one is forced to backtrack, because step B which comes at a certain point in the sequence forces one to undo the results of a previously taken step A.

In this way, by doing experiments on test cases, it is possible to winnow out or correct sequences, and essentially to eliminate all the bad ones, thus gradually finding one's way to the good sequences, which have the property that no such backtracking occurs as a project unfolds.

This property of being backtrack-free is the essence of what makes a successful sequence.

It is very important to note that, for a given set of steps, such a backtrack-free sequence is stable. Once discovered, the property of being backtrack-free stays, and it is true for all contexts. Thus the backtrack-free sequences are the essence of the theory of unfolding. Since the identification of backtrack-free sequences can be made, experimentally, the property is objective and is unambiguously defined by experiment (even though difficult to find, experimentally).

The described methodology incorporates the idea that such backtrack-free sequences exist, and includes all the particular realizations of backtrack-free sequences for providing widespread user participation in the planning design and construction of the built environment. The sequences can be made available within the context of a business model that uses the internet for wide dissemination and a combination of sequences, together with word based questions and probes which bring user input into the end product with a supporting imaging and design tool software. The generative sequences can be combined with online tools which make it possible for the user to create the design dynamically, step-by-step.

The business model can also provide for ancillary project management, and access to local professionals who provide help, management, craft and construction for a community, company or individual who has used the sequences to lay out their own design.

This approach and business method is fundamentally different from previous attempts to plan, design and construct buildings. The present methodology provides for user participation in the planning design and construction of the built environment in a manner which allows the organic growth of a design through a sequence of generative steps.

Just try to make a beautiful thing, and gradually, the right direction will show itself, of its own force.But what does "beautiful" mean? It means that the thing genuinely makes my heart sing. It makes me feel joy, my own wholesomeness. It makes me feel more rooted in the world, more whole as a person. It makes me feel some happy thing, as if the spring was here.

Of course, there is nothing harder in the world, than making a building which has this quality. It is a lifelong thing to try and do it. I fail ten times in every moment, before I succeed. It is unbelievably hard. But it is unbelievably worthwhile. When I do succeed, and even while I am failing, I feel happy. And the finished product, when it is standing there, makes people happy in themselves, to be in the presence of this beauty.

100. Hannah Arendt

21 February 2022 17:00

“The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be good or evil.”

“Storytelling reveals meaning without committing the error of defining it.”

“The most radical revolutionary will become a conservative the day after the revolution.”

“In an ever-changing, incomprehensible world the masses had reached the point where they would, at the same time, believe everything and nothing, think that everything was possible and that nothing was true. ... Mass propaganda discovered that its audience was ready at all times to believe the worst, no matter how absurd, and did not particularly object to being deceived because it held every statement to be a lie anyhow. The totalitarian mass leaders based their propaganda on the correct psychological assumption that, under such conditions, one could make people believe the most fantastic statements one day, and trust that if the next day they were given irrefutable proof of their falsehood, they would take refuge in cynicism; instead of deserting the leaders who had lied to them, they would protest that they had known all along that the statement was a lie and would admire the leaders for their superior tactical cleverness.”

“The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced Communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction (i.e., the reality of experience) and the distinction between true and false (i.e., the standards of thought) no longer exist.”

“The aim of totalitarian education has never been to instill convictions but to destroy the capacity to form any.”

“Before mass leaders seize the power to fit reality to their lies, their propaganda is marked by its extreme contempt for facts as such, for in their opinion fact depends entirely on the power of man who can fabricate it.”

“Forgiveness is the key to action and freedom.”

“Under conditions of tyranny it is far easier to act than to think. ”

“Clichés, stock phrases, adherence to conventional, standardized codes of expression and conduct have the socially recognized function of protecting us against reality, that is, against the claim on our thinking attention that all events and facts make by virtue of their existence.”

“No punishment has ever possessed enough power of deterrence to prevent the commission of crimes.”

“When all are guilty, no one is; confessions of collective guilt are the best possible safeguard against the discovery of culprits, and the very magnitude of the crime the best excuse for doing nothing. ”

“Only the mob and the elite can be attracted by the momentum of totalitarianism itself. The masses have to be won by propaganda.”

“One of the greatest advantages of the totalitarian elites of the twenties and thirties was to turn any statement of fact into a question of motive.”

“the greatest evil perpetrated is the evil committed by nobodies, that is, by human beings who refuse to be persons”

“Good can be radical; evil can never be radical, it can only be extreme, for it possesses neither depth nor any demonic dimension yet--and this is its horror--it can spread like a fungus over the surface of the earth and lay waste the entire world. Evil comes from a failure to think.”

“Evil comes from a failure to think. It defies thought for as soon as thought tries to engage itself with evil and examine the premises and principles from which it originates, it is frustrated because it finds nothing there. That is the banality of evil.”

“Only crime and the criminal, it is true, confront us with the perplexity of radical evil; but only the hypocrite is really rotten to the core.”

“As citizens, we must prevent wrongdoing because the world in which we all live, wrong-doer, wrong sufferer and spectator, is at stake.”

“There is hardly a better way to avoid discussion than by releasing an argument from the control of the present and by saying that only the future will reveal its merits.”

“True goal of totalitarian propaganda is not persuasion, but organization of the polity. ... What convinces masses are not facts, and not even invented facts, but only the consistency of the system of which they are presumably part.”

“The point is that both Hitler and Stalin held out promises of stability in order to hide their intention of creating a state of permanent instability.”

“Never has our future been more unpredictable, never have we depended so much on political forces that cannot be trusted to follow the rules of common sense and self-interest—forces that look like sheer insanity, if judged by the standards of other centuries. It is as though mankind had divided itself between those who believe in human omnipotence (who think that everything is possible if one knows how to organize masses for it) and those for whom powerlessness has become the major experience of their lives.”

“The outstanding negative quality of the totalitarian elite is that it never stops to think about the world as it really is and never compares the lies with reality.”

“Man cannot be free if he does not know that he is subject to necessity, because his freedom is always won in his never wholly successful attempts to liberate himself from necessity. ”

“Men have been found to resist the most powerful monarchs and to refuse to bow down before them, but few indeed have been found to resist the crowd, to stand up alone before misguided masses, to face their implacable frenzy without weapons and with folded arms to dare a no when a yes is demanded. Such a man was Zola!”

“Revolutionaries do not make revolutions! The revolutionaries are those who know when power is lying in the street and when they can pick it up. Armed uprising by itself has never yet led to revolution.”

“I'm more than ever of the opinion that a decent human existence is possible today only on the fringes of society, where one then runs the risk of starving or being stoned to death. In these circumstances, a sense of humor is a great help.”

“For an ideology differs from a simple opinion in that it claims to possess either the key to history, or the solution for all the "riddles of the universe," or the intimate knowledge of the hidden universal laws which are supposed to rule nature and man. Few ideologies have won enough prominence to survive the hard competitive struggle of persuasion, and only two have come out on top and essentially defeated all others: the ideology which interprets history as an economic struggle of classes, and the other that interprets history as a natural fight of races. The appeal of both to large masses was so strong that they were able to enlist state support and establish themselves as official national doctrines. But far beyond the boundaries within which race-thinking and class-thinking have developed into obligatory patterns of thought, free public opinion has adopted them to such an extent that not only intellectuals but great masses of people will no longer accept a presentation of past or present facts that is not in agreement with either of these views.”

101. Doug Engelbart’s Bootstrapping

22 February 2022 09:01

Positioning organizations to meet the unprecedented challenges of this decade and beyond will require sweeping changes in every facet of organizational life. It will not be a simple matter of replacing our existing work structures, procedures, and technologies. What is required is a strategy for organizational fitness, including leveraging limited resources to effect dramatic, continuous, and rapid improvement.

The following outlines a comprehensive strategic framework for bootstrapping organizations into the 21st century, and an explicit proposal for launching an exploratory pilot implementation of this strategy.

ABCs of Organizational Improvement

Given the shifting nature of organizations, the increasingly complex and urgent global market forces, and the virtual bombardment of end users by vendors and consultants, organizations must keep getting faster and smarter at identifying and integrating improvements into their every day life. Improving this improvement capability should be a key element in every organization's improvement strategy:

As a minimum, organizations must adopt a permanent and highly-coordinated B Activity, responsible for continuously identifying and implementing candidate improvements to the core business activity.

But the current means of developing and transferring improvements are not adequate for the scale and rate of change faced today. Organizations need to learn more effective ways of assimilating dramatic improvements on a continuing basis. They need to get better at understanding requirements, surveying, evaluating, selecting, integrating, developing, testing, and applying the improvements. And they need to get better and better at deploying the improvements into rapidly shifting organizational targets – identifying suitable pilot groups, planning the training program, running and evaluating the pilot results, learning how much to introduce, how quickly, how to overcome cultural barriers, and how to quickly incorporate lessons learned.

To improve this B Activity improvement capability, organizations will need to invest in an explicit on-going C Activity. A key to the long-term vitality and competitive edge for an organization will be to get better and better at improving itself.

A key to the long-term vitality of an organization – to get better and better at improving itself.

Extra "Bootstrapping" Leverage

Ideally the C Activity should focus on improving generic capabilities which boost all three Activities (A, B, and C). For example, a key strategic target early on would be to improve how an organization:

• identifies needs and opportunities;
• plans and deploys solutions;
• incorporates lessons learned.
  

Since these basic knowledge-work capabilities are central to effective A, B, and C work, improving them would boost both the job capability and the improvement capability simultaneously, thus providing extra compounded investment leverage, or bootstrapping leverage.

Concurrent Knowledge Work

As complexity and urgency increase, the need for highly effective knowledge-work capabilities will become increasingly urgent. Increasing pressure for reduced product cycle time, and for more and more work to be done concurrently, is forcing unprecedented coordination across project functions and organizational boundaries. Yet most organizations do not have a comprehensive picture of what knowledge work is, and which aspects would be most profitable to improve.

The objective of most knowledge work is to determine and describe what needs to be done, and how and when it will be accomplished – i.e. to identify needs and opportunities, plan and deploy solutions, and incorporate lessons learned.

Identifying Needs and Opportunities:

An alert project group, whether classified as an A, B, or C Activity, always keeps a watchful eye on its external environment, actively surveying, ingesting, and interacting with it. The resulting intelligence is integrated with other project knowledge on an ongoing basis to identify problems, needs, and opportunities which might require attention or action.

Planning and Deploying Solutions:

Responding effectively to needs and opportunities involves a high degree of coordination and dialog within and across project groups. The resulting plans provide a comprehensive picture of the project at hand – e.g. new products and services, improvements to existing products and services, or solutions to a specific problem situation. These plans, which are iteratively and collaboratively developed, represent the knowledge products of the project team, and constitute a roadmap for implementation and deployment.

Incorporating Lessons Learned:

The planning process is rarely a one-shot effort. Lessons learned, as well as intelligence and dialog, must be constantly analyzed, digested, and integrated into the planning documents throughout the life cycle of the project.

For lack of a better term, I call this basic knowledge-work process a CODIAK process, for the Concurrent Development, Integration, and Application of Knowledge. The resulting operational knowledge base, consisting of intelligence, dialog records, and knowledge products, is continuously updated, used, and re-used by many players, concurrently and over time:

This knowledge base represents a valuable corporate asset. And yet, many of its crucial elements, such as decision trails and intelligence collections, are generally not recorded. Even minor inadequacies in the CODIAK process can be extremely costly in terms of:

• slip-ups in version control;
• lapses in project "memory" (e.g. design rationale);
• delayed access to important intelligence;
• non-optimal collaboration on design decisions.
  

This knowledge process is the driving force of the organization, and the resulting body of knowledge represents a valuable corporate asset.

The Concurrent, Integrated Enterprise

Almost every effort in the organization is immersed in, or impacted by, an ongoing CODIAK process. And each organizational unit's knowledge process and knowledge products – whether individual, project team, functional unit, program, department, division, task force – are part of a larger effort within and even outside of the organization:

This nested web of concurrent knowledge-work is especially evident in complex R&D and manufacturing environments, where close coordination via concurrent engineering, or total quality management, is increasingly critical. And in the case of joint ventures, each knowledge domain must integrate its CODIAK work within, and also across, organizations.

The CODIAK process is the driving force of the organization, providing direction and momentum for new or renewed organizational efforts. Giving knowledge workers new capabilities for coordinating their work concurrently, with instant access to the correct document, and all the supporting intelligence and dialog trails which led to key decisions, could dramatically reduce product-cycle time and improve first-time quality. Significantly improved CODIAK capabilities, applied within the C, B, and A Activities of an organization, offer powerful bootstrapping leverage for improving overall effectiveness, productivity, and fitness.

An Open Hyperdocument System (OHS)

As more and more of the CODIAK process work moves online, and more of the work is done concurrently using a hodgepodge of workstations, networks, application packages, and utilities, organizations will be faced with a whole new set of challenges for coordinating the enterprise knowledge work.

A strategic solution to these challenges begins with a hyperdocument system. The hyperdocument refers to multimedia files which support many object types, including hypertext links, hyperdocument e-mail, and online hyperdocument publishing (library) with automated cataloging and version control. Links should be easily created, human-readable, and printable. Files should have structure, and objects should be independently addressable within a file, with zooming in and out and other on-the-fly custom views. Personal signature encryption and suitable privacy provisions should also be supported.

A hyperdocument system should enable flexible collaborative development, integration, application, study, and re-use of CODIAK knowledge online:

Ultimately, the hyperdocument system will need to be an open hyperdocument system (OHS), allowing for an integrated "seamless" multi-vendor architecture where distributed diverse knowledge workers can share hyperdocument files, and share screens, regardless of each worker's particular hardware/software configuration.

This interoperability must extend across departments and across organizations to include customers, suppliers, and joint-venture partners. Furthermore, within the integrated enterprise of tomorrow, standard provisions must exist for links between OHS documents and objects within other enterprise data forms (e..g. data bases, CAD models). An OHS should provide totally interoperable CODIAK support for a truly concurrent, integrated enterprise.

The Co-Evolution Approach8

An OHS would go a long way toward providing much needed improvements to the CODIAK process. However, most capabilities are improved, or augmented, by many interdependent technical and non-technical elements, of which tools make up only a small part:

Until recently, we got by with improving selected elements of the Augmentation System in isolation, assuming that the other elements would eventually adapt "on their own".

But with the recent computer revolution, many organizations' Augmentation Systems are now heavily weighted with point-solution technology, seriously overpowering the human-system elements. Tools are being introduced to automate methods that evolved around now-obsolete tools, and vice versa. Many tools are not being harnessed effectively for lack of appropriate, well-evolved methods.

As the complexity and urgency of our improvement programs increase, this tactically-limited trend will prove to be very costly. Until we significantly stretch our perception of the scale and pervasiveness of change-opportunities in the human-system side of the equation, the organizational stresses from unbalanced Augmentation Systems will worsen, and the truly significant improvements in organizational capability will be forestalled.

The OHS requirements described above are based on 20 years of experience with an early OHS prototype used in large pilot trials in government and aerospace organizations. These requirements are recommended as a baseline starting point only. There is much more to be learned about the rigorous use of an OHS in a wide-area, distributed CODIAK process. The human-system elements – all the methods, procedures, conventions, skills, etc. – must be highly developed, in close association with the continuing evolution of OHS requirements.

Exploratory Pilots

To intensify and accelerate the human-tool co-evolution process, intensive pilot environments must be established by the C and B Activities. The C Activity should operate as the first pilot outpost of the organization, evolving the advanced methods and system prototypes to support its own intensive CODIAK process, and paving the way for subsequent pilot operations. Flexibly evolving OHS research prototypes will be required to support the advanced pilot exploration in a wide variety of application areas (e.g. CASE, concurrent engineering, total quality, CSCW). The resulting experience will feed the requirements definition for future prototypes, for products and services, and for the standards that will ultimately be required to support a truly integrated and interoperable OHS architecture. The experience will also serve to maximize the relevance, applicability, and transferability of the resulting products and services, rendering increased cost-effectiveness for end-user organizations and vendors alike.

Now, who will be responsible for this exploratory work? Vendors? End-user organizations? Universities? Government?

C-Activities Joining Forces

Ultimately, C Activities from a wide range of enterprises will need to join forces in a cooperative C Community to collaborate on common activities. This is feasible because most C Activity is generic, not proprietary. It is highly desirable because creating a vibrant pilot environment to support this work will be very costly. By pooling resources, members can spread the risk and spend less to get more – including attracting resources that would otherwise not be available – thus freeing up more internal resources to further invest in their proprietary B and A Activities.

Joining forces is also necessary for dealing appropriately with the increasingly complex interoperability requirements between enterprises. For instance, understanding the requirements for an OHS, developing a procurement approach for OHS prototypes to support planned pilot usage among Community Mem-bers, coordinating the planning and operation of such pilots, and integrating the lessons learned seems the most promising way to yield the desired results. And coordinating the standards requirements for interfacing or integrating applications software and utilities can only be accomplished by extensive cooperation among user organizations and vendors.

Such a Bootstrap Initiative would provide a common focus for user organizations, vendors, consultants, government agencies, and universities. Operating as an advanced pilot, or living prototype of its work, its results would be directly transferable to member organizations:

A Bootstrap Initiative offers the most direct, high-leverage, cost-effective path for bootstrapping organizations. But individual organizations can get started on their own, even before an Initiative is formally launched. They can begin by forming an explicit C Activity, headed by a responsible high-level executive, and staffed and advised by stakeholders from representative B Activities, to integrate the bootstrap strategy with their own strategic planning efforts. They can start planning for selected exploratory pilots, using off-the-shelf hyperdocument systems, and begin to test out the concepts and strategies described here.

The sooner organizations launch on a strategic path toward high-performance organizational fitness, the sooner the benefits can be achieved. Where does your organization stand?

Why this matters so much?

The feature of humans that makes us most human – that most clearly differentiates us from every other life form on Earth – is not our opposable thumb, and not even our use of tools. It is our ability to create and use symbols. The ability to look at the world, turn what we see into abstractions, and to then operate on those abstractions, rather than on the physical world itself, is an utterly astounding, beautiful thing, just taken all by itself. We manifest this ability to work with symbols in wonderful, beautiful ways, through music, through art, through our buildings and through our language - but the fundamental act of symbol making and symbol using is beautiful in itself.

Consider, as a simple, but very powerful example, our invention of the negative – our ability to deal with what something is not, just as easily as we deal with what it is. There is no "not," no negative, in nature, outside of the human mind. But we invented it, we use it daily, and divide up the world with it. It is an amazing creation, and one that is quintessentially human.

The thing that amazed me – even humbled me – about the digital computer when I first encountered it over fifty years ago – was that, in the computer, I saw that we have a tool that does not just move earth or bend steel, but we have a tool that actually can manipulate symbols and, even more importantly, portray symbols in new ways, so that we can interact with them and learn. We have a tool that radically extends our capabilities in the very area that makes us most human, and most powerful.

There is a native American myth about the coyote, a native dog of the American prairies – how the coyote incurred the wrath of the gods by bringing fire down from heaven for the use of mankind, making man more powerful than the gods ever intended. My sense is that computer science has brought us a gift of even greater power, the ability to amplify and extend our ability to manipulate symbols.

It seems to me that the established sources of power and wealth understand, in some dim way, that the new power that the computer has brought from the heavens is dangerous to the existing structure of ownership and wealth in that, like fire, it has the power to transform and to make things new.

I must say that, despite the cynicism that comes with fifty years of professional life as a computer scientist, inventor, and observer of the ways of power, I am absolutely stunned at the ferocious strength of the efforts of the American music industry, entertainment industry, and other established interests to resist the new ability that the coyote in the computer has brought from the heavens. I am even more surprised by the ability of these established interests to pass laws that promise punishment to those who would experiment and learn to use the new fire.

We need to become better at being humans. Learning to use symbols and knowledge in new ways, across groups, across cultures, is a powerful, valuable, and very human goal. And it is also one that is obtainable, if we only begin to open our minds to full, complete use of computers to augment our most human of capabilities.

Here is a highly condensed version of Doug’s methodology for a disciplined approach to evolving collective aptitude in this time of accelerating change:

1. Recognize that everything is built on a set of collective capabilities. Though not acknowledged as such, there is a capability infrastructure that girds organizations and society.
2. The way to unleash evolutionary-level transformation is to augment the capability infrastructure.
3. To augment the capability infrastructure, we must intentionally co-evolve tool systems and human systems. The human side lags and ultimately paces how fast we can raise the Collective IQ.
4. Organizations need to invest in sustained C work, which means focusing attention on cultivating an improvement infrastructure appropriate to our challenges and then recursively improving on the improvement infrastructure. We need to acknowledge C work as critical to the well-being of organizations and the larger society and invest accordingly.
5. In conducting C work, our objective must be to seek out and invest in things that meet the criteria of raising the Collective IQ.
6. This requires global interoperability for our tools. And it similarly requires a dynamic, open and interoperable system for handling our emergent knowledge. We must be able to concurrently develop, integrate, and apply our knowledge at any scale.
7. To amplify learning and reduce risk, organizations must form or join a Networked Improvement Community (NIC). NICs are special exploration groups constituted by networks of organizations jointly pursuing C work – concurrently and collaboratively exploring, testing, and sharing major advances. They must have the freedom to conduct pilot projects and learn by doing.
8. We must accept that in today’s environment of growing complexity and accelerating change, Bootstrapping is a constant. Improving the improvement infrastructure is essential, and C work is a survival skill. We must embark now on networked exploring, learning and adapting.
   

102. The Cow Who Didn’t Know How

23 February 2022 15:08

My buns are on fun!

Don't you dare put it out

Said the wobbly wabbit

In a mighty big shout

The buns or the fun?

Said the sad little cow

I wish I had buns

I wish I had fun

But I don't know how

The wabbit looked up

The wabbit looked down

The wabbit jumped in a circle

Until he fell down

It is fun to have fun

If you know how

Do you know what fun is

In the here and now?

I can be a king or dragon

A pineapple or a wagon

A ghost or a shadow

The wind or the gallow

I can see the circus or the darkness

The worthless or the heartless

The story or the teller

The puppet and the seller

I can feel the cold or the sheets

Boredom or the heat

The mountain top or the pillow soft

Over load, overwhelm, or simply... naught

I can choose though I have not much choice

I can lose yet I have a loud voice

I can muse with my imagin-a-shon

I can snooze (yawn) for the day is but gone

This is my world borrowed

Funny fun fun

Then everything stopped.

I can? Said the cow

You can said the wabbit

You can make it a habit

Just lie on your back

And laugh like a crack

Wiggle your toes

And wiggle your nose

Clap your hands

And then dance...

Without pants? said the cow

Hahaha no said the wabbit

just dance like it's your last chance

It's so easy

It's so fun

Said the excited little cow

The now is my play thing

The wabbit took a bow

103. Your true name

23 February 2022 15:30

Most of us have nicknames—annoying, endearing, embarrassing. But what about your true name? It is not necessarily your given name. But it is the one to which you are most eager to respond when called. Ever wonder why? Your true name has the secret power to call you. (Vera Nazarian)

If names are not correct, language will not be in accordance with the truth of things. (Confucius)

A name represents identity, a deep feeling, and holds tremendous significance to its owner. (Rachel Ingber)

The beginning of wisdom is to call things by their proper name. (Confucius)

… for to name a thing is to give it order and purpose... (N.K. Jemisin)

What others call you, you become. It's a terrible magic that everyone can do — so do it. Call yourself what you wish to become. (Catherynne M. Valente)

Throughout the ancient world, naming was a sacred act. It was the word by which a child was called into his calling. It was the voice of destiny, summoning the child into his future with all its glorious promise. (Anne Hamilton)

you give a dog a bad name, and that dog is bad for life. (Eleanor Catton)

For the Hebrews, names provided a direct link with the Creator. They understood words as being the creative fire of God, the ‘black fire on white fire’ of His Law. Every utterance and every act of creation through which He revealed Himself was not only word made flesh but fire made flesh. The word for ‘being’, yesh, ‘to exist’ or ‘to have substance’ was flame–breathed. The word for ‘fire’, esh, was embedded in the word for ‘being’ and in the very notion of ‘being human’. The rabbis were said to have asked: Why is the word for ‘woman’, ishah? Because she is fire, esh. Why is the word for ‘man’, ish? Because he too is fire, esh. They noted that when the Hebrew letters for ‘man’ and ‘woman’ came together they produced a new word as part of the union: yah, a reference to Yahweh, the Name of God. (Anne Hamilton)

If this interpretation of nashamah by the rabbis is right ... then it is naming that creates soul. (Anne Hamilton)

There are five main principles about naming highlighted so far which emerge from Hebrew thought. They are:

• the etymological approach through an analysis of the root meaning of a name and its separate syllables
• the homological approach through a similarity of sound with another word
• the anagrammatic approach in which a rearrangement of letters occurs
• the associative approach which links one name to another
• the elision of words to create new meaning when placed together
  

An example of the first is Saul as desired; of the second, Korah as sounding like to open up a pit; of the third, Noah as grace spelt backwards; of the fourth, Jericho, as traditionally associated with Jordan, to fall down; and of the fifth, the union of ‘ish’ and ‘ishah’ to create the name of God. These principles are not mutually exclusive. You are likely to find several of them, if not all of them, operating in your life.

There is a mistaken idea that all languages are just direct equivalences of each other. So we can translate word for word and carry the entire meaning across. Because English is such a blotting paper of a language we tend to miss how distinctive a language can be. Each language encapsulates a vision of the world. Ken Rolph

104. The Precautionary Principle

24 February 2022 12:51

The PP is intended to make decisions that ensure survival when statistical evidence is limited—because it has not had time to show up —by focusing on the adverse effects of "absence of evidence."

Standard Risk Management Precautionary Approach

localized harm systemic ruin

nuanced cost-benefit avoid at all costs

statistical fragility based

statistical probabilistic non-statistical

variations ruin

convergent probabilities divergent probabilities

recoverable irreversible

independent factors interconnected factors

evidence based precautionary

thin tails fat tails

bottom-up, tinkering top-down engineered

evolved human-made

TABLE I: Two different types of risk and their respective characteristics compared

(Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Rupert Read, Raphael Douady, Joseph Norman, Yaneer Bar-Yam)

Foundational Principles

Fundamentally, statistics is about ensuring people do not build scientific theories from hot air, that is without significant departure from random. Otherwise, it is patently "fooled by randomness". Further, for fat tailed variables, the conventional mechanism of the law of large numbers is considerably slower and significance requires more data and longer periods. Ironically, there are claims that can be done on little data: inference is asymmetric under fat-tailed domains. We require more data to assert that there are no black swans than to assert that there are black swans hence we would need much more data to claim a drop in violence than to claim a rise in it. Finally, statements that are not deemed statistically significant –and shown to be so –should never be used to construct scientific theories. These foundational principles are often missed because, typically, social scientists’ statistical training is limited to mechanistic tools from thin tailed domains. In physics, one can often claim evidence from small data sets, bypassing standard statistical methodologies, simply because the variance for these variables is low. The higher the variance, the more data one needs to make statistical claims. For fat-tails, the variance is typically high and underestimated in past data. For fat-tailed variables, the mean is almost entirely determined by extremes. If you are uncertain about the tails, then you are uncertain about the mean. It is thus incoherent to say that violence has dropped but maybe not the risk of tail events; it would be like saying that someone is "extremely virtuous except during the school shooting episode when he killed 30 students".

It is not changing the color of the dress

Many people know (well, sort of) what fat tails means, but in a vague sense, believing that it is just another class of distributions than the normal and they can think of them as, simply, other distributions doing the same thing. Unfortunately things work differently:

The very definition of inference and confidence interval goes out of the window. More rigor is required. To work with fat tails one has to approach things differently, at a conceptual level. In fact one of us found contradictions in discussions: once it is stated that a distribution is fat-tailed, then many statements taken for granted are no longer valid.

• The mean of the distribution will not correspond to the sample mean. In fact there is no fat-tailed distribution in which the mean can be properly estimated from the sample mean.

• Sharpe ratio, variance, beta and other common finance metrics are uninformative. Variance and standard deviations are not usable.

• Correlations (in the Pearson sense) usually do not exist, and when they do, provide little information (but there are other forms of dependence).

• Robust statistics is not robust at all.

• Maximum likelihood methods work for parameters (good news).

• The gap between disconfirmatory and confirmatory empiricism is wider than common statistics.

• Principal components analysis is likely to produce false factors.

• Methods of moments fail to work.

• There is no such thing as "typical" large deviation: conditional on having a large move, such move isn’t "typical"

Behavioral finance so far makes conclusions from statics and not dynamics, hence misses the picture. It applies trade-offs out of context and develops the consensus that people irrationally overestimate tail risk (hence need to be "nudged" into taking more of these exposures). But the catastrophic event is an absorbing barrier. No risky exposure can be analyzed in isolation: risks accumulate. If we ride a motorcycle, smoke, fly our own propeller plane, and join the mafia, these risks add up to a near-certain premature death. Tail risks are not a renewable resource. Every risk taker who survived understands this. Warren Buffett understands this. Goldman Sachs understands this. They do not want small risks, they want zero risk because that is the difference between the firm surviving and not surviving over twenty, thirty, one hundred years. This attitude to tail risk can explain that Goldman Sachs is 149 years old –it ran as a partnership with unlimited liability for approximately the first 130 years, but was bailed out once in 2009, after it became a bank. This is not in the decision theory literature but we (people with skin in the game) practice it every day. We take a unit, look at how long a life we wish it to have and see by how much the life expectancy is reduced by repeated exposure.

Next let us consider layering, why systemic risks are in a different category from individual, idiosyncratic ones. The worst-case scenario is not that an individual dies. It is worse if your family, friends and pets die. It is worse if you die and your arch enemy survives. They collectively have more life expectancy lost from a terminal tail event. So there are layers. The biggest risk is that the entire ecosystem dies. The precautionary principle puts structure around the idea of risk for units expected to survive. Ergodicity in this context means that your analysis for ensemble probability translates into time probability. If it doesn’t, ignore ensemble probability altogether.

WHAT TO DO?

To summarize, we first need to make a distinction between Mediocristan and Extremistan, two separate domains that never overlap with one another. If we don't make that distinction, we don't have any valid analysis. Second, if we don't make the distinction between time probability (path dependent) and ensemble probability (path independent) we don't have a valid analysis. The next phase of the Incerto project is to gain understanding of fragility, robustness, and, eventually, anti-fragility. Once we know something is fat-tailed, we can use heuristics to see how an exposure there reacts to random events: how much is a given unit harmed by them. It is vastly more effective to focus on being insulated from the harm of random events than to try to figure them out in the required details (as we saw the inferential errors under fat tails are huge). So it is more solid, much wiser, more ethical, and more effective to focus on detection heuristics and policies rather than fabricate statistical properties. The beautiful thing we discovered is that everything that is fragile has to present a concave exposure similar –if not identical –to the payoff of a short option, that is, a negative exposure to volatility. It is nonlinear, necessarily. It has to have harm that accelerates with intensity, up to the point of breaking. If I jump 10m I am harmed more than 10 times than if I jump one meter. That is a necessary property of fragility. We just need to look at acceleration in the tails. We have built effective stress testing heuristics based on such an option-like property. In the real world we want simple things that work; we want to impress our accountant and not our peers. (My argument in the latest installment of the Incerto, Skin in the Game is that systems judged by peers and not evolution rot from overcomplication). To survive we need to have clear techniques that map to our procedural intuitions. The new focus is on how to detect and measure convexity and concavity. This is much, much simpler than probability.

105. Elinor Ostrom’s 8 rules for managing the commons

01 March 2022 17:45

The commons are those things that we all own together, that are neither privately owned, nor managed by the government on our behalf. Some are large scale and somewhat abstract, such as the English language. Others are local and more tangible, such as fishing rights, and they need more careful management. Our current political paradigm is sceptical of the commons: if nobody takes responsibility for something, it will inevitably be abused. So either it needs to be in private hands, or run by public institutions.

There are good examples of commons though – irrigation networks or pastures that have been managed by and for ordinary people for generations, and they’re still functioning. There are also examples of wrecked pastures and over-exploited fishing grounds, failed commons where a resource was mismanaged and destroyed. Elinor Ostrom studied both kinds, and drew up a list of principles for running the commons. I read them recently in Derek Wall’s book on her work, and they’re worth sharing.

1. Define clear group boundaries.

Commons need to have clearly defined boundaries. In particular, who is entitled to access to what? Unless there’s a specified community of benefit, it becomes a free for all, and that’s not how commons work.

2. Match rules governing use of common goods to local needs and conditions.

Rules should fit local circumstances. There is no one-size-fits-all approach to common resource management. Rules should be dictated by local people and local ecological needs.

3. Ensure that those affected by the rules can participate in modifying the rules.

Participatory decision-making is vital. There are all kinds of ways to make it happen, but people will be more likely to follow the rules if they had a hand in writing them. Involve as many people as possible in decision-making.

4. Make sure the rule-making rights of community members are respected by outside authorities.

Commons must be monitored. Once rules have been set, communities need a way of checking that people are keeping them. Commons don’t run on good will, but on accountability.

5. Develop a system, carried out by community members, for monitoring members’ behavior.

Sanctions for those who abuse the commons should be graduated. Ostrom observed that the commons that worked best didn’t just ban people who broke the rules. That tended to create resentment. Instead, they had systems of warnings and fines, as well as informal reputational consequences in the community.

6. Use graduated sanctions for rule violators.

Conflict resolution should be easily accessible. When issues come up, resolving them should be informal, cheap and straightforward. That means that anyone can take their problems for mediation, and nobody is shut out. Problems are solved rather than ignoring them because nobody wants to pay legal fees.

7. Provide accessible, low-cost means for dispute resolution.

Commons need the right to organise. Your commons rules won’t count for anything if a higher local authority doesn’t recognise them as legitimate.

8. Build responsibility for governing the common resource in nested tiers from the lowest level up to the entire interconnected system.

Commons work best when nested within larger networks. Some things can be managed locally, but some might need wider regional cooperation – for example an irrigation network might depend on a river that others also draw on upstream.

The ‘tragedy of the commons’ is real, but it is not inevitable. It is possible to create and operate thriving commons, a third way besides private ownership and government control. In an age where we all depend on global commons such as the atmosphere or the oceans, we should be paying more attention to commons management. (JEREMY WILLIAMS)

106. Breathing

10 March 2022 10:22

Square Breathing (AKA Box Breathing):

The Square Breathing exercise that follows a “square” framework. Breathe in to the count of 4, hold your breath to the count of 4, breathe out to the count of 4, hold to the count of 4, and repeat this breathing pattern.

4 7 8 Breathing & Variations:

Breathing exercise developed by Dr. Andrew Weil. Breath in through your nose to the count of 4, hold to the count of 7, exhale slowly to the count of 8. Repeat.

One round of the Wim Hof Method breathing technique includes these steps:

Take in a strong inhalation through the nose. Let out a relaxed exhalation through the mouth. Repeat for 30 breaths. On the 30th breath, exhale to 90 percent and hold for as long as you can. When you feel your body really needs to take a breath, inhale fully and hold for 15 seconds before releasing. The basic technique involves three consecutive rounds of the above. Eventually, the breathing may feel like a wave flowing through your lungs, but this will take practice.

In many high activity sports (for example freediving) there are some well-known exercises to develop smart breath-holding skills. Most of these exercises consist of breath holds and rests with specific lengths — apnea tables or static tables (apnea training based on repeated intervals of breath holds). They are mostly used in freediving but they can be very beneficial when practicing other sports or just for meditation and relaxation moments.

freediving apnea static tables co2

O2 & CO2 Static Tables are timed static breath holds with no movement during them. Their aim is to get the body used to the extreme conditions of lack of oxygen or excess carbon dioxide.

If you want to improve the duration of your breath hold, you must get your body used to have high levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) and low levels of oxygen (O2). It takes quite a lot of time to do it but this static training undoubtedly leads to a visible improvement in the long run.

You need to follow two types of tables – CO2 and O2 tables. They are both based on your personal best (PB) breath-hold time, which you should measure beforehand. Additionally, you will measure your PB every 2 months and adjust the tables accordingly.

Before trying to perform the maximum breath-hold, make sure you do some warm-up breath holds first.

CO2 Table for exercises

This type of static table enables the body to get used to high levels of carbon dioxide. It does that by decreasing the resting time between fixed breath-hold periods. The duration of breath-hold should not be higher than 50% of your personal best and the table should consist of no more than 8 cycles.

This table is an example based on a personal best of 3 minutes:

1 ventilate – 2:30 min apnea – 1:30 min

2 ventilate – 2:15 min apnea – 1:30 min

3 ventilate – 2:00 min apnea – 1:30 min

4 ventilate – 1:45 min apnea – 1:30 min

5 ventilate – 1:30 min apnea – 1:30 min

6 ventilate – 1:15 min apnea – 1:30 min

7 ventilate – 1:00 min apnea – 1:30 min

8 ventilate – 1:00 min apnea – 1:30 min

Total duration 25:15 min

Of course, you can adjust this exercise by changing the breath-hold duration to 50% of your personal best or by changing the duration of the starting resting period.

With this table, you want to decrease the duration of the initial and final resting periods and to increase the duration of the fixed breath-hold.

O2 Table for exercises

This type of static table makes the body get used to very low levels of oxygen. It does that by increasing the duration of breath holds between resting periods. The duration of the last breath-hold in this table should not exceed 80% of your personal best and the table should have 8 cycles or less.

This example table is based on a personal best of 3 minutes:

1 ventilate – 2:00 min apnea – 1:00 min

2 ventilate – 2:00 min apnea – 1:15 min

3 ventilate – 2:00 min apnea – 1:30 min

4 ventilate – 2:00 min apnea – 1:45 min

5 ventilate – 2:00 min apnea – 2:00 min

6 ventilate – 2:00 min apnea – 2:15 min

7 ventilate – 2:00 min apnea – 2:30 min

8 ventilate – 2:00 min apnea – 2:30 min

Total duration 30:45 min

You can modify this table by changing the maximum breath-hold to 80% of your personal best or by changing the duration of resting periods between breath holds.

With this exercise, you want to decrease the fixed resting period and increase the duration of the initial breath-hold.

It is important to perform between two to four tables per week – one at a time – Never perform both types of tables during the same day.

IMPORTANT! If you violate any of the table limits you may suffer serious damage to your respiratory system. Never practice more than one table daily! Never practice more than eight cycles within one table! Never practice without the company of another person who is completely aware of what you are doing! Practicing static tables may lead to an LMC or even a blackout.

107. Tell the truth but tell it slant

17 March 2022 13:35

(1263) BY EMILY DICKINSON

Tell all the truth but tell it slant —

Success in Circuit lies

Too bright for our infirm Delight

The Truth's superb surprise

As Lightning to the Children eased

With explanation kind

The Truth must dazzle gradually

Or every man be blind —

108. The modern business plan

17 March 2022 13:37

It’s not clear to me why business plans are the way they are, but they’re often misused to obfuscate, bore and show an ability to comply with expectations. If I want the real truth about a business and where it’s going, I’d rather see something else. I’d divide the modern business plan into five sections:

• Truth
• Assertions
• Alternatives
• People
• Money
  

The truth section describes the world as it is. Footnote if you want to, but tell me about the market you are entering, the needs that already exist, the competitors in your space, technology standards, the way others have succeeded and failed in the past. The more specific the better. The more ground knowledge the better. The more visceral the stories, the better. The point of this section is to be sure that you’re clear about the way you see the world, and that you and I agree on your assumptions. This section isn’t partisan, it takes no positions, it just states how things are.

Truth can take as long as you need to tell it. It can include spreadsheets, market share analysis and anything I need to know about how the world works.

The assertions section is your chance to describe how you’re going to change things. We will do X, and then Y will happen. We will build Z with this much money in this much time. We will present Q to the market and the market will respond by taking this action.

This is the heart of the modern business plan. The only reason to launch a project is to change something, and I want to know what you’re going to do and what impact it’s going to have.

Of course, this section will be incorrect. You will make assertions that won’t pan out. You’ll miss budgets and deadlines and sales. So the alternatives section tells me what you’ll do if that happens. How much flexibility does your product or team have? If your assertions don’t pan out, is it over?

The people section rightly highlights the key element… who is on your team, who is going to join your team. ‘Who’ doesn’t mean their resume, who means their attitudes and abilities and track record in shipping.

And the last section is all about money. How much do you need, how will you spend it, what does cash flow look like, P&Ls, balance sheets, margins and exit strategies.

Your local VC might not like this format, but I’m betting it will help your team think through the hard issues more clearly. (Seth Godin)

109. Marketing

Marketing in four steps

The first step is to invent a thing worth making, a story worth telling, a contribution worth talking about.

The second step is to design and build it in a way that people will actually benefit from and care about.

The third one is the one everyone gets all excited about. This is the step where you tell the story to the right people in the right way.

The last step is so often overlooked: The part where you show up, regularly, consistently and generously, for years and years, to organize and lead and build confidence in the change you seek to make.

The simple but difficult marketing flip

From, “Pay attention, I want you to buy what I made.”

to…

“I’ve been paying attention, and I think I can offer you what you want.”

The best way to learn marketing …is to do marketing. Do it on the weekends. Volunteer and do it for a non-profit. Fundraise. Run a business online. Market a kid's lemonade stand. When you put your ideas in the world, then, and only then, do you know if they're real. Not expensive, merely frightening.

Question checklist for reviewing your new marketing materials…

For that new video, or that new brochure, or anything you create that you're hoping will change minds (and spread):

What's it for?

When it works, will we be able to tell? What's it supposed to do?

Who is it for?

What specific group or tribe or worldview is this designed to resonate with?

What does this remind you of?

Who has used this vernacular before? Is it as well done as the previous one was?

What's the call to action?

Is there a moment when you are clearly asking people to do something?

Show this to ten strangers. Don't say anything. What do they ask you?

Now, ask them what the material is asking them to do.

What is the urgency?

Why now?

Your job is not to answer every question, your job is not to close the sale. The purpose of this work is to amplify interest, generate interaction and spread your idea to the people who need to hear it, at the same time that you build trust. You will rarely achieve this with one fell swoop, so be prepared to drip your way through countless swoops until you've earned the privilege of engaging with the audience you seek.

Persistent, consistent, and frequent stories, delivered to an aligned audience, will earn attention, trust, and action.

Attention is a precious resource since our brains are cluttered with noise. Smart marketers make it easy for those they seek to work with, by helping position the offering in a way that resonates and is memorable.

If you want to make change, begin by making culture. Begin by organizing a tightly knit group. Begin by getting people in sync. Culture beats strategy— so much that culture is strategy.

The way we make things better is by caring enough about those we serve to imagine the story that they need to hear. We need to be generous enough to share that story, so they can take action that they’ll be proud of.

If you can bring someone belonging, connection, peace of mind, status, or one of the other most desired emotions, you’ve done something worthwhile.

Begin by choosing people based on what they dream of, believe, and want, not based on what they look like. In other words, use psychographics instead of demographics.

Yes, we’re typecasting— willfully exaggerating people’s attitudes and beliefs in order to serve them better.

Choose the people you serve, choose your future.

“It’s not for you” shows the ability to respect someone enough that you’re not going to waste their time, pander to them, or insist that they change their beliefs. It shows respect for those you seek to serve, to say to them, “I made this for you. Not for the other folks, but for you.”

Everything that we purchase— every investment, every trinket, every experience— is a bargain. That’s why we bought it. Because it was worth more than what we paid for it. Otherwise, we wouldn’t buy it.

they’re searching for a feeling, not a logical truth.

We sell feelings, status, and connection, not tasks or stuff.

And this is where we begin: with assertions. Assertions about what our audience, the folks we need to serve, want and need. Assertions about what’s on their minds when they wake up, what they talk about when no one is eavesdropping, what they remember at the end of the day. And then we make assertions about how our story and our promise will interact with these wants and desires. When someone encounters us, will they see what we see? Will they want what we think they’ll want? Will they take action?

A Simple Marketing Worksheet

Who’s it for? What’s it for? What is the worldview of the audience you’re seeking to reach? What are they afraid of? What story will you tell? Is it true? What change are you seeking to make? How will it change their status? How will you reach the early adopters and neophiliacs? Why will they tell their friends? What will they tell their friends? Where’s the network effect that will propel this forward? What asset are you building? Are you proud of it?

The other kind of marketing, the effective kind, is about understanding our customers’ worldview and desires so we can connect with them. It’s focused on being missed when you’re gone, on bringing more than people expect to those who trust us. It seeks volunteers, not victims.

It’s easier to make products and services for the customers you seek to serve than it is to find customers for your products and services.

Marketing is the generous act of helping others become who they seek to become.

If you want to make change, begin by making culture. Begin by organizing a tightly knit group. Begin by getting people in sync. Culture beats strategy— so much that culture is strategy.

We tell stories. Stories that resonate and hold up over time. Stories that are true, because we made them true with our actions and our products and our services. We make connections. Humans are lonely, and they want to be seen and known. People want to be part of something. It’s safer that way, and often more fun. We create experiences. Using a product, engaging with a service. Making a donation, going to a rally, calling customer service. Each of these actions is part of the story; each builds a little bit of our connection. As marketers, we can offer these experiences with intent, doing them on purpose.

Good stories: 1. Connect us to our purpose and vision for our career or business. 2. Allow us to celebrate our strengths by remembering how we got from there to here. 3. Deepen our understanding of our unique value and what differentiates us in the marketplace. 4. Reinforce our core values. 5. Help us to act in alignment and make value-based decisions. 6. Encourage us to respond to customers instead of react to the marketplace. 7. Attract customers who want to support businesses that reflect or represent their values. 8. Build brand loyalty and give customers a story to tell. 9. Attract the kind of like-minded employees we want. 10. Help us to stay motivated and continue to do work we’re proud of. (Seth Godin)

Restrictions will set you free

Someone says, “Write me a piece of music. Anything. No restrictions. Go!”

You’re stumped. It’s the blank page syndrome.

Instead, someone says, “Write me a piece of music using only a flute, ukulele, and this toy piano. You can only use the notes D, E, and B. It has to start quiet, get louder, then end quietly. Go!”

Aha! Now that’s an inspiring challenge!

You can use this approach for business, too. If you’re feeling stuck with marketing, give yourself restrictions. Contact fifty fans using only personal emails — no mass-mailing. Make a music video using only stock footage. Give promotion a time-limit of just 15 minutes per day. Spend a week only contacting people you’ve never contacted before. Whenever you’re feeling uninspired or unmotivated, use creative restrictions to set you free.

Creative communication

The way you communicate with people is part of your art. For people who have never heard your music, it’s the start of your art! If you make depressing music, send your fans a dark black announcement that’s depressing just to look at. If you are an “in-your-face country-metal-speedpunk” artist, have the guts to call a potential booking agent and scream, “Listen you crazy dirtbag! Book me or I explode! Waaaaaah!!” If they like that introduction, you’ve found a good match. Set the tone. Pull in those people who love that kind of thing. Proudly alienate those that don’t. There’s a minimalist classical music composer whose emails to me are always just one provocative thought. Like when I posted something online about being an introvert, he emailed me just one sentence: “Are we not ever-changing, both gradually and per situation?” That’s it. No greeting or closing or manners in-between. His communication style always makes me smile, and reminds me of his music. The gentle new-age artist always calls me “sweetie” and reminds me to nourish my soul. The surf-music artist always uses the Hawaiian greetings “aloha” and “mahalo” when he emails, along with other surfer slang. The rebellious punk never calls me by my name, but instead just says, “Hey sellout.” Be different. Show who you are. It gives people’s lives more variety, too.

“Marketing” just means being considerate

Don’t confuse the word “marketing” with advertising, announcing, spamming, or giving away branded crap. Really, “marketing” just means being considerate. Marketing means making it easy for people to notice you, relate to you, remember you, and tell their friends about you. Marketing means listening for what people need, and creating something surprisingly tailored for them. Marketing means getting to know people, making a deeper connection, and keeping in touch. All of these are just considerate — looking at things from the other person’s point of view, and doing what’s best for them. A lot of musicians say, “I hate marketing!” So, yeah, if you thought marketing meant turning off your creativity, spending lots of money, and being annoying, then it’s a good thing you don’t like that. Nobody likes that. Just find creative ways to be considerate. That’s the best marketing.

Constantly ask what they really want

This may sound obvious, but for me it made all the difference. Before I interact with people, I ask myself this question: “What do they really want?” Like if I’m writing someone an email, I ask, “Why are they really reading this email?” If I’m contacting an agent, I ask, “Why are they really doing this job?” If I’m about to perform a show, I ask, “What are they really hoping to get from a night out at a concert?” Thinking of everything from the other person’s point of view is one of the best things you can do in life. Be what they want. And maybe they’ll be what you want, too.

Touch as many of their senses as you can

The more senses you touch in someone, the more they’ll remember you. The most sensory experience is a live show, with you sweating in front of them, the sound system pounding their chest, the flashing lights, the smell of the stinky club, and the visceral feeling of pushing up against strangers. The least sensory experience is an email or a plain web page. Reach as many senses as possible. Have some great photos that you use next to any text. Make a video for every song. Be a guest on every video-show you can. At your live shows, burn incense or hug every person there, or… You get the idea. Keep aiming for the most sensory way to reach your audience.

Life is like high school

When you’re in high school, it’s all about popularity, cliques, and being cool. When you go to college, the focus shifts to academic achievement. Many people get out of college thinking the world will be like that — like the harder you work, the more you’ll be rewarded. But it’s not. Life is like high school. It’s all about how you come across, how social you are, what scene you’re in, being likable, and being cool. But you can make this work in your favor. You can be your idealized self. You can be where things are happening. You can attend cool events, and invite people to join you. You can practice your social skills and be the kind of person that people like to help. You can approach this strategically, as if you were a new kid going to a new school, with a goal to be popular. It sounds shallow, but it works. Be who they want to be. In your role as a musician, it’s actually considerate! It’d be easier to put in no effort and be normal. Show up wearing whatever, take a normal photo, and be a regular person. But people want someone to look up to. Someone who’s not of their normal boring world. Someone who’s being who they wish they could be, if they had the courage. It takes some extra effort to look and act cool instead of normal, but it’s considerate and part of your art. Look back at artists like Andy Warhol or Miles Davis, who were not only great at their art, but also knew how to play their image — to be cool.

Get personal

Before I got into the music industry, I had an idea of what it would look like: Some powerful manager or agent calling me into his office to discuss the business of my music. Then I moved to New York City and became friends with cool people who also did things in music. Sometimes these people were agents or managers, but that was secondary. Mostly we were just friends. Sometimes I’d send them clients. Sometimes they’d hook me up with opportunities. But really we were just friends, talking about our love life or ideas, hanging out and having fun. It was a long time before I realized that I was already in the industry — that this is how things are done. People send business to people they like. It’s all more personal than I had expected. One of my best friends in the world is also my lawyer. He’s one of the top music lawyers in the world, but mostly he’s my friend. We talk about cycling, his kids, and music. And sometimes we stop to discuss a recent contract. The initial contact usually happens for professional reasons. Like when I was looking for a lawyer, and someone introduced me to this guy. When I hear music I love, I contact the musician, and say let’s meet. Within minutes we’re talking about her dogs, microphones, Japan, and whatever. Then, when someone asks me to recommend some music, guess who comes to mind first? Point is: As you’re out there in the music business, get personal. Don’t always be selling yourself. That keeps people at a distance from you, because it shows you’re not friends. Even if it starts professional, get personal as soon as possible. Be a friend. That’s how things are done.

Always think how you can help someone

When someone says they’re looking for something, remember it, and help them find it. Introduce people to each other. Also listen carefully for what they might not realize they need. Ask them what’s the hardest part about their job. People love to complain. And each complaint gives you an idea about how you could help. When you come across something that might be useful, go through the list of everyone you know, and think if it’s particularly useful to that person. If so, contact them personally to tell them about it. Not a mass blast, but a real just-to-you recommendation. That’s much more meaningful because it shows you were thinking of them in particular. There’s always a favor you can do. Give give give, and sometimes you will receive.

Don’t be afraid to ask for favors

Have you ever asked for directions in a city? People get a little ego boost when they know the answer to something you’re asking. They’ll gladly show off their knowledge. So don’t be afraid to ask for favors. People like doing favors! When I lived in New York City, one bold musician I know called me and said, “I’m coming to New York in two months. Can you give me a list of all the important contacts you think I should meet?” I laughed because I admired his directness! Then I emailed him a list of twenty people he should call. Sometimes you need to find something specific: a video director, a JavaScript programmer, a sitar player. Contact everyone you know and ask. Friends of friends will know how to get everything you want in life. Some people have time on their hands and would rather help you do something interesting instead of watching TV. Need help doing promotion? Need help getting equipment to a show? Just ask them! By making them feel important, connected, and needed, you’ll be doing them a favor, too.

Small gifts go a long way

When I worked at Warner/Chappell, I was the least-important person in the company, just working in the library. Since it’s the largest music publisher in the world, I dealt with hundreds of people. I can’t remember most of their names. But three times, and only three times, I got a surprise gift from one of our songwriters. James Mastro, from The Bongos, got me a cool little “Mother Mary” keychain when he toured Spain. Gerry DeVeaux, the multi-platinum dance writer, got me some funky plastic fish Christmas ornaments when he went to the Bahamas. And Jane Kelly Williams got me a red sweatshirt. Can you believe I remember these details twenty years later? Believe it! If any of these three people asked me for a favor, I’d be sure to help them out. As you climb the ladder of success, giving a gift may go a long way and be remembered for years. Get presents for the people you’ve met that are probably under-appreciated. Don’t waste gifts on the high-power people. They already receive too many. Be generous. You’re going to see the same faces for years to come.

Persistence is polite

As teenagers, we learned the hard way that if you contact someone and they don’t reply, they’re just not into you. If you keep trying, you must be a total loser. But in the business world, it’s the opposite. If you don’t keep trying, you’re a loser! If someone doesn’t get back to you, it probably wasn’t intentional. Everyone is busy, and their situation has nothing to do with you.

Imagine two different scenarios:

Someone doesn’t reply, so you get upset and decide they’re evil and clearly meant to insult you. You resent them for life, and speak poorly of them forever.

Someone doesn’t reply, so you assume they must be swamped in work. You wait a week, and contact them again. If still no reply, you feel sympathy that they must be really overwhelmed. You wait a week, and try again. If still no reply, you try to reach them a different way.

Now, which one was rude, and which one was polite?

Show success before asking for help

I learned this huge life lesson from a secret document. Music publishers give a cash advance to a songwriter in return for owning half the future income generated from their songs. The publisher is betting that those songs will earn at least as much as that cash advance. I was working at Warner/Chappell music publishing, when someone stepped away from her desk. I noticed she had accidentally left out the private financial statement showing every songwriter we had signed, the amount of their cash advance, and how much they had earned. I secretly made a copy for myself, then put hers back. I noticed a huge difference between two songwriters:

One was a great writer, constantly delivering songs with great hit potential, super professional, and a great collaborator. She got her deal because one of the managers heard her and believed in her. But she hadn’t had any success yet.Her advance: $15,000.

The other writer was horrible. His songs were really bad metal that would make the worst metal band cringe. They were poorly recorded and terribly performed. But in the 80s he had been in a band with a major rock star, so he had a partial songwriting credit on a song on a record that sold over 12 million copies. His advance: $500,000.

The moral of this story? You have to make your own success first, before you ask the industry for help. Show that you’re going to be successful without their help. Show that you have momentum. If they want to accelerate or amplify your success, they will have to pay to ride your train. If you approach them before you can show some success, then you’ll have no negotiating leverage, and will get the worst deal possible.

What it means to be resourceful

I was at a musicians’ gathering in Memphis. I met a lot of people complaining that their various forms of online distribution weren’t earning them as much as they’d hoped. Then I met a musician who sold 8000 copies of his album himself. No distributor. No website. Just by himself. I asked him how he did it. He said, “I just slowly drove around the city every night, with the windows down, playing my music loud. When I saw someone digging it, I’d go talk with them. I’d sell almost everyone a copy — about 20 or 30 a night. Been doing this about a year. Sold 8000 so far.” I love this story! It’s so direct! It hit me especially hard because all the musicians I’d met before him were complaining about how it’s impossible to make money anymore. It got me thinking about what it means to be resourceful.

The succinct way to show it is to contrast two different mindsets. I’ll call them A and B.

A: “I spent $60,000 making this album.”

B: “I spent $60 making this album.”

A: “There are no good live music venues anymore!”

B: “I made us a new venue.”

A: “I’ve tried everything.”

B: “I found a book from the 1970s with some unique ideas I’m applying to our marketing.”

A: “I don’t have time to do it all!”

B: “Two of my fans help with promotion, one edits my videos, and one runs my website.”

A: “I’m not some Hollywood networking dude. I don’t have connections in the industry.”

B: “My barber knew the promoter’s wife, so it took some persistence, but now we’re playing at his festival.”

A: “They said we weren’t allowed to just show up.”

B: “We just showed up, and wouldn’t leave. Eventually they said OK.”

A: “We didn’t get the festival gig.”

B: “They rejected us, so we contacted every artist at the festival until we found one that insisted the promoter book us as their opening act.”

A: “There’s just no way!”

B: “I figured out a way.”

It means being creative, rebellious, determined, and unstoppable. It means asking for help, but not waiting for help.

When your music can’t speak for itself

On the radio, your music speaks for itself. People hear your music and like it or not. In concert, your music speaks for itself. Hearing and watching you perform is enough. But in every other situation, unless your music is already in their ears, your music can’t speak for itself. The words that describe your music have to do the hard work. Online, the description needs to be so interesting that people stop to click and listen. In word-of-mouth between friends, the description needs to be so memorable that people search for you later. In the music industry, the description needs to be so intriguing that busy people feel you’re worth their time. These are the main ways you call attention to your music, so this is important. Once you’re a household name, and your music is playing everywhere, you can stop describing it. But for now, you need to come up with a great description.

Make people curious in one sentence

Screenwriters in Hollywood constantly pitch their movie ideas to studio executives. Each one has about five seconds to impress. The one sentence they use to describe their story decides whether the studio will read it or not. Same with you. You just need one good sentence to describe your music. It has only one goal: Make people curious. That’s it. It should not try to describe every note of music you make! It should not try to justify your existence on Earth. It only has to make them curious enough to listen. That’s all. I described my band as “a cross between James Brown and the Beatles”. Of course not everything I did sounded like that, but that phrase was enough to make people want to hear it. I would watch them pause for a second to try to imagine what that might sound like. Then they’d say, “Wow — I have to hear this!” Mission accomplished. The shorter, the better. Give them one good sentence and stop talking. Let them want to hear more. Without a good reason, they won’t bother. Someone sees you carrying a guitar and asks, “What kind of music do you play?” You say, “There’s no way to describe it. You just have to check it out. We’re playing next Thursday night at 11. You should come.”

Imagine reversing the situation:

You meet a man that says he’s running a small business. You ask what his company does. He says, “There’s no way to describe it. You just have to check it out. We’re open next Thursday for just one hour. You should come.” Would you really bother to go check out his business if he couldn’t even tell you why you should? Of course not! So how do you expect anyone to come hear you play? You have to give people a good reason! Say a few words to make them curious. When they ask what kind of music you do, they’re actively hoping you’ll give them a reason to care. If you don’t give them a reason in that very moment, the opportunity is gone.

Describe your music like a non-musician

When describing your music, don’t use musician language. Don’t say, “Wonderful harmonies and intricate arrangements. A tight rhythm section and introspective lyrics!” Real people don’t understand what that means. For most people, listening to music is like a cat watching cars go by.

“That’s a fast one.”

“That one was blue.”

“Wow that was loud.”

Only an expert or mechanic would be able to describe the technical details of the passing car. So speak to people in their terms. Think what an office worker would say to a friend about your music: “It’s cute! I love that song with the little ‘hoop-hoop!’ at the beginning, with that baby voice. It’s kinda funky! And he’s got this sexy bedroom voice. Cool video.” Think what one teenager at the skateboard park would say to another: “Dude, it’s like if Kranetow hadn’t wimped out. It’s like Tweetown went metal, but they’re from Mars or somethin’. It’s slammin’. That chick’s voice is insane!” Real people will compare you to famous artists. Real people talk about the overall vibe or sound of something. Real people don’t talk about “insightful lyrics”, “strong melodies”, or “tight musicianship”. Use their language.

Hillbilly Flamenco

This is a story about how two words can change your career. David and his band had always wanted to play at the big music festivals. They had been performing at clubs for years, and doing pretty well, but he could never get the attention of the agents that book the festivals. He’d call them and submit his music, but those agents would never reply. One night at a show, in between songs, a drunk fan shouted, “You know what you guys sound like? Hillbilly flamenco!” The crowd laughed, and so did the band. They joked about it on stage that night, and again on the drive home. A week later, the band still remembered those two words: “hillbilly flamenco”. It was funny, and the crowd liked it, and it actually described their music well. So they decided to use it more often. Each time they played, they started telling the audience, “If you’re wondering what kind of music this is, it’s hillbilly flamenco!” At the end of the show, they’d ask the audience, “When you tell your friends what kind of music you heard tonight, what will you say?” The crowd would shout, “hillbilly flamenco!” And believe it or not, it worked! People started telling their friends about this band, because it was so easy and fun to describe. Attendance at their shows started going up and up. Then one day, David once again called one of those agents who book the big festivals. But this time David said, “Our music style is hillbilly flamenco!” The agent laughed and said, “Ok — I’ve got to hear this! I’m going to give you my personal address this time.” The agent finally listened to their music, and loved it. Now David and his band are playing the festivals they always wanted. When he told me this story, he finished by saying, “Our career had a clear turning point. The day we started using those two words to describe our music, it made all the difference in the world.”

If you target sharp enough, you will own your niche

Let’s say you’ve decided that your style of music should be proudly called “power-pop”. If you say, “We’re power-pop!” in the very first sentence or paragraph of all of your marketing. If your email address is “powerpop@gmail.com” If your album title is “Powerpop Drip and Drop” If the license plate on your band van is “POWRPOP” When someone asks me for a music recommendation and says they like power-pop, guess who I’m going to tell them to get? Have the confidence to find your niche, define who you are, then declare it again and again and again and again. If you do it persistently enough, you will own that niche. People will not be able to imagine that niche without you. Don’t forget you can use your city or country as a niche! Amplify your regional influence on your genre of music, and declare it to be an official sub-genre, of which you’re the originator. Think of past examples: Minneapolis funk, Seattle grunge, Korean K-pop, Icelandic avant-garde, and of course the different kinds of hip hop from every corner of the world. You can make your own niche, if you’re brave. You might be the best “a cappella medieval metal” artist in the world.

Proudly exclude most people

We love when someone hates the same thing we hate — especially if that thing is popular. We’re drawn to the confidence of someone who is not trying to please anyone. We admire a strong, defiant stand. You can use this to attract your future fans. You can say, “If you like Katy Perry, you’ll hate us.” Then people who hate Katy Perry will love that you said that and want to check you out. You can say, “Don’t listen to this if you’re happy with your life.” Then people who hate all that happy crap will be intrigued. Most musicians are trying to please everyone. So when you’re not, it suggests that you’ve got the talent to back up your confidence. You can be like the doorman of your exclusive club. Maybe you refuse anyone who is over 30, or under 50. Maybe you refuse anyone wearing a suit, or anyone without a tattoo. There are some cool people around the world that would like your music. They may only be 1% of the population. But 1% of the world is 75 million people! Loudly reject 99%. It signals who you are. When someone in your target 1% hears you proudly excluding the rest, they’ll be drawn to you.

Well-rounded doesn’t cut

Imagine the world’s attention as a big squishy pile of apathy — so thick you could cut it with a knife. To call attention to your music, you want to cut through that muck. Only problem is, if you’re well-rounded, you can’t cut through anything. You need to be sharply defined, like a knife. Let’s look at a bad example first: Your name is Mary and you put out an album called “My Songs”, and the cover is a picture of your face. The music is good quality, and the songs are about your life. When people ask what kind of music you do, you say “Oh, everything. All styles.” You put your music out into the world but nothing much happens. Doors aren’t opening.

Imagine instead: You write nine songs about food. You put out an album called “Sushi, Soufflé, and Seven Other Songs about Food”. You recorded your vocals in the kitchen. You quit cooking school to be a musician. Now you’ve got an angle for promotion. Now people can remember and recommend it. Yes, it’s a silly example, but you see how this would be much easier to promote?

You may be thinking, “But I have so much to offer the world, I can’t just limit myself like that!” So stretch-out your musical offerings to the world over many years, and keep each phase focused clearly on one aspect of your music. Look at the long careers of David Bowie, Miles Davis, Madonna, Prince, Joni Mitchell, or Paul Simon. Each went through sharply-defined phases, treating each album as a project with a narrow focus. Be sharp as a knife, cut through the pile of apathy, and make a point. Do this every year or two, and you will have a wide variety in the long run.

Emphasize meaning over price

A musician named Griffin House used to sell CDs at his gigs for $15. He’d mention it once or twice from the stage, and sell about $300 per night on average. One day his manager, Terry McBride, asked him to try a completely different approach.

He said:

Tell the audience, “It’s really important to us that you have our CD. We worked so hard on it and are so proud of it, that we want you to have it, no matter what. Pay what you want, but even if you have no money, please take one tonight.”

Say this again before the end of the show. “Please, nobody leave here tonight without getting a copy of our CD. We’ve shared this great show together so it would mean a lot to us if you’d take one.”

It changes the request from a commercial pitch to an emotional connection. Allowing them to get a CD for no money just reinforces that. As soon as Griffin made this change, he started selling about $1200 per night on average, even including those people who took it for free! The average selling price was about $10.

But the important part came next:

Because every person left each show with a CD, they were more likely to remember who they saw, tell friends about it, listen to it later, and become an even bigger fan afterwards. Then, when the band returned to a town where they had insisted that everyone take a CD, attendance at those shows doubled! The people that took a CD became long-term fans and brought their friends to future shows.

So, whatever you’re selling, emphasize the meaning of it, not the price.

Are fans telling friends? If not, don’t promote

Should you spend more time promoting right now? Or should you spend more time creating and improving? It’s a tough question. Lucky for you, I’ve got the answer. It comes down to one observation: Are your fans telling their friends? If not, then don’t waste time promoting it yet. Keep working, improving, and creating, until your fans are telling their friends about you. To be clear, I don’t mean fans told friends because you asked them to! They can’t do it just to help you, like a favor. They have to do it just because they love your music so much that they’re doing their friends a favor by turning them on to you. Your music needs to be remarkable — so surprisingly good that others remark about it, like this. Until that point, you’re better off just improving and creating as much as you can. For more thoughts on this, read Seth Godin’s book, “Purple Cow”.

Don’t promote until people can take action

I often hear musicians say they want to do advance promotion — telling people about their new album before it’s available for purchase. Though the plan may be to generate excitement, I think the opposite happens. Imagine the dialogue.

“Check out my new music!”

“Where is it? Can I buy it?”

“Not yet — but soon!”

“Why are you telling me now?”

“So you can be ready for the announcement!”

(Then two months pass.)

“Check out my new music! It’s ready!”

“I think I already heard of this. Not new. Delete.”

Instead, imagine this plan:

Record your music. Start conversations with the people who promote music. Don’t pitch them anything. Just get to know them. Prepare your marketing plan, but don’t do it yet. Just get everything into place.

Get your music distributed everywhere. Before you announce it, make sure it’s actually there. Stream and even buy a copy, to make sure there were no mistakes. Finally, do your promotion, and tell everyone.

One of the nice things about crowd-funding is that for each project, there are two stages when people can take action, so you can repeat this cycle twice. Never promote something until people can take action, or you might waste the one moment you had their attention.

A curious answer to the most common question

People will always and forever ask you, “What kind of music do you do?” You will always and forever have to answer that question. So have a good description prepared in advance. Many musicians avoid answering by saying, “We play all styles.” No you don’t. That’s like saying, “I speak all languages.” Many musicians avoid answering by saying, “We are totally unique.” No you’re not. If you use notes, instruments, beats, or words, you’re not totally unique. If you give people a non-answer like this, you lose them. You had the chance to make a fan, and you blew it. They won’t remember you because you gave them nothing to remember. You didn’t make them curious. Imagine if you had said, “We sound like the smell of fresh baked bread.” Or “We’re the soundtrack to the final battle to save the earth.” Or “Bob Marley with a Turkish pipe smoking Japanese candy.” Then you’ve got their interest! A creative description also suggests that your music will be creative, too. So make up a curious answer to that common question. You don’t have to feel limited by it. Notice that those three examples I gave could sound like anything. And that’s the point. With one interesting phrase to describe your music, you can make total strangers wonder about you. But whatever you do, stay away from the words “everything”, “nothing”, “all styles”, “totally unique”, and the other non-answer: “a mix of rock, pop, jazz, hip-hop, folk, reggae, blues, techno, and metal.” (Derek Sivers)

Pick two axes. One is arrayed horizontally (X) and one vertically (Y). For each axis, choose something that people care about. It could be something like convenience, price, healthfulness, performance, popularity, skill level, or efficacy. For example, there are six ways to get some diamonds across town. On one axis we have speed, and on the other we have security. It turns out that both an armored car and the postal service will happily insure a small envelope of diamonds, but one will take a long time and the other will take an afternoon. If you don’t care about security, a bike messenger is even faster. And if you don’t care about speed or security, well, a stamp will work fine. The magic of the XY positioning of extremes is that it clarifies that each option might be appropriate, depending on what you seek. Can you see how this chart would be totally different if the axes were changed to convenience, cost, environmental impact, or scalability? The same approach can work for potato chips (expensive, local, air baked, flavored, extra thick, cheap, etc.) or for Walmart, Zales, and Tiffany (price, convenience, status, scarcity). Or a cruise ship and a private jet. Or perhaps a Ford, a Tesla, and a McLaren. We’re not so much interested in features as we are in the emotions that those features evoke. Here are some axes for you to choose from. Because you

know your space far better than I do, I’m sure you can come up with some others.

Speed

Price

Performance

Ingredients

Purity

Sustainability

Obviousness

Maintenance costs

Safety

Edginess

Distribution

Network effect

Imminence

Visibility

Trendiness

Privacy

Professionalism

Difficulty

Elitism

Danger

Experimental

Limited

Incomplete

After you pick an attribute with two extremes for the X‑axis, find a different attribute and use it for the Y‑axis. Plot the options your customer has on this chart. Now you have a map of how the alternatives stack up. A map that a busy human being can use to find the solution to her problem. Some potato chips are marketed as healthy and organic.

How to title stuff

(Books, blog posts, breakfast cereals, whatever).

I was talking to someone yesterday about naming books, and I realized that there are three useful schools of thought here.

You can pick a completely descriptive, generic, boring name that precisely describes what’s inside. Like "Shredded Wheat" or "12 Ways to Get Traffic to Your Blog" or "Installing Linux on the 8088 Platform in 24 Hours". The advantage of this approach is that Google likes it, and so do people who are quite goal directed. If you’ve got a Linux installation problem and you find that book at your local B&N, not only are you going to buy it immediately, you’re going to do it with a smile on your face.

You can pick a more clever name that’s designed to entice the reader to read the subtitle, or the first few lines of your post or the back of the cereal box. You can imbue the name with some attitude, like BlogWild, or you can pick a name that just begs to be researched, like Join the Conversation.

The third approach is to pick a name that gets talked about. To create a phrase that you hope will enter the vocabulary. Yes, that’s my strategy. My goal is to have people call something a Purple Cow or eviscerate the boss for suggesting yet another Meatball Sundae. It doesn’t always work, but when it does, you sell ten books, not one. (From my point of view, though, I’m happy to sell zero if the phrase catches on… the book is just an excuse for making change).

“We’re not saying ‘We made this. Please come buy it.’ We’re saying, “We see you. We see who you are and what you believe.’ And we assert, right here, right now, we assert that if you’re the kind of person that believes this and is looking for this, we promise that if you engage with your time and money with us, you will get that.” (Seth Godin)

110. Pace Layering: How Complex Systems Learn and Keep Learning

25 March 2022 11:02

"Civilizations with long nows look after things better," says Brian Eno. "In those places you feel a very strong but flexible structure which is built to absorb shocks and in fact incorporate them." You can imagine how such a process could evolve—all civilizations suffer shocks; only the ones that absorb the shocks survive. That still doesn't explain the mechanism.

In recent years a few scientists (such as R. V. O'Neill and C. S. Holling) have been probing the same issue in ecological systems: how do they manage change, how do they absorb and incorporate shocks? The answer appears to lie in the relationship between components in a system that have different change-rates and different scales of size. Instead of breaking under stress like something brittle, these systems yield as if they were soft. Some parts respond quickly to the shock, allowing slower parts to ignore the shock and maintain their steady duties of system continuity.

Consider the differently paced components to be layers. Each layer is functionally different from the others and operates somewhat independently, but each layer influences and responds to the layers closest to it in a way that makes the whole system resilient.

From the fastest layers to the slowest layers in the system, the relationship can be described as follows:

Fast learns, slow remembers. Fast proposes, slow disposes. Fast is discontinuous, slow is continuous. Fast and small instructs slow and big by accrued innovation and by occasional revolution. Slow and big controls small and fast by constraint and constancy. Fast gets all our attention, slow has all the power.

All durable dynamic systems have this sort of structure. It is what makes them adaptable and robust.

Take a coniferous forest. The hierarchy in scale of pine needle, tree crown, patch, stand, whole forest, and biome is also a time hierarchy. The needle changes within a year, the crown over several years, the patch over many decades, the stand over a couple of centuries, the forest over a thousand years, and the biome over ten thousand years. The range of what the needle may do is constrained by the crown, which is constrained by the patch and stand, which are controlled by the forest, which is controlled by the biome. Nevertheless, innovation percolates throughout the system via evolutionary competition among lineages of individual trees dealing with the stresses of crowding, parasites, predation, and weather. Occasionally, large shocks such as fire or disease or human predation can suddenly upset the whole system, sometimes all the way down to the biome level.

The mathematician and physicist Freeman Dyson makes a similar observation about human society:

The destiny of our species is shaped by the imperatives of survival on six distinct time scales. To survive means to compete successfully on all six time scales. But the unit of survival is different at each of the six time scales. On a time scale of years, the unit is the individual. On a time scale of decades, the unit is the family. On a time scale of centuries, the unit is the tribe or nation. On a time scale of millennia, the unit is the culture. On a time scale of tens of millennia, the unit is the species. On a time scale of eons, the unit is the whole web of life on our planet. Every human being is the product of adaptation to the demands of all six time scales. That is why conflicting loyalties are deep in our nature. In order to survive, we have needed to be loyal to ourselves, to our families, to our tribes, to our cultures, to our species, to our planet. If our psychological impulses are complicated, it is because they were shaped by complicated and conflicting demands.

In terms of quantity, there are a great many pine needles and a great many humans, many forests and nations, only a few biomes and cultures, and but one planet. The hierarchy also underlies much of causation and explanation. On any subject, ask a four-year-old's sequence of annoying "Why?"s five times and you get to deep structure. "Why are you married, Mommy?" "That's how you make a family." "Why make a family?" "It's the only way people have found to civilize children." "Why civilize children?" "If we didn't, the world would be nothing but nasty gangs." "Why?" "Because gangs can't make farms and cities and universities." "Why not?" "Because they don't care about anything larger than themselves."

I propose six significant levels of pace and size in the working structure of a robust and adaptable civilization. From fast to slow the levels are:

Fashion/art

Commerce

Infrastructure

Governance

Culture

Nature

In a durable society, each level is allowed to operate at its own pace, safely sustained by the slower levels below and kept invigorated by the livelier levels above. "Every form of civilization is a wise equilibrium between firm substructure and soaring liberty," wrote the historian Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy. Each layer must respect the different pace of the others. If commerce, for example, is allowed by governance and culture to push nature at a commercial pace, then all-supporting natural forests, fisheries, and aquifers will be lost. If governance is changed suddenly instead of gradually, you get the catastrophic French and Russian revolutions. In the Soviet Union, governance tried to ignore the constraints of culture and nature while forcing a five-year-plan infrastructure pace on commerce and art. Thus cutting itself off from both support and innovation, it was doomed.

We can examine the array layer by layer, working down from the fast and attention-getting to the slow and powerful. Note that as people get older, their interests tend to migrate to the slower parts of the continuum. Culture is invisible to adolescents but a matter of great concern to elders. Adolescents are obsessed with fashion while elders are bored by it.

The job of fashion and art is to be froth—quick, irrelevant, engaging, self-preoccupied, and cruel. Try this! No, no, try this! It is culture cut free to experiment as creatively and irresponsibly as the society can bear. From all that variety comes driving energy for commerce (the annual model change in automobiles) and the occasional good idea or practice that sifts down to improve deeper levels, such as governance becoming responsive to opinion polls, or culture gradually accepting "multiculturalism" as structure instead of just entertainment.

If commerce is completely unfettered and unsupported by watchful governance and culture, it easily becomes crime, as in some nations after Communism fell. Likewise, commerce may instruct but must not control the levels below it, because it's too short-sighted. One of the stresses of our time is the way commerce is being accelerated by global markets and the digital and network revolutions. The proper role of commerce is to both exploit and absorb those shocks, passing some of the velocity and wealth on to the development of new infrastructure, but respecting the deeper rhythms of governance and culture.

Infrastructure, essential as it is, can't be justified in strictly commercial terms. The payback period for things such as transportation and communication systems is too long for standard investment, so you get government-guaranteed instruments like bonds or government-guaranteed monopolies. Governance and culture have to be willing to take on the huge costs and prolonged disruption of constructing sewer systems, roads, and communication systems, all the while bearing in mind the health of even slower "natural" infrastructure—water, climate, etc.

Education is intellectual infrastructure. So is science. They have very high yield, but delayed payback. Hasty societies that can't span those delays will lose out over time to societies that can. On the other hand, cultures too hidebound to allow education to advance at infrastructural pace also lose out.

In the realm of governance, the most interesting trend in current times—besides the worldwide proliferation of democracy and the rule of law——is the rise of what is coming to be called the "social sector." The public sector is government, the private sector is business, and the social sector is the nongovernmental, nonprofit do-good organizations. Supported by philanthropy and the toil of volunteers, they range from church charities, local land trusts, and disease support groups to global players like the International Red Cross and World Wildlife Fund. What they have in common is that they serve the larger, slower good.

The social sector acts on culture-level concerns in the domain of governance. One example is the sudden mid-20th-century dominance of "historic preservation" of buildings, pushed by organizations like the National Trust for Historic Preservation in America and English Heritage and the National Trust in Britain. Through them, culture declared that it was okay to change clothing at fashion pace, but not buildings; okay to change tenants at commercial pace, but not buildings; okay to change transportation at infrastructure pace, but not neighborhoods. "If some parts of our society are going to speed up," the organizations seemed to say, "then other parts are going to have to slow way down, just to keep balance." Even New York City, once the most demolition-driven metropolis in America, now is preserving its downtown.

Culture's vast slow-motion dance keeps century and millennium time. Slower than political and economic history, it moves at the pace of language and religion. Culture is the work of whole peoples. In Asia you surrender to culture when you leave the city and hike back into the mountains, traveling back in time into remote village culture, where change is century-paced. In Europe you can see it in terminology, where the names of months (governance) have varied radically since 1500, but the names of signs of the Zodiac (culture) are unchanged in millennia. Europe’s most intractable wars have been religious wars.

As for nature, its vast power, inexorable and implacable, just keeps surprising us. The world's first empire, the Akkadian in the Tigris-Euphrates valley, lasted only a hundred years, from 2300 BCE to 2200 BCE. It was wiped out by a drought that went on for three hundred years. Europe's first empire, the Minoan civilization, fell to earthquakes and a volcanic eruption in the 15th century BCE. When we disturb nature at its own scale, such as with our "extinction engine" and greenhouse gases, we risk triggering apocalyptic forces. Like it or not, we have to comprehend and engage the longest now of nature.

The division of powers among the layers of civilization lets us relax about a few of our worries. We don't have to deplore technology and business changing rapidly while government controls, cultural mores, and "wisdom" change slowly. That's their job. Also, we don't have to fear destabilizing positive-feedback loops (such as the Singularity) crashing the whole system. Such disruption can usually be isolated and absorbed. The total effect of the pace layers is that they provide a many-leveled corrective, stabilizing feedback throughout the system. It is precisely in the apparent contradictions between the pace layers that civilization finds its surest health.

Acknowledgements

The idea of pace layering has a history. The text above is a slightly edited version of a chapter in my 1999 book The Clock of the Long Now: Time and Responsibility. I first created the healthy-civilization diagram with Brian Eno at his studio in London in ­­­­1996. Earlier still, in the early 1970s, the English architect Frank Duffy wrote, “A building properly conceived is several layers of longevity of built components.” He identified four layers in commercial buildings—Shell (lasts maybe 50 years), Services (swapped out every 15 years or so), Scenery (interior walls, etc. move every 5 to 7 years), and Set (furniture, moving sometimes monthly.) For my 1994 book How Buildings Learn: What Happens After They’re Built I expanded Duffy’s four layers to six: Site, Structure, Skin, Services, Space Plan, and Stuff. The chapter on how the components play out in a healthy building I titled “Shearing Layers.” Some reviewers of the book on Amazon claim that How Buildings Learn is really about software and systems design. (Stewart Brand)

111. $10 bill and the bus station

30 March 2022 14:17

Let me start with the marketing story about money. Which is take a $10 bill and go to the bus station, and walk up to someone and say: I'll sell you this $10 bill for a dollar. You should actually do this. No one will buy it from you. There are a few reasons for this. The first reason is no one goes to the bus station hoping to do a financial transaction. The second one is, only an insane person would try to sell you a real $10 bill for a dollar, and dealing with insane people is tricky so it must not be a real $10 bill, and you should just walk away. Now, let’s try a different thing. Put a $10 bill in your neighbor’s mailbox when he’s not home and run away. Do it the next day, do it the third day. On the fourth day, ring your neighbor’s doorbell and say: I'm the guy who left three $10 bills in your mailbox. Here’s another one; you want to buy it for a dollar? You’ll sell it because your neighbor knows you’re crazy but you’re crazy in a very particular way, and you’ve earned the trust that it’s a real $10 bill. So we assume that $10 bills are worth $10, but no, it’s a mutual belief and if the belief isn’t present, they’re worth nothing. (Seth Godin)

112. Get your memo read

30 March 2022 14:30

The unanticipated but important memo has a difficult road. It will likely be ignored.

The difficult parts:

a. no one is waiting to hear from you

b. you need to have the clarity to know who it’s for, what’s it for and precisely what you want them to do

c. you have to have the guts to leave out everything that isn’t part of (b)

Consider a memo that was left outside my door at a hotel recently. The management distributed 1000 of them and perhaps ten people read it and took action.

Here’s what to keep in mind:

Pattern interrupt.

When was the last time you listened to the seat belt announcement on an airplane? We ignore it because we’ve been trained to ignore it. When you show up in a place, at a time, with a format that we’ve been trained to ignore, we’ll ignore you.

Write a story.

You seek engagement. Talk about me. About you, about yesterday, today and tomorrow. If you earn the first sentence, you’ll need to sell me on reading the second sentence.

Frame the story.

Help me compare it to something. Create urgency. Make it about me, my status, my needs.

Chunk the message.

How many things are you trying to say? (Hint: two might be too many). Let me scan instead of study.

Include a call to action.

Right here, right now. (Seth Godin)

113. Finite and Infinite Games

20 April 2022 07:45

Goals are not all that interesting to me, but pathways are. The strategic pathway I was trying to encourage with Whole Earth Catalog was one that empowered people to do pretty much anything they wanted, rather than try for one specific achievement. Religious scholar James P. Carse talks about this difference in his book, Finite and Infinite Games. In a finite game, you’re fighting to win. In an infinite game, you’re doing everything you can, not only to keep the game going, but also to keep it interesting. The infinite game is a direction. The finite game is a goal. (Stewart Brand)

To be prepared against surprise is to be trained. To be prepared for surprise is to be educated.

A finite game is played for the purpose of winning, an infinite game for the purpose of continuing the play.

Strength is paradoxical. I am not strong because I can force others to do what I wish as a result of my play with them, but because I can allow them to do what they wish in the course of my play with them.

Finite players play within boundaries; infinite players play with boundaries

We are playful when we engage others at the level of choice, when there is no telling in advance where our relationship with them will come out-- when, in fact, no one has an outcome to be imposed on the relationship, apart from the decision to continue it.

Because infinite players prepare themselves to be surprised by the future, they play in complete openness. It is not an openness as in candor, but an openness as in vulnerability. It is not a matter of exposing one's unchanging identity, the true self that has always been, but a way of exposing one's ceaseless growth, the dynamic self that has yet to be.

if we cannot tell a story about what happened to us, nothing has happened to us.

What will undo any boundary is the awareness that it is our vision, and not what we are viewing, that is limited.

Gardening is not outcome-oriented. A successful harvest is not the end of a gardener's existence, but only a phase of it. As any gardener knows, the vitality of a garden does not end with a harvest. It simply takes another form. Gardens do not "die" in the winter but quietly prepare for another season.

Storytellers do not convert their listeners; they do not move them into the territory of a superior truth. Ignoring the issue of truth and falsehood altogether, they offer only vision. Storytelling is therefore not combative; it does not succeed or fail. A story cannot be obeyed. Instead of placing one body of knowledge against another, storytellers invite us to return from knowledge to thinking, from a bounded way of looking to an horizonal way of seeing.

Gardeners slaughter no animals. They kill nothing. Fruits, seeds, vegetables, nuts, grains, grasses, roots, flowers, herbs, berries-all are collected when they have ripened, and when their collection is in the interest of the garden's heightened and continued vitality. Harvesting respects a source, leaves it unexploited, suffers it to be as it is.

(James P. Carse, Finite and Infinite Games)

114. A Master Class in Creating Wholeness

20 April 2022 07:46

In the beginning, God (a whole) created the heavens and the earth (other wholes). The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light (another potential whole created but notice it's not in isolation). And God saw that the light was good (in relation to the existing wholes). And God separated the light (a whole now) from the darkness (a non-whole). God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night (boundaries creating more wholeness). And there was evening and there was morning, the first day (another whole created increasing the density of wholeness).

And God blessed them (us as wholes). And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth (with wholeness) and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth (be stewards of wholeness by using the force of wholeness given to create more wholeness).

115. Big Hairy Audacious Goal (BHAG)

22 April 2022 14:47

Boeing Corporation is an excellent example of how highly Visionary companies often use bold missions – or what we prefer to call BHAGs (pronounced bee-hag, short for "Big Hairy Audacious Goals")– as a particularly powerful mechanism to stimulate progress. A BHAG is not the only powerful mechanism for stimulating progress, nor do all the visionary companies use it extensively (some, like 3M and HP, prefer to rely primarily on other mechanisms to stimulate progress, as we'll discuss in later chapters). Nonetheless, we found more evidence of this powerful mechanism in the visionary companies and less evidence of it in the comparison companies in fourteen out of eighteen cases. In three cases we found the visionary company and comparison company to be indistinguishable from each other with respect to BHAGs. In one case, we found more evidence for the use of BHAGs in the comparison company.

All companies have goals. But there is a difference between merely having a goal and becoming committed to a huge, daunting challenge– like a big mountain to climb. Think of the moon mission in the 1960s. President Kennedy and his advisors could have gone off into a conference room and drafted something like "Let's beef up our space program," or some other such vacuous statement. The most optimistic scientific assessment of the moon mission's chances for success in 1961 was fifty-fifty and most experts were, in fact, more pessimistic. Yet, nonetheless, Congress agreed (to the tune of an immediate $549 million and billions more in the following five years) with Kennedy's proclamation on May 25, 1961, "that this Nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to earth." Given the odds, such a bold commitment was, at the time, outrageous. But that's part of what made it such a powerful mechanism for getting the United States, still groggy from the 1950s and the Eisenhower era, moving vigorously forward.

A CLEAR—AND COMPELLING–GOAL

Like the moon mission, a true BHAG is clear and compelling and serves as a unifying focal point of effort– often creating immense team spirit. It has a clear finish line, so the organization can know when it has achieved the goal; people like to shoot for finish lines.

A BHAG engages people– it reaches out and grabs them in the gut. It is tangible, energizing, highly focused. People "get it" right away; it takes little or no explanation.

The moon mission didn't need a committee to spend endless hours wordsmithing the goal into a verbose, meaningless, impossible-to-remember "mission statement." No, the goal itself– the mountain to climb– was so easy to grasp, so compelling in its own right, that it could be said one hundred different ways, yet easily understood by everyone. When an expedition sets out to climb Mount Everest, it doesn't need a three-page, convoluted "mission statement" to explain what Mount Everest is. Think about your own organization. Do you have verbose statements floating around, yet no stimulating bold goals with the compelling clarity of the moon mission, climbing Mount Everest, or the corporate BHAGs in this chapter? Most corporate statements we've seen do little to provoke forward movement (although some do help to preserve the core). To stimulate progress, however, we encourage you to think beyond the traditional corporate statement and consider the powerful mechanism of a BHAG.

Reflecting on the challenges facing a company like General Electric, CEO Jack Welch stated that the first step– before all other steps– is for the company to "define its destiny in broad but clear terms. You need an overarching message, something big, but simple and understandable." Like what? GE came up with the following: "To become #1 or #2 in every market we serve and revolutionize this company to have the speed and agility of a small enterprise." Employees throughout GE fully understood– and remembered– the BHAG. Now compare the compelling clarity of GE's BHAG with the difficult-to-understand, hard-to-remember "vision statement" articulated by Westinghouse in 1989:

The point here is not that GE had the "right" goal and Westinghouse had the "wrong" goal. The point is that GE's goal was clear, compelling, and more likely to stimulate progress, like the moon mission. Whether a company has the right BHAG or whether the BHAG gets people going in the right direction are not irrelevant questions, but they miss the essential point. Indeed, the essential point of a BHAG is better captured in such questions as: "Does it stimulate forward progress? Does it create momentum? Does it get people going? Does it get people's juices flowing? Do they find it stimulating, exciting, adventurous? Are they willing to throw their creative talents and human energies into it?"

116. Practopoiesis

30 May 2022 22:14

Practopoiesis is a theory by Danko Nikolić proposing that life can be understood as a hierarchy of adaptive processes; adaptive processes at lower levels of organization (such as evolution by natural selection) determine properties of the adaptive mechanisms at higher levels of adaptive organization (such as genes).[1] The theory of practopoiesis states that life can be explained by adaptive mechanisms that operate at a total of four levels of organization.

These levels are (from lowest to highest) :

Evolution → Gene expression → Cell anapoiesis → Interaction with the environment

Cell anapoiesis consists of internal homeostatic mechanisms that change the properties of the cell but do not directly involve gene expression. Anapoietic mechanisms do not directly affect the environment of the cell.

The theory has been used to generate new counterintuitive empirically testable predictions[2][3], to propose improvement of control systems [4][5] and artificial intelligence[6][7], and to guide creation of efficient methods for acquiring new languages.[4]

Notably, the theory introduced the level of anapoiesis, an adaptive process not previously formulated as a specific adaptive mechanisms despite evidence of numerous homeostatic mechanisms. Anapoiesis stands for "reconstruction of knowledge"—transforming knowledge from a general form to a specific one.[citation needed]

Practopoiesis was initially developed the explain the functioning of the brain and the emergence of mental phenomena. Its main tenet holds that all our semantic knowledge and procedural knowledge (skills) are stored in a form of "fast learning" mechanisms at the level of anapoiesis. Mental operations therefore occur through application of anapoietic mechanisms. The theory proposes that these fast adaptive mechanisms have been acquired (or poietically created) over an individual's lifetime through interaction with the environment and expression of genes, i.e., by neural plasticity.

That way, practopoiesis challenges current neuroscience doctrines based on a widespread assumption that thinking is synonymous with neural spiking activity (cell function). In contrast, practopoiesis asserts that mental operations primarily occur at the anapoietic level — i.e., that minds emerge from fast homeostatic mechanisms. In other words, it is the homeostatic "fast learning" that is responsible for implementing mental operations such as perception, attention, recall from memory and decision-making. Importantly, it follows that neural spiking activity operates at a level higher than anapoiesis (cell function), and thus, is not directly responsible for mental operations. Spiking activity is necessary for closing sensory-motor loops that create behavior. Anapoietic mechanisms dynamically reorganize these loops, and, in doing so, form a mind.

Contents

1 Hierarchical interactions with the environment

2 Anapoiesis

3 Advantages of adaptive hierarchies

4 A unique approach to explaining mind

5 Relationship to biology and cybernetics

6 Implications for philosophy of mind and artificial intelligence

7 See also

8 References

9 External links

10 Rejected due to article by the same name, which redirects to the draft page.

Hierarchical interactions with the environment

Hierarchical interaction between adaptive mechanisms forming a practopoietic loop of causation. According to the theory, each mechanism must receive specific feedback from the external world.

Practopoiesis provides an explanation how different levels of adaptive mechanisms mutually interact: Each adaptive level must both affect the environment and receive feedback from the environment. A lower level indirectly affects the environment—by first affecting the mechanisms at higher levels of organization. Each lower level must operate at a slower time scale than the level above it. These multi-level interactions are illustrated in the figure on the right.

Anapoiesis

File:FastVsSlowAdaptiveMechanisms.png

Slow adaptive mechanism based on growing synaptic connections (left) and fast adaptive mechanism based on changing membrane properties (right). Red color indicates increased difficulty of passing signals.

Anapoiesis refers collectively to all homeostatic mechanisms that do not involve expression of genes. In the case of anapoiesis, the cell uses its existing proteins to adjust its functionality, requiring no immediate synthesis of proteins. These adaptations can thus occur much faster than those based on gene expression. One can think of anapoietic mechanisms as cell control mechanisms already prepared through gene expression, waiting to be quickly engaged as soon as there is a need. Membrane proteins should play important role in anapoiesis.

Importantly, practopoietic theory asserts that anapoiesis is primarily responsible for mental operations. For example, when we perceive a person, the brain is proposed to generate not only a pattern of neural activity in response to that person, but also that the neurons quickly adjust, some by quickly habituating and others by quickly sensitizing. This pattern of habitation and sensitization, according to the theory, are fast homeostatic mechanisms that prepare us for the interaction with that person. This is the process of anapoiesis. And, when the preparation is successful—resulting in sufficiently good preparation for interacting with that person—we have, according to the theory, correctly perceived someone. The same process is also responsible for attention towards that person, deciding whether to interact with that person, thinking about that person, and so on along the entire palette of cognitive operations.

Moreover, these adaptive mechanisms (such as sensitization and habituation) are not fixed and shared across all neurons. Rather, each neuron learns individually what is an appropriate adaptation action in a given situation. Hence, each neuron has a unique knowledge of when to sensitize or habituate. This knowledge on when to sensitize vs. habituate represents our semantic knowledge acquired over lifetime. Therefore, according to practopoiesis, knowledge stored in synapses is not the only important one.

Look up anapoiesis in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Wang[4] proposed that anapoietic skills grow primarily as a result socio-cultural interactions, and thus reflect socio-cultural knowledge. This is in contrast to corporeal-temporal-spatial knowledge that lays immediately bellow (created by expression of genes) and semiotic knowledge above the anapoietic level (behavior and interactions).

Advantages of adaptive hierarchies

An adaptive hierarchy can take full advantage of inductive bias; when a learning system is biased such that its assumptions approximate reality well, learning is effective. In a practopoietic hierarchy of adaptive components, components lower on the hierarchy shape the biases (assumptions) of the components higher on the hierarchy. For example, evolution determines the learning biases of gene expression mechanisms; gene expression shapes the assumptions of the anapoietic mechanisms; anapoiesis shapes the assumptions of the processing based on neural activity.

As a result, a hierarchical architecture achieves high levels of intelligence with a relatively small system size[8]. Such a system does not need to store complete information on how to adapt in all possible situations. Instead, only general rules for entire classes of environments are learned. These rules are then applied through poietic hierarchy. For example, a neural network needs not learn how to interact specifically with all possible chairs, but instead anapoietic mechanisms contain knowledge of rules on how to interact with chairs in general.

A unique approach to explaining mind

File:Tri-traversal theory of mind.png

Tri-traversal theory of mind

The key difference from the classical brain theory is that the primary brain mechanism for implementing mental operations is not presumed to rely on the electrochemical activity executed by neural circuitry (i.e., on the network "computation" based on excitation and inhibition). Instead, according to practopoiesis, the emergence of the mind depends critically on the mechanisms making quick adaptive changes to that circuitry: anapoietic mechanisms. These fast adjustment mechanisms are hypothesized to be closely related to the well-known phenomenon of (fast) neural adaptation which adjust routing and computational properties of excitatory-inhibitory networks.

File:Practopoiesis Little Red Riding Hood.png

Illustrated routing of neural activity by a pattern of membrane adaptations. A percept of Little Red Riding Hood is favoured over a grandmother.

For example, when deciding which person one perceives—e.g., Grandmother or Little Red Riding Hood—the fast adaptive mechanisms of neurons may route neural activity in the unique pattern that prescribes interaction with that person just as they would when one interacts with Grandmother, or with Little Red Riding Hood. This way, neural adaptations determine the percept. At the same time, they determine the decision on how to behave, the direction of attention, contents of working memory, and so on.

Relationship to biology and cybernetics

Practopoiesis is closely related to a number of biological theories[1] and cybernetic concepts[4]. These include evolution by natural selection, and homeostasis and allostasis. For example, practopoiesis asserts that Lamarckian inheritance cannot possibly work because a species would not be able to accumulate general knowledge that requires a larger number of generations. Past knowledge would be quickly lost over new one.[1]

The theory is founded in two theorems of cybernetics: practopoietic hierarchy is organized such to maximize the requisite variety of responses that an organism generates in its interaction with the environment.[4] Through its hierarchy, practopoiesis also respects the fact that such successful interaction requires the organism to effectively become a model of its environment.

Practopoiesis is also related to autopoiesis; practopoiesis states that autopoiesis of an organism or a cell occurs through allopoietic interactions among its components.

Implications for philosophy of mind and artificial intelligence

Due to emphasizing interaction with the environment and the abandonment of representation, practopoiesis is compatible with the concepts of embodied and embedded cognition.[9]

Mittal and Rainey hypothesize that strong emergent systems are practopoietic systems. Moreover, emergent behavior should be controlled through practopoietic hierarchy. [5]

It is argued that only a hierarchy of slow and fast learning mechanisms can produce Pierce's abductive reasoning and Searle's understanding. Solutions to both problems are based in the proposal that semantics of our minds emerge through the very nature of anapoietic mechanisms, which necessarily possess knowledge in a more general form than do neural networks.[1]

Several proposals argue that the boosted adaptability that results from practopoietic hierarchy will be necessary for advances in artificial intelligence.[6] [10]and brain inspired computing[7]

Practopoietic hierarchy has been used to propose new methods for more efficient language acquisition.[4] Namely, enacting the communicated message and active behavioral interaction during communication should be critical for successfully learning a new language.

Ji proposes that practopoietic hierarchy can help understand Peircian semiotic triade.[11]

117. On Writing

13 June 2022 08:45

This sentence has five words. Here are five more words. Five-word sentences are fine. But several together become monotonous. Listen to what is happening. The writing is getting boring. The sound of it drones. It’s like a stuck record. The ear demands some variety. Now listen. I vary the sentence length, and I create music. Music. The writing sings. It has a pleasant rhythm, a lilt, a harmony. I use short sentences. And I use sentences of medium length. And sometimes, when I am certain the reader is rested, I will engage him with a sentence of considerable length, a sentence that burns with energy and builds with all the impetus of a crescendo, the roll of the drums, the crash of the cymbals–sounds that say listen to this, it is important. (Gary Provost)

The Day You Became A Better Writer

I went from being a bad writer to a good writer after taking a one-day course in “business writing.” I couldn’t believe how simple it was. I’ll tell you the main tricks here so you don’t have to waste a day in class.

Business writing is about clarity and persuasion. The main technique is keeping things simple. Simple writing is persuasive. A good argument in five sentences will sway more people than a brilliant argument in a hundred sentences. Don’t fight it.

Simple means getting rid of extra words. Don’t write, “He was very happy” when you can write “He was happy.” You think the word “very” adds something. It doesn’t. Prune your sentences.

Humor writing is a lot like business writing. It needs to be simple. The main difference is in the choice of words. For humor, don’t say “drink” when you can say “swill.”

Your first sentence needs to grab the reader. Go back and read my first sentence to this post. I rewrote it a dozen times. It makes you curious. That’s the key.

Write short sentences. Avoid putting multiple thoughts in one sentence. Readers aren’t as smart as you’d think.

Learn how brains organize ideas. Readers comprehend “the boy hit the ball” quicker than “the ball was hit by the boy.” Both sentences mean the same, but it’s easier to imagine the object (the boy) before the action (the hitting). All brains work that way. (Notice I didn’t say, “That is the way all brains work”?)

That’s it. You just learned 80% of the rules of good writing. You’re welcome. (Scott Adams)

Putting Ideas into Words

February 2022

Writing about something, even something you know well, usually shows you that you didn't know it as well as you thought. Putting ideas into words is a severe test. The first words you choose are usually wrong; you have to rewrite sentences over and over to get them exactly right. And your ideas won't just be imprecise, but incomplete too. Half the ideas that end up in an essay will be ones you thought of while you were writing it. Indeed, that's why I write them.

Once you publish something, the convention is that whatever you wrote was what you thought before you wrote it. These were your ideas, and now you've expressed them. But you know this isn't true. You know that putting your ideas into words changed them. And not just the ideas you published. Presumably there were others that turned out to be too broken to fix, and those you discarded instead.

It's not just having to commit your ideas to specific words that makes writing so exacting. The real test is reading what you've written. You have to pretend to be a neutral reader who knows nothing of what's in your head, only what you wrote. When he reads what you wrote, does it seem correct? Does it seem complete? If you make an effort, you can read your writing as if you were a complete stranger, and when you do the news is usually bad. It takes me many cycles before I can get an essay past the stranger. But the stranger is rational, so you always can, if you ask him what he needs. If he's not satisfied because you failed to mention x or didn't qualify some sentence sufficiently, then you mention x or add more qualifications. Happy now? It may cost you some nice sentences, but you have to resign yourself to that. You just have to make them as good as you can and still satisfy the stranger.

This much, I assume, won't be that controversial. I think it will accord with the experience of anyone who has tried to write about anything nontrivial. There may exist people whose thoughts are so perfectly formed that they just flow straight into words. But I've never known anyone who could do this, and if I met someone who said they could, it would seem evidence of their limitations rather than their ability. Indeed, this is a trope in movies: the guy who claims to have a plan for doing some difficult thing, and who when questioned further, taps his head and says "It's all up here." Everyone watching the movie knows what that means. At best the plan is vague and incomplete. Very likely there's some undiscovered flaw that invalidates it completely. At best it's a plan for a plan.

In precisely defined domains it's possible to form complete ideas in your head. People can play chess in their heads, for example. And mathematicians can do some amount of math in their heads, though they don't seem to feel sure of a proof over a certain length till they write it down. But this only seems possible with ideas you can express in a formal language. [1] Arguably what such people are doing is putting ideas into words in their heads. I can to some extent write essays in my head. I'll sometimes think of a paragraph while walking or lying in bed that survives nearly unchanged in the final version. But really I'm writing when I do this. I'm doing the mental part of writing; my fingers just aren't moving as I do it. [2]

You can know a great deal about something without writing about it. Can you ever know so much that you wouldn't learn more from trying to explain what you know? I don't think so. I've written about at least two subjects I know well — Lisp hacking and startups — and in both cases I learned a lot from writing about them. In both cases there were things I didn't consciously realize till I had to explain them. And I don't think my experience was anomalous. A great deal of knowledge is unconscious, and experts have if anything a higher proportion of unconscious knowledge than beginners.

I'm not saying that writing is the best way to explore all ideas. If you have ideas about architecture, presumably the best way to explore them is to build actual buildings. What I'm saying is that however much you learn from exploring ideas in other ways, you'll still learn new things from writing about them.

Putting ideas into words doesn't have to mean writing, of course. You can also do it the old way, by talking. But in my experience, writing is the stricter test. You have to commit to a single, optimal sequence of words. Less can go unsaid when you don't have tone of voice to carry meaning. And you can focus in a way that would seem excessive in conversation. I'll often spend 2 weeks on an essay and reread drafts 50 times. If you did that in conversation it would seem evidence of some kind of mental disorder. If you're lazy, of course, writing and talking are equally useless. But if you want to push yourself to get things right, writing is the steeper hill. [3]

The reason I've spent so long establishing this rather obvious point is that it leads to another that many people will find shocking. If writing down your ideas always makes them more precise and more complete, then no one who hasn't written about a topic has fully formed ideas about it. And someone who never writes has no fully formed ideas about anything nontrivial.

It feels to them as if they do, especially if they're not in the habit of critically examining their own thinking. Ideas can feel complete. It's only when you try to put them into words that you discover they're not. So if you never subject your ideas to that test, you'll not only never have fully formed ideas, but also never realize it.

Putting ideas into words is certainly no guarantee that they'll be right. Far from it. But though it's not a sufficient condition, it is a necessary one.

Notes

[1] Machinery and circuits are formal languages.

[2] I thought of this sentence as I was walking down the street in Palo Alto.

[3] There are two senses of talking to someone: a strict sense in which the conversation is verbal, and a more general sense in which it can take any form, including writing. In the limit case (e.g. Seneca's letters), conversation in the latter sense becomes essay writing.

It can be very useful to talk (in either sense) with other people as you're writing something. But a verbal conversation will never be more exacting than when you're talking about something you're writing.

Thanks to Trevor Blackwell, Patrick Collison, and Robert Morris for reading drafts of this. (Paul Graham)

Write Simply

March 2021

I try to write using ordinary words and simple sentences.

That kind of writing is easier to read, and the easier something is to read, the more deeply readers will engage with it. The less energy they expend on your prose, the more they'll have left for your ideas.

And the further they'll read. Most readers' energy tends to flag part way through an article or essay. If the friction of reading is low enough, more keep going till the end.

There's an Italian dish called saltimbocca, which means "leap into the mouth." My goal when writing might be called saltintesta: the ideas leap into your head and you barely notice the words that got them there.

It's too much to hope that writing could ever be pure ideas. You might not even want it to be. But for most writers, most of the time, that's the goal to aim for. The gap between most writing and pure ideas is not filled with poetry.

Plus it's more considerate to write simply. When you write in a fancy way to impress people, you're making them do extra work just so you can seem cool. It's like trailing a long train behind you that readers have to carry.

And remember, if you're writing in English, that a lot of your readers won't be native English speakers. Their understanding of ideas may be way ahead of their understanding of English. So you can't assume that writing about a difficult topic means you can use difficult words.

Of course, fancy writing doesn't just conceal ideas. It can also conceal the lack of them. That's why some people write that way, to conceal the fact that they have nothing to say. Whereas writing simply keeps you honest. If you say nothing simply, it will be obvious to everyone, including you.

Simple writing also lasts better. People reading your stuff in the future will be in much the same position as people from other countries reading it today. The culture and the language will have changed. It's not vain to care about that, any more than it's vain for a woodworker to build a chair to last.

Indeed, lasting is not merely an accidental quality of chairs, or writing. It's a sign you did a good job.

But although these are all real advantages of writing simply, none of them are why I do it. The main reason I write simply is that it offends me not to. When I write a sentence that seems too complicated, or that uses unnecessarily intellectual words, it doesn't seem fancy to me. It seems clumsy.

There are of course times when you want to use a complicated sentence or fancy word for effect. But you should never do it by accident.

The other reason my writing ends up being simple is the way I do it. I write the first draft fast, then spend days editing it, trying to get everything just right. Much of this editing is cutting, and that makes simple writing even simpler. (Paul Graham)

Essay Writing Guide

You can use this word document to write an excellent essay from beginning to end, using a ten-step process. Most of the time, students or would-be essay writers are provided only with basic information about how to write, and most of that information concentrates on the details of formatting. These are necessary details, but writing is obviously far more than mere formatting. If you write your essay according to this plan, and you complete every step, you will produce an essay that is at least very good. You will also learn exactly how to write an essay, which is something very valuable to learn.

To start writing your essay, go to the next page, for Part One: Introduction.

PART ONE: INTRODUCTION

What is an essay?

An essay is a relatively short piece of writing on a particular topic. However, the word essay also means attempt or try. An essay is, therefore, a short piece written by someone attempting to explore a topic or answer a question.

Why bother writing an essay?

Most of the time, students write essays only because they are required to do so by a classroom instructor. Thus, students come to believe that essays are important primarily to demonstrate their knowledge to a teacher or professor. This is simply, and dangerously, wrong (even though such writing for demonstration may be practically necessary).

The primary reason to write an essay is so that the writer can formulate and organize an informed, coherent and sophisticated set of ideas about something important.

Why is it important to bother with developing sophisticated ideas, in turn?

It’s because there is no difference between doing so and thinking, for starters. It is important to think because action based on thinking is likely to be far less painful and more productive than action based upon ignorance. So, if you want to have a life characterized by competence, productivity, security, originality and engagement rather than one that is nasty, brutish and short, you need to think carefully about important issues. There is no better way to do so than to write. This is because writing extends your memory, facilitates editing and clarifies your thinking.

You can write down more than you can easily remember, so that your capacity to consider a number of ideas at the same time is broadened. Furthermore, once those ideas are written down, you can move them around and change them, word by word, sentence by sentence, and paragraph by paragraph. You can also reject ideas that appear substandard, after you consider them more carefully. If you reject substandard ideas, then all that you will have left will be good ideas. You can keep those, and use them. Then you will have good, original ideas at your fingertips, and you will be able to organize and communicate them.

Consider your success over the course of a lifetime. Here is something to think about: the person who can formulate and communicate the best argument almost always wins. If you want a job, you have to make a case for yourself. If you want a raise, you have to convince someone that you deserve it. If you are trying to convince someone of the validity of your idea, you have to debate its merits successfully, particularly if there are others with other competing ideas.

If you sharpen your capacity to think and to communicate as a consequence of writing, you are better armed. The pen is mightier than the sword, as the saying goes. This is no cheap cliché. Ideas change the world, particularly when they are written. The Romans built buildings, and the Romans and the buildings are both gone. The Jews wrote a book, and they are still here, and so is the book. So it turns out that words may well last longer than stone, and have more impact than whole empires.

If you learn to write and to edit, you will also be able to tell the difference between good ideas, intelligently presented, and bad ideas put forth by murky and unskilled thinkers. That means that you will be able to separate the wheat from the chaff (look it up). Then you can be properly influenced by profound and solid ideas instead of falling prey to foolish fads and whims and ideologies, which can range in their danger from trivial to mortal.

Those who can think and communicate are simply more powerful than those who cannot, and powerful in the good way, the way that means “able to do a wide range of things competently and efficiently.” Furthermore, the further up the ladder of competence you climb, with your well-formulated thoughts, the more important thinking and communicating become. At the very top of the most complex hierarchies (law, medicine, academia, business, theology, politics) nothing is more necessary and valuable. If you can think and communicate, you can also defend yourself, and your friends and family, when that becomes necessary, and it will become necessary at various points in your life.

Finally, it is useful to note that your mind is organized verbally, at the highest and most abstract levels. Thus, if you learn to think, through writing, then you will develop a well-organized, efficient mind – and one that is well-founded and certain. This also means that you will be healthier, mentally and physically, as lack of clarity and ignorance means unnecessary stress. Unnecessary stress makes your body react more to what could otherwise be treated as trivial affairs. This makes for excess energy expenditure, and more rapid aging (along with all the negative health-related consequences of aging).

So, unless you want to stay an ignorant, unhealthy lightweight, learn to write (and to think and communicate). Otherwise those who can will ride roughshod over you and push you out of the way. Your life will be harder, at the bottom of the dominance hierarchies that you will inevitably inhabit, and you will get old fast.

Don’t ever underestimate the power of words. Without them, we would still be living in trees. So when you are writing an essay, you are harnessing the full might of culture to your life. That is why you write an essay (even if it has been assigned). Forget that, and you are doing something stupid, trivial and dull. Remember it, and you are conquering the unknown.

A note on technology

If you are a student, or anyone else who is going to do a lot of writing, then you should provide yourself with the right technology, especially now, when it is virtually costless to do so. Obviously, you need a computer. It doesn’t have to be that good, although a digital hard drive is a good investment for speed. Less obviously, you need two screens, one set up beside the other. They don’t have to be bigger than 19” diagonal. Even 17” monitors will do well. High resolution is better. You need the two screens so that you can present your reference material on one screen, and your essay (or even two versions of your essay, side by side) on the other.

Having this extra visual real estate really matters. It will make you less cramped and more efficient. A good keyboard (such as the Microsoft Natural Ergonomic keyboard) is also an excellent investment. Standard keyboards will hurt your hands if you use them continually, and the less said about a notebook keyboard the better. Use a good mouse, as well, and not a touchpad, which requires too much finicky movement for someone who is really working. Set up the keyboards so you are looking directly at their centers when you are sitting up straight. Use a decent chair, and sit so that your feet can rest comfortably on the floor when your knees are bent 90 degrees. These are not trivial issues. You may spend hours working on your writing, so you have to set up a workspace that will not annoy you, or you will have just one more good reason to avoid your tasks and assignments.

A note on use of time

People’s brains function better in the morning. Get up. Eat something. You are much smarter and more resilient after you have slept properly and ate. There is plenty of solid research demonstrating this. Coffee alone is counter-productive. Have some protein and some fat. Make a smoothie with fruit and real yogurt. Go out and buy a cheap breakfast, if necessary. Eat by whatever means necessary. Prepare to spend between 90 minutes and three hours writing. However, even 15 minutes can be useful, particularly if you do it every day.

Do not wait for a big chunk of free time to start. You will never get big chunks of free time ever in your life, so don’t make your success dependent on their non-existent. The most effective writers write every day, at least a bit.

Realize that when you first sit down to write, your mind will rebel. It is full of other ideas, all of which will fight to dominate. You could be looking at Facebook, or Youtube, or watching or reading online porn, or cleaning the dust bunnies from under your bed, or rearranging your obsolete CD collection, or texting an old flame, or reading a book for another course, or getting the groceries you need, or doing the laundry, or having a nap, or going for a walk (because you need the exercise), or phoning a friend or a parent – the list is endless. Each part of your mind that is concerned with such things will make its wants known, and attempt to distract you. Such pesky demons can be squelched, however, with patience. If you refuse to be tempted for fifteen minutes (25 on a really bad day) you will find that the clamor in your mind will settle down and you will be able to concentrate on writing. If you do this day after day, you will find that the power of such temptations do not reduce, but the duration of their attempts to distract you will decrease. You will also find that even on a day where concentration is very difficult, you will still be able to do some productive writing if you stick it out.

Don’t kid yourself into thinking you will write for six hours, either. Three is a maximum, especially if you want to sustain it day after day. Don’t wait too late to start your writing, so you don’t have to cram insanely, but give yourself a break after a good period of sustained concentration. Three productive hours are way better than ten hours of self-deceptive non-productivity, even in the library.

PART TWO: LEVELS OF RESOLUTION

Words, sentences, paragraphs and more

An essay, like any piece of writing, exists at multiple levels of resolution, simultaneously. First is the selection of the word. Second is the crafting of the sentence. Each word should be precisely the right word, in the right location in each sentence. The sentence itself should present a thought, part of the idea expressed in the paragraph, in a grammatically correct manner. Each sentence should be properly arranged and sequenced inside a paragraph, the third level of resolution. As a rule of thumb, a paragraph should be made up of at least 10 sentences or 100 words. This might be regarded as a stupid rule, because it is arbitrary. However, you should let it guide you, until you know better. You have very little right to break the rules, until you have mastered them.

Here’s a little story to illustrate that idea, taken in part from a document called the Codex Bezae.

Christ is walking down the road on the Sabbath, when good Jews of that time were not supposed to work. In the ditch, he sees a shepherd, trying to rescue a sheep from a hole that it has fallen into. It is very hot and, clearly, the sheep will not be in very good shape if it spends a whole day in the desert sun. On the other hand, it is the Sabbath. Christ looks at the shepherd and says, “Man, if indeed thou knowest what thou doest, thou art blessed: but if thou knowest not, thou art cursed, and a transgressor of the law.” Then he walks on down the road.

The point is this: There is a rest day for a reason. Otherwise people would work all the time. Then they would be chronically unhappy and exhausted. They would compete each other to death. So if it’s time for everybody to rest, then rest, and don’t be breaking the rule. However, it is also not good to let a sheep die in the hot sun, when a few minutes of labor might save it. So, if you are respectful of the rule, and conscious of its importance, and realize that it serves as a bulwark against the chaos of the unknown, and you still decide to break it, carefully, because the particularities of the circumstances demand it – well, then, more power to you. If you are just a careless, ignorant, antisocial narcissist instead, however, then look out. You break a rule at your peril, whether you know it or not.

Rules are there for a reason. You are only allowed to break them if you are a master. If you’re not a master, don’t confuse your ignorance with creativity or style. Writing that follows the rules is easier for readers, because they know roughly what to expect. So rules are conventions. Like all conventions, they are sometimes sub-optimal. But not very often. So, to begin with, use the conventions. For example, aim to make your paragraphs about 10 sentences or 100 words long.

A paragraph should present a single idea, using multiple sentences. If you can’t think up 100 words to say about your idea, it’s probably not a very good idea, or you need to think more about it. If your paragraph is rambling on for 300 words, or more, it’s possible that it has more than one idea in it, and should be broken up.

All of the paragraphs have to be arranged in a logical progression, from the beginning of the essay to the end. This is the fourth level of resolution. Perhaps the most important step in writing an essay is getting the paragraphs in proper order. Each of them is a stepping stone to your essay’s final destination.

The fifth level of resolution is the essay, as a whole. Every element of an essay can be correct, each word, sentence, and paragraph – even the paragraph order – and the essay can still fail, because it is just not interesting or important. It is very hard for competent but uninspired writers to understand this kind of failure, because a critic cannot merely point it out. There is no answer to their question, “exactly where did I make a mistake?” Such an essay is just not good. An essay without originality or creativity might fall into this category. Sometimes a creative person, who is not technically proficient as a writer, can make the opposite mistake: their word choice is poor, their sentences badly constructed and poorly organized within their paragraphs, their paragraphs in no intelligible relationship to one another – and yet the essay as a whole can succeed, because there are valuable thoughts trapped within it, wishing desperately to find expression.

Additional levels

You might think that there could not possibly be anything more to an essay than these five levels of resolution or analysis, but you would be wrong. This is something that was first noticed, perhaps, by those otherwise entirely reprehensible and destructive scholars known as post-modernists. An essay necessarily exists within a context of interpretation, made up of the reader (level six), and the culture that the reader is embedded in (level seven), which is made up in part of the assumptions that he or she will bring to the essay. Levels six and seven have deep roots in biology and culture. You might think, “Why do I need to know this?” but if you don’t you are not considering your audience, and that’s a mistake. Part of the purpose of the essay is to set your mind straight, but the other part, equally important, is to communicate with an audience.

For the essay to succeed, brilliantly, it has to work at all of these levels of resolution simultaneously. That is very difficult, but it is in that difficulty that the value of the act of writing exists.

Considerations of Aesthetics and Fascination

This is not all that has to be properly managed when you write an essay. You should also strive for brevity, which is concise and efficient expression, as well as beauty, which is the melodic or poetic aspect of your language (at all the requisite levels of analysis). Finally, you should not be bored, or boring. If you are bored while writing, then, most importantly, you are doing it wrong, and you will also bore your reader. Think of it this way: you get bored for a reason, and sometimes for a good reason. You may be bored while writing your essay because you are actually lying to yourself in a very deep way about what you are doing and why you are doing it. Your mind, independent of your ego, cannot be hoodwinked into attending to something that you think is uninteresting or useless. It will automatically regard such a thing as unworthy of attention, and make you bored by it.

If you are bored by your essay, you have either chosen the wrong topic (one which makes no difference to you and, in all likelihood, to anyone else) or you are approaching a good topic in a substandard manner. Perhaps you are resentful about having to write the essay, or afraid of its reception, or lazy, or ignorant, or unduly and arrogantly skeptical, or something of the kind.

You have to place yourself in the correct state of mind to write properly. That state of mind is partly aesthetic. You have to be trying to produce something of worth, beauty and elegance. If you think that is ridiculous, then you are far too stupid at the moment to write properly. You need to meditate long and hard on why you would dare presume that worth, beauty and elegance are unworthy of your pursuit. Do you plan to settle for ugly and uncouth? Do you want to destroy, instead of build?

You must choose a topic that is important to you. This should be formulated as a question that you want to answer. This is arguably the hardest part of writing an essay: choosing the proper question. Perhaps your instructor has provided you with a list of topics, and you think you are off the hook as a consequence. You’re not. You still have to determine how to write about one of those topics in a manner that is compelling to you. It’s a moral, spiritual endeavour.

If you properly identify something of interest to you, then you have put yourself in alignment with the deeper levels of your psyche, your spirit. If these deeper levels do not want or need an answer to the question you have posed, you will not possibly be interested in it. So the fact of your interest is evidence of the importance of the topic. You, or some part of you, needs the answer – and such needs can be deep enough so that life itself can depend upon them. Someone desperate, for example, might find the question “why live?” of extreme interest, and absolutely require an answer that makes life’s suffering worth bearing. It is not necessary to ensure that every question you try or essay to answer of that level of importance, but you should not waste your time with ideas that do not grip you.

So, the proper attitude is interested and aesthetically sensitive.

Having said all that, here is something to remember: finished beats perfect. Most people fail a class or an assignment or a work project not because they write badly, and get D’s or F’s, but because they don’t write at all, and get zeroes. Zeroes are very bad. They are the black holes of numbers. Zeroes make you fail. Zeroes ruin your life. Essays handed in, no matter how badly written, can usually get you at least a C. So don’t be a completely self-destructive idiot. Hand something in, regardless of how pathetic you think it is (and no matter how accurate you are in that opinion).

PART THREE: THE TOPIC AND THE READING LIST

The central question that you are trying to answer with the essay is the topic question. Here are some potentially interesting topic questions:

• Does evil exist?

• Are all cultures equally worthy of respect?

• How should a man and a woman treat each other in a relationship?

• What, if anything, makes a person good?

• These are very general, abstract topics. That makes them philosophical. Good topics do not have to be so general. Here are some good, more specific topics:

• What were the key events of Julius Caesar’s rule?

• What are the critical elements of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution?

• Is “The Sun Also Rises,” by Ernest Hemingway, an important book?

• How might Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud’s theory of the psyche be contrasted?

• How did Newton and Einstein differ in their conceptualization of time?

• Was the recent Iraq war just or unjust?

You can begin your essay writing process two different ways. You can either list the topics you have been assigned, or list ten or so questions that you might want to answer, if you are required to choose your own topic, or you can start to create and finalize your reading list. If you think you can already identify several potential topics of interest, start with Topics. If you are unsure, then start constructing your Reading List.

CHOICE BETWEEN TOPICS and READING LIST

Topics

Put these in question form, as in the examples above.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

If you can’t do this, then you have to do some more reading (which you will likely have to do to complete the essay anyway). There is, by the way, no such thing as reader’s block. If you can’t write, it is because you have nothing to say. You have no ideas. In such a situation, don’t pride yourself on your writer’s block. Read something. If that doesn’t work, read something else – maybe something better. Repeat until the problem is solved.

Reading List

Indicate here what you have to or want to read. These should be books or articles, generally speaking. If you don’t know what articles or books might be appropriate or useful, then you could start with Wikipedia articles or other encyclopedic sources, and look at their reference lists for ideas about further reading. These sources are fine as a beginning.

If you find someone whose writing is particularly interesting and appropriate, it is often very useful to see if you can find out what authors they admired and read. You can do this by noting who they refer to, in the text of their writings or in the reference list. You can meander productively through wide bodies of learning in this manner.

Assume you need 5-10 books or articles per thousand words of essay, unless you have been instructed otherwise. A double-spaced page of typing usually contains about 250 words. List your sources now, even if you have to do it badly. You can always make it better later.

Reading 1.

Notes: (see next section for Notes on Notes):

Reading 2.

Notes:

Reading 3.

Notes:

Reading 4.

Notes:

Reading 5.

Notes:

Reading 6.

Notes:

Reading 7.

Notes:

Reading 8.

Notes:

Reading 9.

Notes:

Reading 10 (repeat if necessary).

Notes (repeat if necessary):

A Psychological Note and some Notes on Notes.

While you are reading, see if you can notice anything that catches your attention. This might be something you think is important, or something that you seriously disagree with, or something that you might want to know more about. You have to pay careful attention to your emotional reactions to do this.

You also want to take some notes. You can place your notes below the readings you listed above.

When you are taking notes, don’t bother doing stupid things like highlighting or underlining sentences in the textbook. There is no evidence that it works. It just looks like work. What you need to do is to read for understanding. Read a bit, then write down what you have learned or any questions that have arisen in your mind. Don’t ever copy the source word for word. The most important part of learning and remembering is the recreation of what you have written in your own language. This is not some simplistic “use your own words.” This is the dialog you are having with the writer of your sources. This is your attempt to say back to the author “this is what I understand you are saying.” This is where you extract the gist of the writing.

If someone asks you about your day, you don’t say, “Well, first I opened my eyes. Then I blinked and rubbed them. Then I placed my left leg on the floor, and then my right.” You would bore them to death. Instead, you eliminate the extra detail, and concentrate on communicating what is important. That is exactly what you are supposed to be doing when you take some notes during or after reading (after is often better, with the book closed, so that you are not tempted to copy the author’s writing word for word so that you can fool yourself into thinking you did some work).

If you find note-taking in this manner difficult, try this. Read a paragraph. Look away. Then say to yourself, out loud, even in a whisper (if you are in a library), what the paragraph meant. Listen to what you said, and then quickly write it down.

Take about two to three times as many notes, by word, as you will need for your essay. You might think that is inefficient, but it’s not. In order to write intelligibly about something, or to speak intelligently about it, you need to know far more than you actually communicate. That helps you master level six and seven, described previously – the context within which the essay is to be understood. Out of those notes you should be able to derive 8-10 topic questions. Do so. Remember, they can be edited later. Just get them down.

PART FOUR: THE OUTLINE

At this point you have prepared a list of topics, and a reading list. Now it’s time to choose a topic.

ENTER TOPIC HERE

1.

Here’s another rule. When you write your first draft, it should be longer than the final version. This is so that you have some extra writing to throw away. You want to have something to throw away after the first draft so that you only have to keep what is good. It is NOT faster to try to write exactly as many words as you need when you first sit down to write. Trying to do so merely makes you too aware of what you are writing. This concern will slow you down. Aim at producing a first draft that is 25% longer than the final draft is supposed to be. If your final work is to be 1000 words, then write that (or four pages) below. The word document will automatically add 25% to the length you specify.

Now specify the length of your essay.

WORDS:

PAGES:

ADD 25% TO THE ABOVE LENGTHS

Now you have to write an outline. This is the most difficult part of writing an essay, and it’s not optional. The outline of an essay is like the skeleton of a body. It provides its fundamental form and structure. Furthermore, the outline is basically the argument (with the sentences themselves and the words serving that argument).

A thousand-word essay requires a ten-sentence outline. However, the fundamental outline of an essay should not get much longer than fifteen sentences, even if the essay is several thousand words or more in length. This is because it is difficult to keep an argument of more than that length in mind at one time so that you can assess the quality of its structure. So, write a ten to fifteen sentence outline of your essay, and if it is longer than a thousand words, then make sub-outlines for each primary outline sentence. Here is an example of a good simple outline:

• Topic: Who was Abraham Lincoln?

• Why is Abraham Lincoln worthy of remembrance?

• What were the crucial events of his childhood?

• Of his adolescence?

• Of his young adulthood?

• How did he enter politics?

• What were his major challenges?

• What were the primary political and economic issues of his time?

• Who were his enemies?

• How did he deal with them?

• What were his major accomplishments?

• How did he die?

Here is an example of a good longer outline (for a three thousand word essay):

• Topic: What is capitalism?

• How has capitalism been defined?

o Author 1

o Author 2

o Author 3

• Where and when did capitalism develop?

o Country 1

o Country 2

• How did capitalism develop in the first 50 years after its origin?

o How did capitalism develop in the second 50 years after its origin?

o (Repeat as necessary)

• Historical precursors?

o (choose as many centuries as necessary)

• Advantages of capitalism?

o Wealth generation

o Technological advancement

o Personal freedom

• Disadvantages of capitalism?

o Unequal distribution

o Pollution and other externalized costs

• Alternatives to capitalism?

o Fascism

o Communism

• Consequences of these alternatives?

• Potential future developments?

• Conclusion

Beware of the tendency to write trite, repetitive and clichéd introductions and conclusions. It is often useful to write a stock intro (what is the purpose of this essay? How is it going to proceed?) and a stock conclusion (How did this essay proceed? What was its purpose?) but they should usually then be thrown away. Write your outline here. Try for one outline heading per 100 words of essay length. You can add subdivisions, as in the example regarding capitalism, above.

Write outline here:

1. Outline sentence 1:

2. Outline sentence 2:

3. Outline sentence 3:

4. Outline sentence 4:

5. Outline sentence 5:

6. Outline sentence 6:

7. Outline sentence 7:

8. Outline sentence 8:

9. Outline sentence 9:

10. Outline sentence 10 (repeat if necessary):

PART FIVE: PARAGRAPHS

So, now you have your outline. Copy it here:

OUTLINE COPIED HERE

Now, write ten to fifteen sentences per outline heading to complete your paragraph. You may find it helpful to add additional subdivisions to your outline, and to work back and forth between the outline and the sentences, editing both. Use your notes, as well. Use single spacing at this point, so that you can see more writing on the paper at once. You will format your essay properly later.

Don’t worry too much about how well you are writing at this point. It is also best at this point not to worry too much about the niceties of sentence structure and grammar. That is all best left for the second major step, which is editing. You should think of the essay writing process as twofold. The first major step is the first draft, which can be relatively quick and dirty. For the first draft you can use your notes, extensively, and rough out the essay. If you get stuck writing anywhere, just move to the next outline sentence. You can always go back.

The second major step is editing. Production (the first major step) and editing (the second) are different functions, and should be treated that way. This is because each interferes with the other. The purpose of production is to produce. The function of editing is to reduce and arrange. If you try to do both at the same time then the editing stymies the production. It’s not faster to combine them, nor is it better, and it is bound to be frustrating.

Here is an example of writing associated with an outline question: (note: places where references are necessary are indicate as (REFERENCE, 19XX). How to format these references will be discussed later.

Outline sentence: How has capitalism been defined?

Something as complex as capitalism cannot be easily defined. Different authors have each offered their opinion. Liberal or conservative thinkers stress the importance of private property and the ownership rights that accompany such property as key to capitalism (REFERENCE, 19XX). Such private property (including valuable goods and the means by which they are produced) can be traded, freely, with other property owners, in a market where the price is set by public demand, rather than by any central agency. Liberal and conservative thinkers stress efficiency of production, as well as quality, and consider profit the motive for efficiency. They believe that lower cost is a desirable feature of production, and that fair competition helps ensure desirably lower prices.

The World Socialist Movement (REFERENCE, 19XX), an international consortium of far left political parties, defines capitalism, by contrast, as ownership of the means of production by a small minority of people, the capitalist class, who profitably exploit the working class, the genuine producers, who must sell their ability to work for a salary or wage. Such socialists believe that it is profit that solely motivates capitalism, and that the profit motive is essentially corrupt. Modern environmentalists tend to add the natural world itself to the list of capitalist targets of exploitation (REFERENCE, 19XX). Thinkers on the right tend to regard problems emerging from the capitalist system as real, but trivial in comparison to those produced by other economic and political systems, real and hypothetical. Thinkers on the far left regard capitalism as the central cause of problems as serious as poverty, inequality and environmental degradation, and believe that there are other political and economic systems whose implementation would constitute an improvement.

It took two paragraphs to begin to address the first outline sentence. Notice that the essay begins without referring to itself. It is better to tell the reader what the essay will be about and how the topic will be addressed than to meander around stupidly at the beginning of an essay, but it is still better to grab the reader’s attention immediately without beating around the bush.

Once you have completed ten to fifteen sentences for each outline heading, you have finished your first draft. Now it is time to move to editing.

PART SIX: EDITING AND ARRANGING OF SENTENCES WITHIN PARAGRAPHS

Copy the first paragraph of your first draft here:

Paragraph 1:

Now, place each sentence on its own line, so it looks like this (this example is taken from the first paragraph on capitalism, above):

Something as complex as capitalism cannot be easily defined.

Different authors have each offered their opinion.

Liberal or conservative thinkers stress the importance of private property and the ownership rights that accompany such property as key to capitalism (REFERENCE, 19XX).

Such private property (including valuable goods and the means by which they are produced) can be traded, freely, with other property owners, in a market where the price is set by public demand, rather than by any central agency.

Liberal and conservative thinkers stress efficiency of production, as well as quality, and consider profit the motive for efficiency.

They believe that lower cost is a desirable feature of production, and that fair competition helps ensure desirably lower prices.

Now, write another version of each sentence, under each sentence, like this:

Liberal and conservative thinkers stress efficiency of production, as well as quality, and consider profit the motive for efficiency.

Liberal and conservative thinkers alike stress the importance of quality and efficiency, and see them as properly rewarded by profit.

In this example, the meaning of the sentence has been changed slightly, during the rewrite. It may be that the second sentence flows better than the first, and is also more precise and meaningful. See if you can make each sentence you have written better, in a similar manner:

• Better would mean shorter and simpler (as all unnecessary words should be eliminated). There is almost nothing a novice writer can do that will improve his or her writing more rapidly than writing very short sentences. See if you can cut the length of each sentence by 15-25%. Remember, earlier, you tried to make your essay longer than necessary. Here you can start cleaning it up.

• Better would mean that each word is precisely and exactly the right word. Don’t be tempted to use any word that you would be uncomfortable to use in spoken conversation.

Often, new writers try to impress their readers with their vocabulary. This often backfires when words are used that are technically correct but whose connotation is not, or that are unsuitable within the context of the sentence, paragraph or full essay. An expert writer will spot such flaws immediately, and see them for what they are: forms of camouflage and deception. Write clearly at a vocabulary level you have mastered (with maybe a bit of stretching, to produce improvement).

Read each sentence aloud, and listen to how it sounds. If it’s awkward, see if you can say it a different, better way. Listen to what you said, and then write it down. Rewrite each sentence. Once you have done this with all the sentences, read the old versions and the new versions, and replace the old with the new if the new is better. Then copy the new paragraph here:

New paragraph 1:

Repeat for each paragraph:

New paragraph 2:

New paragraph 3:

New paragraph 4:

New paragraph 5 (etc.):

Now you are going to try to improve each of those paragraphs. Copy them again here, unchanged (you are doing this so that you can easily compare the improved paragraphs to the originals, so that you can be sure they are truly improved, before you keep them):

New paragraph 1 (copy):

New paragraph 2 (copy):

New paragraph 3 (copy):

New paragraph 4 (copy):

New paragraph 5 (copy) (etc.):

Start with paragraph 1. Break it up into single sentences, as you did before. Now check to see if the sentences are in the best possible order, within each paragraph. Drag and drop them, or cut and paste them, into better order.

You can also eliminate sentences that are no longer necessary. When you are satisfied with the first paragraph (which means that the sentences are necessary, short and punchy, and in the correct order) then go ahead to the next paragraph and do the same thing.

PART SEVEN: RE-ORDERING THE PARAGRAPHS

Now, copy all of the new, improved paragraphs that you have edited here:

New improved paragraph 1:

New improved paragraph 2:

New improved paragraph 3:

New improved paragraph 4:

New improved paragraph 5 (etc.):

Now you are going to try to improve the order of those new, improved paragraphs. Copy them here, again, unchanged.

New improved paragraph 1 (copy):

New improved paragraph 2 (copy):

New improved paragraph 3 (copy):

New improved paragraph 4 (copy):

New improved paragraph 5 (copy) (etc.):

Now look at the order of the paragraphs themselves (as you just did with the sentences within each paragraph). It may well be that by now in the editing process, you will find that the order of the subtopics within your original outline is no longer precisely appropriate, and that some re-ordering of those sub-topics is called for. So, move around the new improved paragraph (copies) above, until they are ordered more appropriately than they were.

PART EIGHT: GENERATING A NEW OUTLINE

So now you should have produced a pretty decent second draft. You have identified the appropriate sources, written the proper notes, outlined your argument, roughed in a first draft (paragraph by paragraph), rewritten your sentences to make them more elegant, and re-ordered those sentences, as well as the paragraphs themselves. This is much farther than most writers ever get. You may even think you’re finished – but you’re not.

The next step will take you from a “B” essay to an “A” essay. It may even help you write something that is better than you have ever produced (better meaning richer in information, precise, coherent, elegant and beautiful). Copy what you have written so far here:

FULL RE-ORDERED ESSAY HERE

Read it. Then go to the next page.

This part of the process will probably strike you as unnecessary, or annoying, or both, but what do you know? This is the step that separates the men from the boys, or the women from the boys, or the men from the girls, or whatever version of this saying is acceptably non-sexist and politically correct.

You have just finished reading your essay. Try now to write a new outline of ten to fifteen sentences. Don’t look back at your essay while you are doing this. If you have to, go back and re-read the whole thing, and then return to this page, but don’t look at your essay while you are rewriting the outline. If you force yourself to reconstruct your argument from memory, you will likely improve it. Generally, when you remember something, you simplify it, while retaining most of what is important. Thus, your memory can serve as a filter, removing what is useless and preserving and organizing what is vital. What you are doing now is distilling what you have written to its essence.

Write new outline here:

1. New outline sentence 1:

2. New outline sentence 2:

3. New outline sentence 3:

4. New outline sentence 4:

5. New outline sentence 5:

6. New outline sentence 6:

7. New outline sentence 7:

8. New outline sentence 8:

9. New outline sentence 9:

10. New outline sentence 10 (repeat if necessary):

Now that you have a new outline, you can cut and paste material from your previous essay. To do this, open up a new Word document beside this one. Then cut and paste the new outline that you have written into the new Word document. Return to the original document, and scroll up to the full, re-ordered essay you copied and pasted into Part Eight, above.

Then cut and paste from the re-ordered essay into your new outline.

You may find that you don’t need everything you wrote before. Don’t be afraid to throw unnecessary material away. You are trying to get rid of what is substandard, and leave only what is necessary.

Once you have finished cutting and pasting your old material into the new outline, then copy the new essay, and paste it into a new word document. That will be your final essay. Don’t forget to put a title page on it.

PASTE NEWLY OUTLINED ESSAY HERE:

PART NINE: REPEAT

Now you have a third draft, and it’s probably pretty good. If you really want to take it to the next level, then you can repeat the process of sentence rewriting and re-ordering, as well as paragraph re-ordering and re-outlining. Often it is a good idea to wait a few days to do this, so that you can look at what you have produced with fresh eyes. Then you will be able to see what you have written, instead of seeing what you think you wrote (which is the case when you try to edit immediately after producing).

You are not genuinely finished until you cannot edit so that your essay improves. Generally, you can tell if this has happened when you try to rewrite a sentence (or a paragraph) and you are not sure that the new version is an improvement over the original.

PART TEN: REFERENCES AND BIBLIOGRAPHY

When you write a sentence that contains what is supposed to be a fact or at least an informed opinion, and you have picked it up from something you read, then you have to refer to that source. Otherwise, following convention, people may accuse you of plagiarism, which is a form of theft (of intellectual property). There are a large number of conventions that you can follow to properly structure your references and your bibliography (which is a list of books and articles that you have read to obtain relevant background information, but from which you may not have drawn any ideas specific enough to require a reference).

The conventions of the American Psychological Association (APA) are commonly used by essay writers. This convention generally requires the use of the last names of the authors of the source in parentheses after the sentence requiring a reference. For example:

It is necessary to add a reference after a sentence containing an opinion which is not your own, or a fact that you have acquired from some source material (Peterson, 2014).

This sentence could also be constructed like this:

Peterson (2014) claims that it is necessary to add a reference after a sentence containing an opinion which is not your own, or a fact that you have acquired from some source material.

There are also many conventions covering the use of a direct quote, which have to be followed when you directly quote someone, rather than paraphrasing them. Here is an example, adding the specific (fictional) number of the page containing the quoted material in the original manuscript:

Peterson (2014, p. 19) claims that “the conventions of the American Psychological Association (APA) are commonly used by essay writers.”

In the Reference List, at the end of the essay, Peterson’s paper might be listed, as follows (this is a fictional reference):

Peterson, J.B. (2014). Essay writing for writers. Journal of Essay Writing, 01, 15-24.

Different conventions hold for different types of source material such as webpages, books, and articles. All the details regarding APA style can be found at http://www.apastyle.org/

Your instructor may have recommended, or demanded, use of a different set of conventions. Information about other techniques and rules can be found at http://www.easybib.com/reference/guide/mla/general.

It is necessary to master at least one convention. The rules are finicky and annoying. However, they are necessary, so that readers know what writers are up to. Furthermore, you only have to learn them once, so bite the bullet and do it.

Copy your essay here again.

Add references where they are necessary. Then, add your reference list to the end of your essay. Make sure you construct both according to APA convention, or some other set of rules.

YOUR COMPLETED ESSAY

Now your essay is completed. Now you need to copy it into a new Word document, and format it properly.

That generally means double-spaced, with a title page, with a five space tab indent at the beginning of each paragraph. If you want to add subtitles, or section headers, their use is discussed in detail at https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/01/ . Additional useful information for style, including examples, can be found at http://bit.ly/ZC5eFV . A video discussing such matters is available at http://bit.ly/ZpX1nR .

If you got this far, good work. If you write a number of essays using this process, you will find that your thinking will become richer and clearer, and so will your conversation. There is nothing more vital to becoming educated, and there is nothing more vital than education to your future, and the future of those around you

Good luck with your newly organized and refreshed mind. (Jordan B Peterson)

118. Kami: the spirit in everything

23 June 2022 19:50

The Japanese tradition of Shintoism links back to the very early days of the island nation. Shinto emphasizes the notion of animism: all things have a spirit. Kami is the Japanese name given to these spirits. There is kami for rocks, trees, rivers and mountains.

119. Marcus Aurelius

27 June 2022 13:56

“Dwell on the beauty of life. Watch the stars, and see yourself running with them.”

“Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.”

“If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.”

“Accept the things to which fate binds you, and love the people with whom fate brings you together,but do so with all your heart.”

“When you wake up in the morning, tell yourself: the people I deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous and surly. They are like this because they can't tell good from evil. But I have seen the beauty of good, and the ugliness of evil, and have recognized that the wrongdoer has a nature related to my own - not of the same blood and birth, but the same mind, and possessing a share of the divine. And so none of them can hurt me. No one can implicate me in ugliness. Nor can I feel angry at my relative, or hate him. We were born to work together like feet, hands and eyes, like the two rows of teeth, upper and lower. To obstruct each other is unnatural. To feel anger at someone, to turn your back on him: these are unnatural.”

120. The Path to Mastery and to Engagement is Highly Individualized

04 July 2022 08:47

The path to mastery and to engagement is highly individualized—this is a truism that much of our educational system ignores. Those who succeed at the elite levels of any discipline have built relationships to learning around subtle introspective sensitivity. They understand how their minds work, and both cultivate strengths and take on weaknesses through their unique natural voice. They have learned to open communication between their conscious and unconscious minds, and construct repertoires around moments of creative inspiration. They have built triggers for their peak performance state, learned how to funnel emotion into deep focus, turned adversity to their advantage as a way of life—and they have done all of this in a manner and language that feels natural to them. That is how they seem so unobstructed, so fluid…they are just being themselves. Like children.

1. Do what you love.
This seems pretty obvious, but it’s incredible how few of us actually do it. Life is too short to bog ourselves down in a life that doesn’t inspire us. I believe that children, from a very young age, should be encouraged to pursue what they are passionate about. Most kids are drawn to something early—maybe it will be math, music, a sport, painting, dance, reading, chess, whatever. Once you see that spark of inspiration in your child’s eyes, encourage her to dive in. If we dig deeply into something, anything, at a young age, and we touch Quality, then that scent of Quality will be a beacon for us for the rest of our lives. We will know what it feels like. And we will know what it is like to love learning. Then, as adults, we should build our lives around what inspires us. It is common to box ourselves into a lucrative career that we hate, with the belief that the money will make us happy. Of course it will not. I have found that if we do what we love, and we do it passionately, the external will follow naturally.

2. Do it in a way you love and connect to.
It is astonishing how this principle is ignored. All of us have different minds, and so our road to mastery will be unique. The art in the learning process emerges when we begin to tap into the unique nuance of our minds—when the walls are broken down between the conscious and unconscious minds, when creative inspiration directs our technical growth. There are some very simple questions we can ask ourselves to get moving in this direction. For example, am I primarily an auditory, visual, or kinesthetic learner? What about secondarily? I, for one, am a visual and kinesthetic processor. If I see ten phone numbers I can remember them, but if I hear one, it will be a challenge. Imagine if you have a teacher who is an auditory processor, speaking in his or her language to your child who has a visual mind. The disconnect will be huge. And your child might be incorrectly diagnosed with a learning disability.

But this is just one question. Are we charismatic, creative, aggressive, conservative, organized? Do we thrive in stormy conditions or when things are under control? Introspective sensitivity should be at the core of our learning process, so we can build games and loves around our strengths, and so we can address our weaknesses in a language that makes sense to us. This issue is very personal to me, as it precipitated the crisis that ended my chess career. I lost a life’s work because I did not listen to my gut, and it took me many years and a new discipline to return to my roots. We must be true to ourselves to thrive.

3. Give people a Choice and they become engaged.
My mom told me a beautiful story a few nights ago. She learned to play chess from me and for the past fifteen years has run chess programs in schools in New York City and New Jersey. She’s the greatest teacher and mother I could ever dream of. In one of her kindergarten classes there is a little boy named Evan who drives all his teachers crazy. No matter what they are doing, he always wants to read a book. His school life has become defined by teachers taking books out of his hands, telling him to sit down and listen with the rest of the kids. This is unfortunately a typical response to an unusual mind.

So in my mom’s first few chess classes with Evan, she would be teaching a lesson on a demonstration board, or everyone would be playing chess games, and Evan would walk to the bookshelf, pick up a book, sit down and start reading. My mom’s solution: she smiled and gave Evan a chess book that covered similar material to what she was teaching. He immediately put down his other book, opened his eyes wide and started reading the chess book. The wonderful thing about the story is that after a few classes in which my mom embraced his mind and gave him a chess book to read, Evan started putting down the chess book and listening to her lessons. Then he started playing chess with the other kids instead of isolating himself. The next somewhat surprising step is that some other kids started asking for chess books too. The visual learners started to creep out of the woodwork, and the whole class now thrives because a teacher was willing to listen to them.

4. Release a fear of failure.
This is a big issue. The constant testing in our schools, and the bottom-line language of our culture has kids terrified of failing. We’ve all heard the “I wasn’t trying” excuse. That is protecting the ego. And disengaging from any one thing by skipping along the surface of everything is another version of not trying. Many kids, by the way, have told me their attraction to video games is an escape from the pressures of the real world. They are safe from failing in that virtual reality. If we can relieve the fear of failure, then engagement will become a less terrifying experience.

Fortunately, this is not so difficult. Parents and teachers simply need to transition from result-oriented to process-oriented feedback. Tell a child you are proud of the work done instead of praising the result. Help them internalize what developmental psychologists call an incremental theory of intelligence—a perspective that associates the road to mastery with effort and overcoming adversity. The alternative, a fixed or entity theory associates success with an ingrained level of ability in a particular trait—thus the language “I’m smart at math.” This is a much more brittle approach because it does not embrace imperfection. Most valuable lessons come from learning from our errors, and if we associate messing up with being “dumb” then we can become paralyzed by a fear of failure. Think about it this way—if a well-intentioned parent tells a child that she is a winner, and that child associates success with being a winner, what happens when she inevitably loses? The winner becomes a loser. The developmental psychologist Carol Dweck has done very important research and writing in this field, and I have explored the dynamic in the context of my life in The Art of Learning.

5. Build positive routines.
Cultivating new habits is the best way to get rid of bad ones. This is a simple truth with infinite application. We are creatures of habit, and so we should build positive routines into our lives. Exercise, honesty, process-oriented language, introspection, meditation, reading—anything we believe will help our growth can be put into a routine that will help us thrive. So if you are trying to get your child to stop playing video games, then I would suggest replacing the activity with something else that he or she loves to do but that is healthy—for example go outside and have a catch, read a book together, or go to a dance class during video game hours. Do this for 5 or 6 days in a row and the craving for reading or exercise will replace the craving for Nintendo.

Routines can also be built to help us enter states of deep concentration or connectedness. In my chess and martial arts careers, a moment without presence can have devastating effect, and building routines that I condense into triggers for the zone has been an integral part of my process.

6. Do one thing at a time.
If we are tackling multi-tasking, we can replace the habit of doing 6 things at once with the routine of doing one thing at a time. Leo has written powerfully about the effectiveness of focusing on less, and I couldn’t agree more. Skipping along the surface will get us nowhere, and if we cultivate the muscle of digging deep, then it will grow. Not only will single-tasking increase effectiveness, but it will also open up our creativity in the learning process. We’ll start making connections we never dreamed of, because we’ll be touching the principles that operate everywhere.

Let’s take the martial arts as an example—most people want to start off by learning ten or fifteen fancy techniques that they’ve seen in movies or watched the advanced students apply. This will lead to years of wasted time and hollow learning. The more powerful approach is to spend days, weeks, even months on one relatively simple technique. What happens then is quite beautiful. You start to get a sense for what it feels like to do something well with your body. Your mechanics become unobstructed, you experience a smooth fluidity, you focus on subtle ripples of sensation. Once you reach this point of full body flow, you can turn your attention to other techniques and you will very quickly internalize them at a high level, because you know what Quality feels like—or in less abstract language, you have internalized axioms that govern all techniques. This same process applies to chess. Learn a principle deeply, and it will manifest everywhere. Whatever we are cultivating, depth beats breadth any day of the week.

7. Take Breaks.
This is a terribly underappreciated tool, especially in the work place. When I begin to train a company, without exception I see too much linearity in the workday and creative process. People start the day buzzing with energy, but then after a few hours they are tired and perform at a much lower level. That’s when the hunt for coffee begins, there is a brief buzz, and the inevitable crash looms just around the corner.

There is no way we can focus intensely on something for many hours in a row without burning out. The human mind thrives in an oscillatory rhythm. We need to pulse between stress and recovery in order to think creatively over long periods of time. I learned this lesson in my chess career, trying to concentrate feverishly in world-class tournaments 8 hours a day for two weeks straight. After starting to train with the performance psychologists at the Human Performance Institute, I noticed that after an intense 13 minutes of thinking in a chess game, the quality of my process deteriorated slightly. So I started taking little breaks between chess moves or whenever my energy flagged—if extremely tired, I’d wash my face with cold water or even go outside and sprint 50 yards, which would flush my physiology and leave me energized. My endurance and creativity soared. A nap is a beautiful thing to fill up the tank. So is a quick 30 minute workout. A great way to improve mental recovery is with physical interval training. Have you or your child’s physical exercise follow the rhythm of stress and recovery, and your ability to take breaks and recover from mental strain will also improve dramatically.

A big obstacle in this battle against disengagement is guilt. We have so much to do and so little time, taking a break seems absurd—the same could be argued for doing what we love in a way we connect to, releasing perfectionism, giving ourselves some freedom to choose our way, building positive routines, and doing one thing at a time. Release the guilt! Four or six hours of high quality, inspired immersion will be infinitely more effective and satisfying than eight or ten hours of grinding your way through the day and getting locked into a mechanized, inside-the-box mode that ignores your true potential. For child and adult, learning or working should not be a forced march, and in order to engage deeply and creatively, we need to be as organic as possible by listening to our internal rhythms. (Josh Waitzkin)

121. Mental Models

06 July 2022 11:48

122. Seek The Sacred

02 August 2022 09:03

The stoics have serious advice to offer: Life can become terrible at any moment, you should equip yourself to be prepared for difficult situations. Almost everyone could use more personal responsibility and personal strength. And nobody disagrees that a certain level of emotional continence is desirable. But stoicism is not a sufficient philosophy for a good life, only a survivable one. We must remember what that responsibility, strength, and character are ultimately for.

I think our relation to the world should be quite different than what the stoics suggest. I cannot accurately condense it, it would be a mistake to try, but I can gesture towards it: Your emotions, your moods, and the moods of the world are the sacred underwriting of your life. Instead of developing nerves of steel, we will flourish more when we learn to lure back our sense of wonder in the world, our environments, and each other. But this means we must afford those things their own respect: enough to admit they are bad when they are bad, and to honor what we find beautiful. We must refuse to desecrate our world out of convenience or carelessness, and we must build better environments for each other.

We should concern ourselves less with individuality, which in modern times takes on cultish proportions, and in aggregate leads to boring, nihilistic living. Instead to live well we must learn to create things outside ourselves, through ritual and poesy.

This is not a simple philosophy to prescribe. It does not have the advantage of being straightforward, there is no umbrella of specifics or rules. But it is the opposite of stoicism: A philosophy of noticing the world and remaining open to it. It is the acknowledgement that ultimate goals lie beyond ourselves, in society and family, and in the worlds we choose to create and pass on. It is in this participation with the things beyond ourselves that we might learn to inhabit communities again. As we succeed in cultivating our environment, through this we will come to cultivate ourselves. (Simon Sarris)

123. Without The Truth, There is only The Chase.

13 September 2022 09:17

Is It True

Man’s longing

For pleasantries

Makes him blind

To Truth.

A space can only be filled

With one thing

Or another.

If it is filled with X,

There is no room for Y.

So many concepts.

So many principles.

So many tenets.

So many claims . . .

A fool nods his head.

An idiot says,

‘That sounds wonderful.’

A Wise Man asks,

‘Though it may sound nice

Though it may sound silly,

The question is,

Is It True.’

Eat more fruits and vegetables

And you will feel better

And live longer.

Sounds nice.

Is it True?

If you eat fat,

You will become fat.

Sounds reasonable.

Is it True?

Be kind

And others will be kind to you.

Sounds nice.

Is it True?

Work hard

And you will succeed.

Sounds logical.

Is it True?

Two heads

Are better than one.

Makes sense.

Is it True?

Better technique

Creates better results.

So work on technique.

Sounds reasonable.

Is it True?

Meditation

Is the way to enlightenment.

Sounds possible.

Is it True?

Exercise

And you will live longer.

Sounds logical.

Is it True?

There is a guru on the internet

Who claims that if you turn your hand upside down

Your heart rate will change.

Sounds interesting.

It takes but a few seconds to verify it.

You may do so now.

Was he correct?

Is it True?

A university degree

Provides a high-paying job.

It could be.

Is it True?

An MBA

Is necessary or even useful for a career in business.

Sounds logical.

Is it True?

Is one Required

To pursue what is True?

Is one Required

To abandon that which sounds sweet

But is hollow fluff?

Certainly not.

I Recommend Truth

To no one.

Man

Is a hopelessly conditioned creature.

He is not awake enough

To ask what is True.

And not driven enough

To pursue it.

He is resigned to a life

Of sweet lies

And brightly-colored pills.

He lays asleep

In a bed of thorns,

Listening to those

Who have convinced him they are roses.

(Kapil Gupta)

124. The Successful Man’s Path To Lasting Satisfaction

13 September 2022 09:22

If one examines with a sharp scalpel the foundations of his desires, he discovers that they rest upon foundation of hope.

If one examines this hope with incisive detail, he discovers that it rests upon a need.

If one examines this need with the utmost clarity, he discovers that it rests upon a bed of pleasure.

Man does not truly seek Success.

For there is no independent entity known as “success.”

He seeks the trimmings of success.

He seeks the fragrance of success.

He seeks the implications of success.

He seeks the lidocaine-like effects of success, that numb the pains of his insecurities.

He seeks the feeling of importance from being accepted into the successful circles.

To seek such things is neither right or wrong.

Their only liability lies in their inability to bring Lasting Satisfaction.

The unsuccessful man seeks success.

The successful man seeks Lasting Satisfaction.

And having once attained it, it is only he who is in the position to discover that it is not success, but Satisfaction that he has been seeking all along.

Not having found lasting satisfaction, he turns to temporary pleasures. Hoping that, through volume and in their aggregate, he can patch together a semblance of satisfaction.

Not having found lasting satisfaction, he resorts to the surrogate of self-adornment.

He adorns his intellect by filling it with information from books. Information from science, philosophy, psychology, and finance. Information that he can carry with him in an invisible briefcase to social settings, and sprinkle his newfound knowledge upon his peers. This might cause them to think of him as highly intelligent. And their opinions about him give birth to pleasure within him. But having once started, he cannot stop. He must remain fully abreast of the latest trends and the breaking information lest he lose his coveted place in the social hierarchy.

He adorns his interiority through spiritual austerities.

He adorns his body through physical exercise and body-building.

He adorns his look, his image, and the face he shows to the world.

For these are his currency to purchase the feelings of pleasure that arise when others view him in the way that he has carefully orchestrated.

The Sincere man needs no convincing that such things have not brought him lasting satisfaction.

And while a continuation of them would not be wise, neither would it be wise to seek their alternative.

For this would also be a pleasure chase, only in a different direction.

Chasing pleasures does not bring satisfaction, as your own experiences have taught you.

But following prescriptions toward satisfaction do not bring satisfaction either.

To a great extent, the Non-Way is the Way.

When all roads become blocked, the one that remains is The Truth.

When all chases have been abandoned, it is only the inevitable that remains.

Any and all attempts to discipline oneself eventually fail.

Willpower has no power in the search for Truth.

And prescriptions are the road to the sort of hell from which few men return.

If the prize is hidden in one out of the ten boxes. And you are told which nine are empty, the prize will soon be yours.

Do not force yourself to stop your chases. For if you do, your chase will simply move underground.

Continue to read your books.

Carry on with your self-adornments.

Keep the information flowing into you.

Allow yourself free reign to bless others with your great intelligence.

If you think my words to be motivated by sarcasm you would be mistaken.

For it is critical to understand that any attempt to force the mind against its habitual patterns is to incite it.

And this is a war that no human has ever won.

What will transform you will not be a prescription, but a Space.

A space between the action, and the motivation behind this action.

As you come face to face with the realization that the actions which you pursue do not bring you that which you seek, the motivation that compels it will begin to die.

While the space between this motivation and its corresponding action will begin to grow.

This space will become your new home.

And without the slightest effort,

It will become the bosom of satisfaction you have been seeking all along.

Namaste.

(Kapil Gupta)

125. What Is It Really Like To Awaken From Slumber?

13 September 2022 09:24

In the classic film, Wall Street, Charlie Sheen says, “I never knew how poor I was until I started to make some real money.”

Please don’t worry. I won’t try to awaken you from your slumber. Scout’s honor.

You can remain asleep as you read this discourse. Please . . . turn to the other side, pull up the covers, and find a comfortable neck position on your pillow.

For it’s not really YOU that I’m speaking to. I’m speaking to something deep inside of you. And this something will hear me whether you are facing me or your back is turned. It will feel my words whether you are listening or you are fast asleep.

I’m going to now make a few statements and they are not meant to encourage or mobilize you. Please relax. I’m simply stating points of fact. They will serve as a springboard for the remainder of this discussion.

Please relax. No need to do anything. Not even listen. As I said, it’s not you I’m speaking to.

Since the moment you woke this morning, life has sped by you like a bullet train.

You didn’t notice it. You didn’t hear it. Because your back was turned when it passed you.

While you were reading about ways to become “happy” it was passing you to your left.

While you were trying to tie the loose ends which keep coming untied . . . darn those loose ends. They just don’t stay tied do they. Life was passing you to your right.

And while you were busy reciting scripture, chanting slokas, and meditating, it passed right before your closed eyes.

No, no, no . . . please relax. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t have done those things. I’m not telling you to keep your eyes open. Frankly, even if you did, life would pass behind your back.

Please relax. You’ve done nothing wrong. Turn around and go back to sleep.

Remember, it’s not you I’m speaking to.

The events of your life are ridiculously powerful. The stream of interpersonal episodes of drama are sitting two inches from your nose, begging to be “fixed.”

Tomorrow is a constant source of anxiety.

Acquiring even more success than you already have is a whirring motor which hums in your ear.

There are so many Ongoing and Unresolved issues.

And it stands to reason why they make you act. It is completely logical that you want to satisfy the urges, fix the problems, and mend the conflicts. Totally logical.

But when logic gives way to understanding, a man begins to truly see.

This is where I must be careful not to give you a fact that requires you to believe me. The last thing I want you to do is to subscribe to belief.

Let’s see, how shall I say it . . .

You see, all of these problems, aspirations, conflicts, and issues that you have are like a school of fish. They surround each of us. And when you try to fix one part of the school of fish, the school immediately shifts. And when you try to mend a different part, the school of fish shifts again.

Now, the man who is given to logic and brute determination will keep trying to fix different parts of the school of fish, convinced that One Day he will catch hold of it.

The man of understanding will allow himself to at least entertain the possibility that the school of fish is not fixable. That it is an exercise in complete futility, no matter how much in his grasp it seems to be.

You see, my friend, it is extraordinarily enticing to believe that these schools of fish are your life. But, in actuality, they are not. They are just schools of fish.

And for as long as they catch your eye, life will pass behind you.

Life is not the school of fish.

Life is everything but the school of fish.

Life is the water in which they swim. Life is the single ray of sunlight that penetrates the ocean.

Life is what existed before you decided to create the school of fish.

And life is what passes you by as you remain mesmerized by your own creation.

Life is what passes you by as you sleep through each and every moment of your day.

I will not ask what it “means” to be awake. For meaning has no meaning.

Rather, I will ask you what it is Like to be awake.

You will say that you don’t know. And I will accept your honest reply.

But when you are tired of running after the school of fish. And they don’t hold as much promise for you as they once did, you will begin to ask what life is.

But beware! For at this juncture is where man falls off the “razors edge.”

For he often begins to ask not what life IS, but what the Purpose and the Meaning of life is.

Oh no . . . the poor man has just traded one school of fish for another.

Listen, dear friend, when your mind can’t explain it, you’re on the right track.

If words become inadequate, you’re on the right track.

When you awaken, awaken not to a surrogate or a middle man . . .

Awaken not to a theory or a promise . . .

Awaken not to an aphorism or a sloka . . .

Awaken to Life Itself.

Where will you find it?

You will find it anywhere where there are no schools of fish.

(Kapil Gupta)

126. Your Morning Hours

13 September 2022 09:25

Many like to discuss morning “routines.”

But morning routines are more a chronology of specific events, than a true absorption of any kind.

Some exercise then eat breakfast.

Some “meditate” and go for a walk.

Some eat breakfast, then go for a walk.

Some read the newspaper, then go straight to work.

I don’t see the significance of discussing what one does, much less the order in which one does them.

I do have an idea as to why people like to discuss these things. Because societal man is a Categorizer. He likes to put people into boxes with printed labels.

Most of all HIMSELF.

You see, if “meditation” is a part of your morning routine, you are looked upon as forward-thinking, spiritual, and new age.

If you lift heavy weights, then you are a iron-pumping, physically fit, athletic sort of individual.

Man is not interested in anyone per se. He is only interested in the Category that you belong to. And in filing you under a category, he can begin to make inferences about you.

But let us forget about morning “routines” and discuss something that cuts deep to your core as a human being, shall we?

What if the question changed from, “What things do you do in the morning?” to “What sort of Experiences do you have, regardless of what you are doing?”

From soaping your body to brushing your teeth to washing your face to the configuration of your hand as you grab door handles . . .

From the one swift pull of the belt strap to your sense of balance as you put on your socks . . .

Do you experience it?

Have you noticed that if you raise one foot to cover it with a sock, the moment you have a single thought you lose balance? And if you have no thought at all, you could stand on that one leg forever?

When you put on the shampoo, do you knead it deep into the pores of your scalp? Or do you spread it amongst the superficial hair fibers?

When you brush your teeth, have you ever tried using your non-dominant hand?

When you first awake, do you sit on the edge of your bed and look at the world through the window? Or do you jump out of bed and head straight for the necessities?

And if you do sit on the edge of your bed and look at the world through the window, is there anything that you try to notice? Is there anything that you wonder? Or does the mind’s rambling grab you immediately as you open your eyes?

When you sit down to meditate, do you intentionally sit in a pose that befits a “meditator?” And when you are involved in this meditation, what exactly are you doing? And before you give me the reflexive response of “nothing,” please have a little more respect for the question.

Do you recognize that the bottom of your feet are flat? When you walk, the flatness of your feet so beautifully allow you to traverse the hardwood. Can you imagine if they were slight concave?

When you do walk on the hardwood, do you slightly stomp the heel? Or do you roll from forefoot to heel?

Have you noticed how heavy your car keys are? And how light your toothbrush is?

When you kiss your family goodbye, what are you thinking when you kiss them? Is it a kiss that strikes flush? Or does it just miss?

When you hug your family members one by one, is it a tapping sort of hug? Or is it the sort of hug you’d give them if this was the first time you’d seen them in 26 years?

You see, man has become accustomed to the idea that these are all Preliminaries. That these are chores that preface the big show.

But I think that you will readily admit that the place that you go to every day isn’t really a meaningful show at all. And it certainly isn’t “big.”

These things are not preliminaries.

This, my friend, is the Whole Of Your Life.

We prepare at home to go to “work.” And we prepare at work to go “home.”

And, as a result, we Live neither.

And if you think I’m speaking of “mindfulness,” you will not only miss the experience, but you will superimpose upon it a heavy does of frustration.

Life awaits us all.

But we are mesmerized by its silhouette.

My dear friend . . .

May you never miss another morning again.

(Kapil Gupta)

127. The Journey To Wisdom

13 September 2022 09:25

Dear Friend:

I will begin by stating that I have nothing to teach you. I have no lesson to give. Or message to impart.

I have divorced myself from any hope that you will enjoy what I have to say.

I wish only to speak to you as a sincere human being. For as life goes on, it becomes increasingly clear to me that Sincerity is really all we have. For everything that we think we have, we lose one by one.

There was a time in which I thought that I knew.

I did not.

There was a time in which I thought I was wise.

I was ignorant.

For much of my life, I was mesmerized by achievement. But I found it to be hollow in the end.

For so many years I listened to what my mind told me. Until I began to learn that it was speaking only to itself.

We teach our children. But the truth is, we teach from a place of ego rather than wisdom.

We look at life through the lens of conquest. But the truth is, there has never really been anything to conquer.

We have become addicted to creating obstacles for ourselves so that we may have an excuse to conquer.

We have become addicted to telling ourselves false tales so that we may live a romanticized existence.

But if we are sincere, we learn that we don’t know what we think we know. And as we continue to collide with life, our armor of knowledge begins to crumble. And we are left with an ocean of ignorance.

We one day see that we must begin to learn. For the methodologies we have used, and the precepts that guided our lives simply did not work. And this is evidenced by our torn relationships and our years of turmoil.

The truth is that we begin to see only once we are willing to let go of ourselves. We begin to experience life only once we are willing to look beyond ourselves. And we begin to fill the hearts of others once we submit wholly to their desires, completely forgetting ours in the process for a period of time.

It is so seductive to believe that we are RIGHT, is it not? The ego is so convincing that we see a storm cloud, yet we notice only the speck of sunshine that attempts to peak through it.

We eventually come to a point in our life in which we sit deep in our chair and say, “I just don’t know, anymore. I have no answers. I don’t know what is the right thing to do. I now distrust my judgment so much that I’m afraid to even make a suggestion.”

And perhaps this is the ONLY place from which we can truly function.

Perhaps it is this Vulnerable Sincerity that is our greatest guide.

Why?

Because we begin to function from a place of Not Knowing. From a place of Exploration. From a place of Non-Ego.

Our words begin to carry the weight of Truth. And perhaps they penetrate the heart of those we speak to.

You see, it really isn’t about “reaching” anyone. It’s about using their company to help you find yourself. And this is perhaps the greatest way to affect the life of another.

Truth be told, I don’t believe any message. I do not comply with any instruction. I do not submit to any methodology. I do not surrender to any doctrine.

For such things are lifeless.

The only thing that I have to offer is my living, breathing self. And my meandering and awkward search for Truth at the expense of all else. And perhaps as you watch me search, you will realize that I have no answers to give.

Perhaps you will understand that my fingers do not point the way, but claw through the shifting sands. In search of something that I lost long ago. Somewhere between the wild and carefree days of my youth and the serious and “intelligent” days of my adulthood.

If my life is transforming it is perhaps because I know Less than I have ever before known.

If I look into the eyes of my children it is perhaps because I try to look into their heart rather than show them my brain.

If I feel the weight of the moment it is not because of silly prescriptions such as “mindfulness” but because I’ve realized that there really is nowhere else I would rather live.

The journey to wisdom is perhaps a journey toward systematically dismantling all of your so-called knowledge and reducing the whole of life into one single human interaction.

And in that interaction, ridding yourself of the YOU that you have come to know.

Perhaps this is the way to Freedom.

And perhaps this is where life has been trying to lead us all along.

(Kapil Gupta)

128. The Price Of Interest

03 October 2022 07:54

If a family member is sick,

The remaining family members

Take notice.

The sicker the person,

The more they take notice.

If on the verge of death,

Other things fall by the wayside.

When sickness or death

Does not obviously loom,

There are only

The Other Things.

When sickness or death

Does not obviously loom,

There is room

And time

For conflict.

This must be done.

That must be done.

Late for this.

Forgot that.

The child

Has little interest

In a healthy parent.

Friends,

Phones,

The bells and whistles of the world

Are a consuming attraction.

There is not enough time,

Not enough bells and whistles,

Not enough lights and colors

To satisfy.

The price of Interest

Is sickness

Or death.

This is the threshold

That must be met,

To pull a human

From his Other Things.

In the moments

Of sickness or impending death,

The relationship takes on

A different complexion.

Softness,

Kindness,

Agreeability,

Mercy . . .

When sickness or death

Does not obviously loom,

Such things

Are far-off luxuries.

Because they are not required.

If it is not required,

A human will not do it.

Essentially,

Human lives

Are a frenzy of distraction.

With occasional breaks

For things that are sufficiently worthy

To temporarily suspend the addiction

To bells and whistles.

Things spoken clearly

Are too harsh for the human ear,

And too troublesome for the human mind.

“I am hopelessly attracted

By the things of the world.

I have nothing to say to you.

But if you become gravely sick,

Or are on the verge of death . . .

Let me know.

Apologies,

But this is the price

Of my interest.”

This is the power

Of the World.

This is the power

Of its bells and whistles.

Nothing . . .

Survives its torrent.

Relationships,

Are a dime-a-dozen . . .

Truth,

Freedom,

Realization

Are a comical spiritual fairy tale . . .

Collateral damage . . .

Of an addiction

To the world.

Namaste.

(Kapil Gupta)

129. Naval Ravikant: How To Get Rich (without getting lucky)

07 October 2022 11:25

1. Seek wealth, not money or status. Wealth is having assets that earn while you sleep. Money is how we transfer time and wealth. Status is your place in the social hierarchy.
2. Understand that ethical wealth creation is possible. If you secretly despise wealth, it will elude you.
3. Ignore people playing status games. They gain status by attacking people playing wealth creation games.
4. You’re not going to get rich renting out your time. You must own equity — a piece of a business — to gain your financial freedom.
5. You will get rich by giving society what it wants but does not yet know how to get. At scale.
6. Pick an industry where you can play long term games with long term people.
7. The Internet has massively broadened the possible space of careers. Most people haven’t figured this out yet.
8. Play iterated games. All the returns in life, whether in wealth, relationships, or knowledge, come from compound interest.
9. Pick business partners with high intelligence, energy, and, above all, integrity.
10. Don’t partner with cynics and pessimists. Their beliefs are self-fulfilling.
11. Learn to sell. Learn to build. If you can do both, you will be unstoppable.
12. Arm yourself with specific knowledge, accountability, and leverage.
13. Specific knowledge is knowledge that you cannot be trained for. If society can train you, it can train someone else, and replace you.
14. Specific knowledge is found by pursuing your genuine curiosity and passion rather than whatever is hot right now.
15. Building specific knowledge will feel like play to you but will look like work to others.
16. When specific knowledge is taught, it’s through apprenticeships, not schools.
17. Specific knowledge is often highly technical or creative. It cannot be outsourced or automated.
18. Embrace accountability, and take business risks under your own name. Society will reward you with responsibility, equity, and leverage.
19. The most accountable people have singular, public, and risky brands: Oprah, Trump, Kanye, Elon.
20. “Give me a lever long enough, and a place to stand, and I will move the earth.” — Archimedes
21. Fortunes require leverage. Business leverage comes from capital, people, and products with no marginal cost of replication (code and media).
22. Capital means money. To raise money, apply your specific knowledge, with accountability, and show resulting good judgement.
23. Labor means people working for you. It’s the oldest and most fought-over form of leverage. Labor leverage will impress your parents, but don’t waste your life chasing it.
24. Capital and labor are permissioned leverage. Everyone is chasing capital, but someone has to give it to you. Everyone is trying to lead, but someone has to follow you.
25. Code and media are permissionless leverage. They’re the leverage behind the newly rich. You can create software and media that works for you while you sleep.
26. An army of robots is freely available — it’s just packed in data centers for heat and space efficiency. Use it.
27. If you can’t code, write books and blogs, record videos and podcasts.
28. Leverage is a force multiplier for your judgement.
29. Judgement requires experience, but can be built faster by learning foundational skills.
30. There is no skill called “business.” Avoid business magazines and business classes.
31. Study microeconomics, game theory, psychology, persuasion, ethics, mathematics, and computers.
32. Reading is faster than listening. Doing is faster than watching.
33. You should be too busy to “do coffee,” while still keeping an uncluttered calendar.
34. Set and enforce an aspirational personal hourly rate. If fixing a problem will save less than your hourly rate, ignore it. If outsourcing a task will cost less than your hourly rate, outsource it.
35. Work as hard as you can. Even though who you work with and what you work on are more important than how hard you work.
36. Become the best in the world at what you do. Keep redefining what you do until this is true.
37. There are no get rich quick schemes. That’s just someone else getting rich off you.
38. Apply specific knowledge, with leverage, and eventually you will get what you deserve.
39. When you’re finally wealthy, you’ll realize that it wasn’t what you were seeking in the first place. But that’s for another day.

130. Protein Leverage Hypothesis

14 November 2022 16:01

The protein leverage hypothesis states that human beings will prioritize the consumption of protein in food over other dietary components, and will eat until protein needs have been met, regardless of energy content, thus leading to over-consumption of foodstuffs when their protein content is low.

131. Satiety Index

14 November 2022 16:05

The list with the most filling food at the top:

Potatoes, boiled 323%

Ling fish 225%

Porridge/Oatmeal 209%

Oranges 202%

Apples 197%

Brown pasta 188%

Beef 176%

Baked beans 168%

Grapes 162%

Whole meal bread 157%

Grain bread 154%

Popcorn 154%

Eggs 150%

Cheese 146%

White rice 138%

Lentils 133%

Brown Rice 132%

Honeysmacks 132%

All-Bran 151%

Crackers 127%

Cookies 120%

White pasta 119%

Bananas 118%

Jellybeans 118%

Cornflakes 118%

Special K 116%

French fries 116%

Sustain 112%

White bread 100%

Muesli 100%

Ice cream 96%

Crisps 91%

Yogurt 88%

Peanuts 84%

Mars candy bar 70%

Doughnuts 68%

Cake 65%

Croissant 47%

(S.H.A. Holt, J.C. Brand Miller, P. Petocz, and E. Farmakalidis)

132. Rooted Productivity

21 December 2022 08:25

The Root Of All Productivity

The new year is here, which means productivity tweaks are in the air. I’m not going to offer you a specific strategy today. Instead, I want to touch briefly on a meta habit that will help you succeed in any number of areas in your life where you seek more effectiveness. It’s something I’ve used for years but have never discussed publicly before. I call it: rooted productivity.

Before describing this idea let me motivate it.

A little discussed issue in the productivity community is the role that these strategies play in your mental life. Most people maintain a haphazard and shifting collection of rules and systems only in their head. When a blog post inspires them, this collection may grow, while approaches they once embraced might fizzle unexpectedly. This unstructured approach to organizing the ideas that are supposed to organize your life can cause problems, such as…

Open loop syndrome.
As David Allen taught us, having commitments maintained only in your head requires constant mental resources and can generate stress or anxiety. A commitment to a specific productivity habit kept only in your head can be just as taxing as any other type of open loop.

Fragile motivation.
A commitment to a productivity habit casually kept only in your head occupies a low status in your hierarchy of important things in your life. A lot of people get excited about a hack when they first read about it, but it’s all too easy for it to fade away along with their initial enthusiasm.

Evaluation entanglement.
Keeping your productivity commitments all tangled in your head can cause problems when a strategy fails. Without more structure to the productivity portion of you life, it’s too easy for your brain to associate that single failure with a failure of your commitments as a whole, generating a systemic reduction in motivation.

The solution to these issues is simple: maintain a single root commitment, that you’ll stick to no matter what, which will in turn help you get the most out of all the other productivity commitments that come and go in your life.

To be more concrete, create a single page document that describes the key productivity rules, habits, and systems (which I’ll summarize as “processes” in the following) that you currently follow in your life. I type mine and keep it near my desk in a plastic sleeve (for privacy reasons, I’m showing you only the back below):

Some of the commitments on my root document include: daily and weekly planning, GTD task capture, my deep work rituals, my exercise routines, and the systems I use to track and review ideas.

Once you’ve written this root document you must make the following unbreakable root commitment:

I will do my best to: (a) follow the processes on this document; and (b) on a regular basis evaluate these processes and update the document to better reflect what’s working and what’s not, as well as what’s important to me and what’s not.

This philosophy is simple to implement, but in a single stroke it eliminates most of the major problems of a more ad hoc approach to personal productivity; e.g. you minimize open loops, as all you have to remember is to try to do what the root document says; you strengthen your motivation, as the processes you’re supposed to be following are printed in black and white as oppose to just wallowing in the churn of your cognitive landscape; and it’s easy to modify or discard specific productivity processes without negatively impacting others, as these evaluations and updates are part of your core commitment.

My suggestion for the new year, in other words, is that before you make any new commitments to improve your life, start with this one root commitment that can serve all the rest.

Better than a to do list:

I was talking recently with a friend who is a project manager at a tech company who happens to also be particularly interested in productivity strategies. He told me about a fascinating habit he’s been deploying with great success in his own work life. Instead of maintaining endless to-do lists, when he takes on a new obligation, he puts it on his calendar: scheduling a specific date and time when he will tackle it. As he clarified, this approach applies even if the obligation is just to “think some about this topic.”

This might sound extreme, but it shouldn’t. What my friend is really doing is acknowledging that he has a limited amount of total time to spend on tasks. By scheduling each obligation, he’s confronting the reality of how much time each item will actually take, and identifying where these mental cycles will come from.

In knowledge work, we often ignore these realities. We pass around obligations like hot potatoes, via dashed-off emails and Slack eruptions, often pushing ourselves beyond what we can realistically accomplish, compensating by dropping things or completing them at a low quality level. This can’t possibly be the best way to organize cognitive work. And as my friend demonstrates, it’s not the only way.

I’ve been writing all week about how the disruptions in knowledge work we’re facing in the current moment might be an opportunity to spark radical new ideas about how this sector operates. This particular issue, confronting how we’re actually allocating our attention, is as good a place as any to start. (Cal Newport)

133. Those who work much do not work hard

21 December 2022 08:42

The really efficient laborer will be found not to crowd his day with work, but will saunter to his task surrounded by a wide halo of ease and leisure. There will be a wide margin for relaxation to his day. He is only earnest to secure the kernels of time, and does not exaggerate the value of the husk. Why should the hen sit all day? She can lay but one egg, and besides she will not have picked up materials for a new one. Those who work much do not work hard.

He does nothing with haste and drudgery, but as if he loved it. He makes the most of his labor, and takes infinite satisfaction in every part of it. He is not looking forward to the sale of his crops or any pecuniary profit, but he is paid by the constant satisfaction which his labor yields him.

(Thoreau)

134. OPQRST-A : The Key Features of Every Symptom

14 February 2023 15:11

For all symptoms, it is important to fully understand the essential characteristics. Always pursue the following features for every symptom. The Bates textbook calls them the features of every symptom.

**When describing the symptoms in a problem presentation, use semantic qualifiers whenever possible.

OPQRST-A

Onset – Onset means the beginning of something. Describe the onset in detail with the 5Ws and 1H: When did the pain start? Where were you? What you were doing when the pain started? How did it start or come on (sudden or gradual)? Why does the pt think the pain came on? Also, ask freq and duration of each episode. Have the pt paint a picture of the environment and setting. e.g., relation to meals, exertion, etc.

Provokes / Palliates – What makes it better? What makes it worse?

Quality – This is the character of the pain. What is the pain like? An ache? Stabbing?

Region and Radiation – Point with one finger to where it hurts the most. Where does your pain go from there?

Severity – On a scale of 0 to 10, where zero is no pain and 10 is the worst pain ever, how bad is the pain? What quantity of sputum do you produce (how many cups, teaspoons, etc.)

Time course – Does the pain follow any pattern? Continuous or episodic? “How long the condition has been going on and how it has changed since onset (better, worse, different symptoms), whether it has ever happened before, whether and how it may have changed since onset, and when the pain stopped if it is no longer currently being felt.”

Associated symptoms – Any other signs or symptoms associated with the pain? E.g. For chest pain: diaphoresis, nausea, dyspnea, radiation to jaw and arms?

Some semantic qualifiers have been underlined below.

Onset

Onset means the beginning of something. Describe the onset in detail with the 5Ws and 1H.

When did the pain start? Where were you? What you were doing when the pain started? How did it start or come on (sudden or gradual)? Abrupt or progressive, acute or chronic? Why does the pt think the pain came on? Also, ask frequency and duration of each episode. Have the pt paint a picture of the environment or setting in which it occurred. e.g., relation to meals, exertion, etc.

What was the patient doing physically; emotionally, psychologically/mentally; socially; and spiritually? Consider physical activity, emotional stress/anxiety, mental stress/worry, social stress, spiritual stress, environmental factors, or anything else that may have contributed to the disease. E.g. Travel, drinking from a well, working on a farm, living in an old house, etc. Was he active, inactive, stressed, calm? Acrostic for setting: MESS – Material or physical word (body and the surrounding world), Emotional/psychological/mental, social, & spiritual. These are the four fundamental relationships.

Palliating & Precipitating factors

Does anything make it better or worse? Does any movement, pressure, or other external factors make the problem worse or better? Does rest relieve the symptoms? Is it post-prandial, exertional, pleuritic, positional?

Quality

For pain, what is the pain like? Is it sharp, dull, burning, crushing, pulsating/throbbing, cramping, tearing, pressure-like? Is it constant or does it come and go?

Region and Radiation

What region or location is this pain found? Does it radiate or spread to any other area? You want to also note if it is unilateral or bilateral, proximal or distal, diffuse or localized, radiating vs. non-radiating.

Severity or Quantity

On a scale of 1 to 10, where does it fall? Painful or painless? Can you estimate the amount of phlegm for me? Teaspoon? Tablespoon? Cupful?

Time course

Does the pain follow any pattern? When it starts, how long does it last? How often does it happen? (frequency) Is it continuous or episodic? How has it changed since onset (better, worse, different symptoms)? Has it ever happened before? You want to know whether and how it may have changed since onset, and when the pain stopped if it is no longer currently being felt.

Associated Manifestations

Have you noticed anything else that accompanies it? E.g. For chest pain: diaphoresis, nausea, dyspnea, radiation to jaw and arms?

135. Coaching Habit

17 February 2023 08:03

1. Keep coaching to 10 minutes or less. If you can’t, you don’t have time for coaching.
2. Keep it simple. You don’t need to be “a people person” or use fancy coaching models. Seven good questions and the discipline to make asking them a habit is all you need.
3. Strive for drip irrigation (not an occasional flash flood). Make coaching a regular act by transforming the interactions you have rather than adding to your workload.
   

“What’s on your mind?” / “Where should we start?” / “What’s most useful for us to look at first?”

Your default advice-giving behavior often generates two of the vicious cycles of the modern manager: an overdependent team, and a deep sense of overwhelm from having too much to do.

One of the most useful questions here is the Lazy Question: How can I help? (A blunter version is, “What do you want from me?”)

Here’s your script…

Hi [name]. Thanks for the email—looks like there’s a lot going on. Out of curiosity, what do you want from me here?

Yours, etc.

Bottom line: Less advice. More curiosity. In as many interactions as possible.

People don’t really learn when you tell them something. They don’t even really learn when they do something. They start learning, start creating new neural pathways, only when they have a chance to recall and reflect on what just happened. That’s why the Learning Question is so powerful, and your secret for how to finish strong: “What was most useful here for you?”

There are of course variations you can try: “What was most valuable for you? What do you know now that you didn’t know before? What should we do differently next time?”

136. Suffering

27 February 2023 07:14

Can there be an end to suffering?

There can indeed be an end to suffering.

Can a man be shown The Way?

A man can indeed be shown The Way.

But he must have eyes that long to See

Ears that long to Hear

A heart that longs to Know

And a Mind

That longs to be Silent.

The Truest and most effective test of Sincerity

In virtually all worldly humans

Is money.

He who protests this

Is the one to whom it most applies.

Do you believe what you did today was worthwhile?
That it transformed you?
That it raised you to an elevated way of being?
That it awakened within you an astounding possibility?

In what way was today different from all your yesterdays?

In what way was today

Not a wasted life.

I cannot deny the longing for the sort of question that is so Sincere and heartfelt that it is an inspiration unto itself.

The greatest, most delightful, and freedom-filled thing in the entire world is . . .

To not give a nickel's worth of Damn!

A man seeks respect from his peers

Validation from the world

Love from his family

Fortune from fate

Mercy from god . . .

Under the weight of such hope

Under the burden of such demands,

Fear and anxiety become his constant companion.

And Freedom,

A mirage in the distance.

The shedding of all hope

The dropping of all expectation

From intimates, and strangers

Is the price of one’s Freedom.

The man who, by any possible means, arrives at a place of:

“I am unconcerned with the way that I feel. Be it high or low, pleasant or unpleasant. For I have learned that such feelings are whims of a wayward mind, beyond my control”

Is a man who can never be touched by anxiety.

A man feels anxiety

If it does not matter to him that he is anxious, the anxiety is harmless.

For it not to matter that he is anxious, he must find a home other than the home that is free of anxiety

This home is the understanding that Mind is, and will always be, Anxiety.

Kapil: It’s a more fundamental level. The next level is: zero. The idea that someone should get rid of anxiety is the problem. The problem is not, “How do I get rid of anxiety?” The way is actually to learn where anxiety comes from. The people who have conquered anxiety are the ones who had a clear understanding of what it is and where it came from.

The solution to a problem is never the solution. It’s always the problem. The solution to any problem lies squarely deep within the problem. There are not two things. There’s only one. Everyone is taught to look for solutions and they believe that the solution is independent of the problem. But ingeniously, nature has hidden the problem inside the solution and maybe it did it because it wanted human beings to look inside the problem. The definition of the problem is the key.

Naval: Can you go through a specific example?

Kapil: Absolutely. So in the case of anxiety, a person asks, “How do I get rid of anxiety?” The problem isn’t that they have anxiety. The problem is that their anxiety will never end as long as they look for a solution to it. “Well, if I don’t find a solution, then I’m always going to have anxiety.” That’s correct.

The solution is to go backwards. It’s to look at what actually is the anxiety. Put a name on it. When does it arise? What part of the body does it arise in? In what situations does it arise? Know the face of anxiety, not run from it like a boogie man.

(Kapil Gupta)

137. Discipline

9 March 2023 14:01

The reason that man seeks a “meaning” and a “purpose” to life is because he is desperate to run away from LIVING by any and all means necessary.

Let us deal with what we have right in front of us, shall we?

Let us examine that which has stared us in the face since the day we were born.

The premise under which we have lived our lives, and that which is being preached to the masses, is the idea that if you Pay for something today, you will get it Tomorrow.

The idea that you should do something because it’s “good for you.”

No matter how logical this idea sounds, it destroys our lives.

Why?

Because we live our lives following precepts and prescriptions in exchange for a tomorrow which absolutely never comes.

Never.

I have a better idea. And I’m going to literally stake my life upon it.

My friend, I do not do this in order to “prove” anything to you. For if I did that I would immediately distance myself from the authenticity of the idea, and place myself into the world of Ego. And the world of Ego is the world of a living hell. There is no more accurate description that I can give.

I have placed my life in the hands of this idea because there is no other way in which I wish to live my life. I wonder if perhaps this is what life has been trying to teach me all along. But perhaps I was too ignorant to see the writing on the clouds.

If someone were to say to me “You must be disciplined!” I would tell him to sing his sermons somewhere else. For I don’t follow prescriptions.

Why?

Because prescriptions don’t have the power to reach the bloodstream. It has nothing whatsoever to do with whether the message is Correct. It has everything to do with the vehicle of its transmission.

For instance, there are many subjects in science, philosophy, and mathematics that I find to be incredibly interesting. But if you present them to me (or anyone else) in the package of “school” and “assignments,” I’ll toss them in the trash.

If someone says that we should be Disciplined, are they correct?

To be honest, I would never even get to the point of entertaining the word “disciplined.” Because the word “should” would get caught in my throat. “Should” is a deal-breaker. It is the most INEFFECTIVE vehicle for transmission of any idea.

If someone is going to use “should” they might as well replace it with “should not.” Because no one is going to listen. Nor “should” they :).

Let us discuss the matter of Discipline, AUTHENTICALLY, shall we?

We spend our lives hoping for this and dreaming of that. We spend our lives “working toward” things. We work today for a “better tomorrow.”

And this is precisely the understanding under which we are given the prescription of “discipline.”

Forget about tomorrow, my friend. Why talk about something which no one in the history of civilization has ever seen?

Let us also forget about “today.” For everything that is not RIGHT NOW, is simply a tomorrow. The coming afternoon is a “tomorrow.” The next five minutes is also a “tomorrow.”

As a lover of the Asian arts and the wisdom from the ancient East, I recall the procedural details of the Zen temples.

The “mindful” folding of one’s clothes.

The “mindful” sweeping of the floor.

The “mindful” washing of the dishes.

The “mindful” practice of one’s martial arts form.

On the face of it, it seems holy and proper and sanctified. ( I can hear you now, “My God, is he now even attacking zen temples? Doesn’t this man consider anything sacred?”).

But temples and monasteries are similar to any other trade. Within them, there are the common and there are the Elite.

And what separates the two is Authenticity.

Most in monasteries are going through the motions of discipline. Because their master told them to do so. They are doing it precisely because it is their “duty” and because it is “good for them.” And because this is what a proper Buddhist does.

But Siddhartha did not become The Awakened One because he was “more disciplined” than anyone else. In many ways he was less disciplined. For the Sadhus that he met in the forest who were committed to the mortification of their flesh and denying themselves food and water for years on end were enormously disciplined individuals.

But they did not become Awakened. And he did.

Why?

The reason is because the discipline of those Sadhus was in service of maintain their self-image as “disciplined ascetics.”

But image and form were of no use to Siddhartha. He wanted FREEDOM. Period. Exclamation.

And perhaps this freedom did not come from the PRACTICE of discipline. But from the discipline itself.

If I may put it simply, it would be as if someone was about to wash the dishes and as he stood before the sink he had the GENUINE feeling that he simply couldn’t wait to EXPERIENCE THE DISCIPLINED WAY OF WASHING.

Not washing “mindfully” as a practice/penance for a future reward of enlightenment.

But Enlightenment right here, right now! The disciplined way of doing something IS ITSELF THE ENLIGHTENMENT. No waiting necessary.

If a business man who is building his business “puts in his time” and “pays his dues” and “gives his blood, sweat, and tears” he is wasting his life. And I say this with first hand knowledge, for I have wasted as many years as anyone believing such ideas.

It is not that he is wasting his life because his reward won’t come. It is that he has paid with his life for a tomorrow which was not worth the price.

I will proclaim this from the rooftops. You may accept or reject it. You may consider me wise or a man gone insane.

But I hail it with all my heart:

If the reward is not immediate, the action is not worth it!

If you are going to do it NOW, then you must be rewarded NOW!

For if you are not, you have signed a faulty contract.

To live every action with discipline is perhaps the way to instant divinity.

A disciplined stride, disciplined speech, disciplined breathing, disciplined stirring of the warm soup, disciplined smiles, disciplined admonishments . . . a wholly disciplined micro-existence.

What does it mean to walk and speak disciplined? How will you know?

This question is not answered by words after the action takes place.

It is answered by the intention before the action commences.

For where there is Sincerity, failure cannot exist.

Any principle or idea that you are considering, do not ask yourself if it is “worth doing.”

Ask yourself, “Is it worth devoting your life to.”

For devoting your life even to answering such a question would not be a wasted life.

(KapilGupta)

138. King Warrior Magician Lover

16 March 2023 10:15

139. Good Explanations

21 April 2023 06:51

Our connection to reality is never just perception. It’s always, as Karl Popper put it, theory-laden. Scientific knowledge isn’t derived from anything. Like all knowledge, it’s conjectural, guess work. Tested by observation, not derived from it.

So, were testable conjectures the great innovation that opened the intellectual prison gates? No. Contrary to what’s usually said, testability is common in myths and all sorts of other irrational modes of thinking. Any crank claiming the sun will go out next Tuesday has got a testable prediction.

Consider the ancient Greek myth explaining seasons. Hades, god of the underworld, kidnaps Persephone, the goddess of spring, and negotiates a forced marriage contract requiring her to return regularly and lets her go. Each year she is magically compelled to return. Her mother, Demeter, goddess of the earth is sad, and makes it cold and barren.

That myth is testable. If winter is caused by Demeter’s sadness, then it must happen everywhere on earth simultaneously. So, if the ancient Greeks had only known that Australia is at its warmest when Demeter is at her saddest, they’d have known that their theory is false.

So, what was wrong with that myth, and all pre-scientific thinking, and what then made that momentous difference? I think there’s one thing you have to care about. And that implies testability, the scientific method, the Enlightenment, and everything. And here’s the crucial thing: there is such a thing as a defect in a story. I don’t just mean a logical defect, I mean a bad explanation.

What does that mean?

Well, an explanation is an assertion for what’s there that is unseen that accounts for what’s seen because the explanatory role of Persephone’s marriage contract could be played equally well by infinitely many other ad hoc entities. Why a marriage contract and not any other reason for regular annual action? Here’s one: Persephone wasn’t released, she escaped, and returns every spring to take revenge on Hades with her spring powers. She cools his domain with spring air, venting heat up to the surface, creating summer.

That accounts for the same phenomena as the original myth. It’s equally testable. Yet what it asserts about reality is in many ways the opposite. That’s possible because the details of the original myth are unrelated to seasons except via the myth itself. This easy variability is the sign of a bad explanation because without a functional reason to prefer one of countless variants, advocating one of them in preference to the others is irrational.

So, for the essence of what makes the difference to enable progress, seek good explanations, the ones that cannot be easily varied, while still explaining the phenomena.

Now, our current explanation of seasons is that the earth’s axis is tilted, so each hemisphere tilts towards the sun for half the year and away for the other half. That’s a good explanation, hard to vary, because every detail plays a functional role.

For instance, we know, independently of seasons, that surfaces tilted away from radiant heat are heated less, and that a spinning sphere in space points in a constant direction. And, the tilt also explains the sun’s angle of elevation at different times of year, and predicts that the seasons will be out of phase in the two hemispheres. If they’d been observed in phase, the theory would have been refuted, but now, the fact that it’s also a good explanation, hard to vary, makes the crucial difference.

If the ancient Greeks had found out about seasons in Australia, they could have easily varied their myth to predict that. For instance, when Demeter is upset, she banishes heat from her vicinity into the other hemisphere, where it makes summer.

So, being proved wrong by observation, and changing their theory accordingly, still wouldn’t have got the ancient Greeks one jot closer to understanding seasons because their explanation was bad, easy to vary. It’s only when an explanation is good that it even matters whether it’s testable. If the axis tilt theory had been refuted, its defenders would have had nowhere to go. No easily implemented change could make that tilt cause the same season in both hemispheres.

The search for hard-to-vary explanations is the origin of all progress. It’s the basic regulating principle of the Enlightenment. So, in science, two false approaches blight progress. One’s well known: untestable theories. But the more important one is explanation-less theories.

That the truth consists of hard-to-vary assertions about reality is the most important fact about the physical world. It’s a fact that is itself unseen, yet impossible to vary.

A good explanation is a hard to vary assertion about reality, because every detail, ideally, plays a functional role, and if the explanation is refuted, its defenders would have nowhere to go.

“The point is that, whenever we propose a solution to a problem, we ought to try as hard as we can to overthrow our solution, rather than defend it. Few of us, unfortunately, practice this precept; but other people, fortunately, will supply the criticism for us if we fail to supply it ourselves.”

― Karl Popper, The Logic of Scientific Discovery

140. Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.

5 May 2023 10:05

Before Enlightenment, you hate your life. You chop wood and carry water, but secretly wish to get out of it all. You bear with these activities through habit and out of hopelessness, but you really wish you could do something else. In a way, you are a victim, a slave - the wood chops you and the water carries you, and there is no way to escape. This could go for eternity, it is like living in eternal hell.

After Enlightenment, you are in harmony with the universe. You realized the emptiness of it all, so you see that there is nothing more important than chopping wood and carrying water. All activities are equalized, there is no preference, no discrimination. Because there is no "you", no ego, no personality, no being, no separate individuality - there is no conflict. No need to escape. No other bank to be reached, no Nirvana to seek. But also, because you have mastered your mind, you are not chopped by the wood and carried by the water anymore. You can flip your perspective at will. It is your choice to chop wood and carry water, and you live it in complete suchness and spontaneity.

141. How to be remarkable

5 May 2023 13:29

1. Understand the urgency of the situation. Half-measures simply won’t do. The only way to grow is to abandon your strategy of doing what you did yesterday, but be better. Commit.
2. Remarkable doesn’t mean remarkable to you. It means remarkable to me. Am I going to make a remark about it? If not, then you’re average, and average is for losers.
3. Being noticed is not the same as being remarkable. Running down the street naked will get you noticed, but it won’t accomplish much. It’s easy to pull off a stunt, but not useful.
4. Extremism in the pursuit of remarkability is no sin. In fact, it’s practically a requirement. People in first place, those considered the best in the world, these are the folks that get what they want. Rock stars have groupies because they’re stars, not because they’re good looking.
5. Remarkability lies in the edges. The biggest, fastest, slowest, richest, easiest, most difficult. It doesn’t always matter which edge, more that you’re at (or beyond) the edge.
6. Not everyone appreciates your efforts to be remarkable. In fact, most people don’t. So what? Most people are ostriches, heads in the sand, unable to help you anyway. Your goal isn’t to please everyone. Your goal is to please those that actually speak up, spread the word, buy new things or hire the talented.
7. If it’s in a manual, if it’s the accepted wisdom, if you can find it in a Dummies book, then guess what? It’s boring, not remarkable. Part of what it takes to do something remarkable is to do something first and best. Roger Bannister was remarkable. The next guy, the guy who broke Bannister’s record wasn’t. He was just faster … but it doesn’t matter.
8. It’s not really as frightening as it seems. They keep the masses in line by threatening them (us) with all manner of horrible outcomes if we dare to step out of line. But who loses their jobs at the mass layoffs? Who has trouble finding a new gig? Not the remarkable minority, that’s for sure.
9. If you put it on a T-shirt, would people wear it? No use being remarkable at something that people don’t care about. Not ALL people, mind you, just a few. A few people insanely focused on what you do is far far better than thousands of people who might be mildly interested, right?
10. What’s fashionable soon becomes unfashionable. While you might be remarkable for a time, if you don’t reinvest and reinvent, you won’t be for long. Instead of resting on your laurels, you must commit to being remarkable again quite soon.

(Seth Godin)

142. Self-Soothing / Reparenting

08 May 2023 08:53

“Self-soothing” refers to any behaviour an individual uses to regulate their emotional state by themselves.

( Kaelan Jones)

In discussions about helping babies learn to fall asleep on their own, you may hear "self-soothing" mentioned a lot. The term can sometimes be interpreted as a parent making a baby "cry it out" or ignoring their cries. This is absolutely not true. Allowing babies to learn calming strategies gives them an important life skill. Leading by example and teaching good coping skills from the beginning helps babies become happy, well-adjusted children. Teaching how to self-soothe involves a learning curve for you as well as your baby. If your baby is extremely irritable, for example, they may be hungry (and then you need to feed them) or very tired (and then you need to try to help them sleep). If you think your baby is in pain, you need to address that. If all of these are ruled out and your baby is fed, changed, and well rested but fussy, then you can try a progression of calming techniques. Too often, when your baby is crying (which may seem like all the time!), you may have the instinct to immediately pick them up. Instead, next time try to slow down and take steps to really learn about your baby and what they need. Try each technique slowly, and pause to see how your baby responds; you will both learn what helps and what doesn't.

The order of the progression is important because you are doing less at the beginning by just using your voice and more at the end when you are holding and possibly feeding your baby. The goal is for your baby to calm with less intervention from you, and for you to move away from holding your baby all day, something that happens frequently with fussy babies.

• Look at your baby, letting them see your eyes.
• Look at and talk to them.
• Put a hand on their belly or chest.
• Hold their arms together toward the body or curl their legs up toward their belly.
• Change their position by rolling them onto their side (while awake, only).
• Pick up your baby and hold them in your arms or at your shoulder (but don't move yet!).
• Hold and rock your baby.
• Swaddle your baby and rock them.
• Place a pacifier in their mouth (or assist them to get their hand or thumb to their mouth to suck). You can also try this earlier in the progression if your baby likes pacifiers.
• Feed them if you think this will help.

(Patti Ideran)

We contain within ourselves a version of all the people we have ever been. There is, in recessive form, somewhere in the folds of our natures, a confused teenager, a sad child, a jealous or hungry infant. No version of us entirely disappears, it is merely added to and buttressed, just like an oak tree that still contains, in its rings, the marks of all its former circumferences.

Furthermore, if we follow the psychological thesis, some of our inner children are likely not to be especially well. They might be dealing with a hurt that they have no idea how to cope with, they might have suffered a loss without any chance to understand who and what is to blame, they might be lonely, distressed or ashamed. No one might have taken proper care of them during a crisis or bothered to sympathize with their unusual difficulties at school.

Despite their pain, it isn’t that the inner child’s cries are in any danger of breaking through into the public realm. That is precisely the problem. Inner children cause psychic distress not because they are too present, but because they are not present enough. They have been too effectively locked away. Their cries have been seamlessly forgotten and ignored. They have been pushed into a sound-proof chamber from which no murmur emerges. And yet still they exist.

We are dealing with unwanted restless ghosts who have not been appeased or understood — but whose ongoing ignored unhappiness threatens the course of our lives. The subterranean sobbing undermines our confidence; the repressed loneliness saps at our smiles. To appeal to the metaphor of the self as a house, we rest on foundations with substantial unattended damage below the ground floor.

The task ahead requires a perhaps even more grating and obtuse word: reparenting. The inner child needs to be identified, their distinctive troubles understood and their pains soothed and becalmed. In a perfect world, it is parents themselves who would carry out this work at the time the difficulties arose. But in the real world, some of the work gets left behind and lingers, which requires a bizarre-sounding maneuver to correct. We — as adults — need to become parents to the children we once were. We need to gather together our adult capacities for kindness, reassurance, empathy, generosity and warmth and direct these towards the three or five or fifteen year olds who still exist in our minds. We need to take stock of these young people’s sorrows and help them in a way they were not helped at the time in the name of helping ourselves right now; for we are standing on their shoulders — and can only be as stable as they are.

For a sense of what the work of reparenting might look like, we can imagine going through our lives from their beginnings, and pausing at key difficult moments to ask the frightened, sad or confused version of ourselves what we would, from an ideal vantage point, like to say to ourselves now.

(School of Life)

143. Lamenting

21 June 2023 07:24

For many Christians, the coronavirus-induced limitations on life have arrived at the same time as Lent, the traditional season of doing without. But the sharp new regulations—no theater, schools shutting, virtual house arrest for us over-70s—make a mockery of our little Lenten disciplines. Doing without whiskey, or chocolate, is child’s play compared with not seeing friends or grandchildren, or going to the pub, the library or church.

There is a reason we normally try to meet in the flesh. There is a reason solitary confinement is such a severe punishment. And this Lent has no fixed Easter to look forward to. We can’t tick off the days. This is a stillness, not of rest, but of poised, anxious sorrow.

No doubt the usual silly suspects will tell us why God is doing this to us. A punishment? A warning? A sign? These are knee-jerk would-be Christian reactions in a culture which, generations back, embraced rationalism: everything must have an explanation. But supposing it doesn’t? Supposing real human wisdom doesn’t mean being able to string together some dodgy speculations and say, “So that’s all right then?” What if, after all, there are moments such as T. S. Eliot recognized in the early 1940s, when the only advice is to wait without hope, because we’d be hoping for the wrong thing?

Rationalists (including Christian rationalists) want explanations; Romantics (including Christian romantics) want to be given a sigh of relief. But perhaps what we need more than either is to recover the biblical tradition of lament. Lament is what happens when people ask, “Why?” and don’t get an answer. It’s where we get to when we move beyond our self-centered worry about our sins and failings and look more broadly at the suffering of the world. It’s bad enough facing a pandemic in New York City or London. What about a crowded refugee camp on a Greek island? What about Gaza? Or South Sudan?

At this point the Psalms, the Bible’s own hymnbook, come back into their own, just when some churches seem to have given them up. “Be gracious to me, Lord,” prays the sixth Psalm, “for I am languishing; O Lord, heal me, for my bones are shaking with terror.” “Why do you stand far off, O Lord?” asks the 10th Psalm plaintively. “Why do you hide yourself in time of trouble?” And so it goes on: “How long, O Lord? Will you forget me for ever?” (Psalm 13). And, all the more terrifying because Jesus himself quoted it in his agony on the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Psalm 22).

Yes, these poems often come out into the light by the end, with a fresh sense of God’s presence and hope, not to explain the trouble but to provide reassurance within it. But sometimes they go the other way. Psalm 89 starts off by celebrating God’s goodness and promises, and then suddenly switches and declares that it’s all gone horribly wrong. And Psalm 88 starts in misery and ends in darkness: “You have caused friend and neighbor to shun me; my companions are in darkness.” A word for our self-isolated times.

The point of lament, woven thus into the fabric of the biblical tradition, is not just that it’s an outlet for our frustration, sorrow, loneliness and sheer inability to understand what is happening or why. The mystery of the biblical story is that God also laments. Some Christians like to think of God as above all that, knowing everything, in charge of everything, calm and unaffected by the troubles in his world. That’s not the picture we get in the Bible.

God was grieved to his heart, Genesis declares, over the violent wickedness of his human creatures. He was devastated when his own bride, the people of Israel, turned away from him. And when God came back to his people in person—the story of Jesus is meaningless unless that’s what it’s about—he wept at the tomb of his friend. St. Paul speaks of the Holy Spirit “groaning” within us, as we ourselves groan within the pain of the whole creation. The ancient doctrine of the Trinity teaches us to recognize the One God in the tears of Jesus and the anguish of the Spirit.

It is no part of the Christian vocation, then, to be able to explain what’s happening and why. In fact, it is part of the Christian vocation not to be able to explain—and to lament instead. As the Spirit laments within us, so we become, even in our self-isolation, small shrines where the presence and healing love of God can dwell. And out of that there can emerge new possibilities, new acts of kindness, new scientific understanding, new hope. New wisdom for our leaders? Now there’s a thought. (NT Wright)

1. Lament is a form of praise.

Old Testament scholars estimate that two-thirds of the psalms are laments. Yet the title of the compilation is “praises” (Hebrew tehillim). How could a collection which includes so many complaints be considered praise?

It’s helpful to define our terms. In common usage, the words lament and complaint are interchangeable. But in the Scripture, complaint and lament occur in different contexts and can be distinguished as different concepts. In the wilderness, Israel complained to God about the lack of bread and meat and water (Exodus 16-17). They assumed the worst about God: He wants to kill us! The people who had been dramatically rescued from Egypt and saved through the Red Sea turned on their Rescuer, painting Him as the villain. Their complaints were actually a way of putting God on trial; they were “testing” God. But in the psalms, Israel asks God to answer according to His unfailing love, because He is a God of justice and righteousness, and because He has been faithful in the past. By contrasting Israel in the wilderness with Israel in worship, we can say that a complaint is an accusation against God that maligns His character, but a lament is an appeal to God based on confidence in His character.

2. Lament is a proof of the relationship.

Israel brought their lament to God in the psalms on the basis of His covenant with them. These prayers and songs were not vain attempts to convince a distant deity to notice them. They were not like the priests of Baal dancing and cutting themselves to conjure a response. These were a people whom YHWH—the sole sovereign creator—had called His “firstborn”. They were asking their Father to act accordingly.

On a Saturday morning, when my wife and I are trying to sleep in until that luxurious hour of 8am but our younger children are hungry for breakfast, they don’t run outside to the neighbor begging for food. They come boldly into our bedroom asking for what they need. “Will you please make me some eggs?!” We are tempted in those moments to get upset, but we should be honored by their request. It is in itself proof of our relationship with them.

The reverse of this scene is tragically described by Dr. Russell Moore in his book, Adopted for Life. Moore describes going to an orphanage in Russia as they were in the process of pursuing adoption. The silence from the nursery was eerie. The babies in the cribs never cried. Not because they never needed anything, but because they had learned that no one cared enough to answer. Children who are confident of the love of a caregiver cry. For the Christian, our lament, when taken to our Father in heaven, is proof of our relationship with God, our connection to a great Caregiver.

3. Lament is a pathway to intimacy with God.

A few years ago, I read a stunning article by psychologist Bonnie Poon Zahl on attachment theory and our relationship with God. She describes attachment theory as an explanation of “how people learn to experience and respond to separation and distress in the context of core, close relationships from very early on in their lives.” Drawing on both John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth, Zahl explains the three types of attachment—a secure attachment, an anxious-avoidant attachment, or an anxious-ambivalent attachment. From Ainsworth’s research, an “anxious-avoidant” child didn’t care when they were separated or reunited with their parents, and only wanted to play alone; “anxious-ambivalent” children “clung to their parents, and were extremely upset when their parents left” and “were difficult to soothe” even when their parents returned, seeming “to be angry at their parents for leaving.” Zahl writes that research “confirms the tendency to see God as an attachment figure and the tendency to think about one’s relational dynamics with God along the same two dimensions of human attachment: anxiety about abandonment and avoidance of intimacy.”

When I read Zahl’s article, I thought about the value of honesty in the Psalms. By laying every emotion and every experience before YHWH, their covenant God, the psalmist was reinforcing a bond of intimacy, affirming an attachment. Just as God made covenant with Abraham by the breaking apart of animals, so Israel embodied the bond of the covenant by breaking open their hearts before God. The Torah was organized into five books of God’s instruction—His word to His people; the Psalms are organized into five books, guiding us in how to “answer God”. The God who speaks calls us into relationship. Lament is one of the ways we respond.

4. Lament is a prayer for God to act.

Lament in the Bible is not simply an outlet for our frustrations. Though venting may be proven to be beneficial in and of itself, a lament is a form of prayer. And prayer is not passive. Many of the laments in the psalms are calls to action. They plead with God to pay attention to them and to act on their behalf. In fact, many Old Testament scholars identify “petition” as an essential element of a lament psalm. For example, the Hebrew word for “hear”, shema, appears 79 times, as the psalmist implores God to listen attentively to their cry. The psalmist appeals to God’s character and covenant and asks for His attention and action.

The New Testament takes us further. When Jesus taught His disciples to pray, He wasn’t giving them something cute to do to pass the time. He was inviting them to participate in the arrival of the Kingdom. In Paul’s epistles, his prayers were not the preamble but the premise for his whole letter, embodying his theology and ethics in his doxology. In fact, for Paul, prayer is one of the ways God is acting. As Professor Wright has said, “when we are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, then somehow, God is praying within us for the pain around us”.

5. Lament is a participation in the pain of others.

Several years ago, I began praying the psalms regularly. I discovered early on that there were several psalms that just didn’t seem to “fit” my life—I had little to no devotional use for them. But as I learned more about the practice of Psalm-praying, I realized that the whole point of such a practice was to put me among the congregation of the saints—all who had come before and all who are around the world today. Maybe I was not being pursued by enemies or hemmed in on every side, but what about the Christians in Syria? What about Susan who was dealing with a cancer diagnosis? The better I got at a prayerful imagination, the more I began to realize the psalm-praying was a participation in the prayer life of the Church, historic and global.

Lament is not only for the suffering; it is for solidarity with the suffering. We love our neighbor when we allow their experience of pain to become the substance of our prayer. This, after all, is what Jesus did for us. The strange act of asking why God had forsaken Him has been analyzed by scholars and theologians for what it means about our theology of the incarnation or the Trinity. But what we often miss is that Jesus was praying the words of Psalm 22 precisely because that was the prayer of many Jewish martyrs in the first century. Jesus, dying the vile and shameful death on the cross prayed in solidarity with the suffering. Indeed, His death was the ultimate prayer of solidarity. And every prayer of lament which we offer is another “Amen”.

———-

Lament is not our final prayer. It is a prayer in the meantime. Most of the lament psalms end with a “vow to praise”—a promise to return thanksgiving to God for His deliverance. Because Jesus Christ is risen from the dead, we know that sorrow is not how the story ends. The song may be in a minor motif now, but one day it will resolve in a major chord. When every tear is wiped away, when death is swallowed up in victory, when heaven and earth are made new and joined as one, when the saints rise in glorious bodies…then we will sing at last a great, “Hallelujah!”

For now, we lift our lament to God as we wait with hope. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.

(Dr Glenn Packiam)

144. Salary Negotiation

12 July 2023 08:12

Your Negotiation Started Before You Applied To This Job.

Your negotiation doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Many people think job searches go something like this:

1. See ad for job on Monster.com
2. Send in a resume.
3. Get an interview.
4. Get asked for salary requirements.
5. Get offered your salary requirement plus 5%.
6. Try to negotiate that offer, if you can bring yourself to.
   

This is an effective strategy for job searching if you enjoy alternating bouts of being unemployed, being poorly compensated, and then treated like a disposable peon. You will have much, much better results if your job search looks something more like:

1. (Optional but recommended) Establish a reputation in your field as someone who delivers measurable results vis-a-vis improving revenue or reducing costs.
2. Have a hiring manager talk with you, specifically, about an opening that they want you, specifically, to fill.
3. Talk informally (and then possibly formally) and come to the conclusion that this would be a great thing if both sides could come to a mutually fulfilling offer.
4. Let them take a stab at what that mutually fulfilling offer would look like.
5. Suggest ways that they could improve it such that the path is cleared for you doing that voodoo that you do so well to improve their revenue and/or reduce their costs.
6. (Optional) Give the guy hiring you a resume to send to HR, for their records. Nobody will read it, because resumes are an institution created to mean that no one has to read resumes. Since no one will read it, we put it in the process where it literally doesn’t matter whether it happens or not, because if you had your job offer contingent on a document that everyone knows no one reads, that would be pretty effing stupid now wouldn’t it.
   

You might think that desirable jobs at well-managed companies (Google, Microsoft, hot startup FooWithTheWhat.ly, etc) have layers and layers of bureaucratic scar tissue to ensure that their hiring will conform to established processes and that offers will not be given to candidates sourced by using informal networks and interpersonal connections. If you believe this, you have a dangerously incomplete mental model of how the world operates. I have a specific recommendation for you to make that model more complete: start talking to people who actually work for those companies and who have hiring authority. Virtually no company has a hiring process which is accurately explained by blog posts about the company. No company anywhere has a hiring process which is accurately explained by their own documents about how the hiring process works.

When Does A Salary Negotiation Happen?

Only negotiate salary after you have agreement in principle from someone with hiring authority that, if a mutually acceptable compensation can be agreed upon, you will be hired.

This is really, really important because it has direct implications for your negotiating strategy. First, the company is going to spend a lot of time and effort on getting you to the point of agreement-in-principle. Pretend you’ve gone through six rounds of interviews. (You probably won’t if you get hired on informal networks, because all barriers vanish when important people want a deal to get done, but let me give some advice to someone a little less well-situated.) Do some quick mental math on what that actually cost the company, with reference to “one man-month of an engineer’s time costs $20k” like we discussed earlier. You’ll quickly reach the conclusion that the company has spent thousands of dollars just talking to you, and that doesn’t even count the thousands they spent deciding to talk to you instead of whoever isn’t in the room right now. Walking away from the negotiation means that they lose all that investment. (Yeah, sunk cost fallacy and all, but since people predictably act in this fashion you should, well, predict that they will act in this fashion.) They really want to reach an agreement with you.

The second implication is that the inner serf worrying “If I even attempt to negotiate this, the deal will fall through” is worrying for nothing. They’ve got thousands invested in this discussion by this point. They want you. The absolute worst outcome of negotiating an offer in good faith is that you will get exactly the contents of that offer. Let me say that again for emphasis: negotiating never makes (worthwhile) offers worse. This means you need what political scientists call a commitment strategy: you always, as a matter of policy, negotiate all offers. (In this wide world I’m sure you can find a company who still makes exploding offers, where you get one yay-or-nay and then the offer is gone. You have a simple recourse to them: refuse them and deal with people who are willing to be professionals. You’re not a peasant. Don’t act like one.)

This also means you do not start negotiating until you already have a Yes-If. (Yes-If we agree on terms.) Do not start negotiating from No-But. (No-But we might hire you anyway if you’re really, really effing cheap.) You don’t want to work for a No-But for the same reasons that smart employers hate hiring candidates who are a No-But (No-But maybe if not on my team, etc). If they’re leaning to not hiring you, you will compromise excessively on negotiation to get them to hire you. Compromising excessively is not the point of the exercise. It is a seller’s market for talent right now: sell to someone who is happy to buy.

This means that any discussion of compensation prior to hearing Yes-If is premature. If you’re still at the job interview and you’re talking price you are doing something wrong. (Read the room: it is entirely possible that you came for a job interview, finished it, and proceeded directly to a salary negotiation. That’s probably suboptimal, but it is OK. Just don’t give the employer the option of having the schedule be job interview, salary negotiation, and back to job interview if they discover that you have a spine.) The ideal resolution to the job interview is for both sides to be optimistic about the arrangement, and then you close with a warm handshake and “I look forward to receiving your offer by, oh, would tomorrow be enough time for you to run the numbers?”

You then have a high likelihood of doing your salary negotiation over email, which is likely to your advantage versus doing it in real time. Email gives you arbitrary time to prepare your responses. Especially for engineers, you are likely less disadvantaged by email than you are by having an experienced negotiator talking to you.

The First Rule Is What Everyone Tells You It Is: Never Give A Number First

Every handbook on negotiation and every blog post will tell you not to give a number first. This advice is almost always right. It is so right, you have to construct crazy hypotheticals to find edge cases where it would not be right.

For example, if your previous salary was set during the dot-com bubble and you are negotiating after the bubble popped, you might mention it to anchor your price higher such that the step down will be less severe than it would be if you engaged in free negotiations unencumbered by the bubbilicious history. Does this sound vaguely disreputable to you? Good. This vaguely disreputable abuse of history is what every employer asking for salary history, salary range, or desired salary is doing. They are all using your previous anomalously low salary — a salary which did not reflect your true market worth, because you were young or inexperienced or unskilled at negotiation or working at a different firm or in another line of work entirely — to justify paying you an anomalously low salary in the future.

Never give a number.

“But Patrick,” you cry. “I don’t want to be difficult.” You’re not being difficult. You’re not doing anything immoral. You’re not being unprofessional. They’re businessmen, sometimes they don’t have all the information they would love to have prior to making a decision. They’ll deal.

They already deal with every employee that they’ve ever had who was not a doormat at negotiations, which includes essentially all of the employees they really value. Ramit Sethi (more on him later) introduced me to a concept that he calls Competence Triggers: basically, if you have to judge someone’s skill based on a series of brief interactions, you’re going to pattern match their behavior against other people who you like. When people with hiring authority think of winners, they think of people like them who live and breathe this business thing. They negotiate things as a matter of course: that is a major portion of the value they bring to the company. Volunteering a number when asked says the same thing to people with hiring authority that flunking FizzBuzz says to an engineer: this person may be a wonderful snowflake in other regards, but on the thing I care about, they’re catastrophically incompetent. It will also cause them to retroactively question competencies they’d previously credited you with.

I have literally heard that feedback, in so many words, from folks with whom I’ve had successful business dealings. (A funny in hindsight story: I cost myself five figures with a single email. The particulars are boring, but suffice it to say I fairly recently made a wet-behind-the-ears-engineer error in quoting a client. He noticed. So did my bank statement. My bank statement kept quiet, but the client opined that it made him think less of me until we actually got to work together.)

So anyhow, you may well hear reasons why you should give a number.

Objection: “I really need a number to move the process forward.”

What you should think: “You’re lying to me to attempt to get me to compromise my negotiating position.”

What you should say: “I’m more concerned at the moment with talking to you about discovering whether we’re a mutual fit. If we’re a great fit, then I can be flexible on the numbers with you and you can be flexible on the numbers with me. If we’re not a great fit, then the numbers are ultimately irrelevant, because your company only hires A players and I only work at roles I would be an A player at.”

(Don’t talk like that normally? Fine then, talk like yourself, but say substantially the same things. Engineers overestimate how different we really are from business people: we say “10x engineer,” they say “A player,” but at the end of the day we believe that there are vast differences in productivity between workers. OK, gut check: is this something we actually believe to be true or just something we wish for? If it is actually your best guess about the state of reality, that has immediate news-you-can-use implications about how you should conduct your life.)

Objection: “This form needs a number.”

What you should think: “You’re lying to me to attempt to get me to compromise my negotiating position.”

What you should say: “Give me git access and I’ll fix it in a jiffy! both people laugh No, seriously, speaking, I’m more concerned at the moment with discovering whether we’re a mutual fit… Oh, it’s physically impossible? Put in $1 then to get the ball rolling, and we’ll circle back to this later.”

Objection: “We want to figure out whether you’re an appropriate candidate for the position.”

What you should think: “You’re lying to me to attempt to get me to compromise my negotiating position.”

What you should say: “It’s so important to me that this is a good mutual fit for us. Let’s talk about why I’m a great fit for this position: I know you’re concerned about $FILL_IN_THE_BLANK. In addition to my previous successes doing it, I have some great ideas for what I’d do about that if I was working at your company. Would you like to drill into those or is there another job area you’re more concerned about to start with?”

Objection: “I’m sorry, great try at a dodge there, but I just can’t go forward without a number.”

What you should think: “You’re lying to me to attempt to get me to compromise my negotiating position.”

What you should say (if you’re an engineer): “Well, you know, I would hate to have to walk away from the negotiation over this. Working with your company looked like it would have been such a wonderful opportunity. I hear the hiring market is super-tight right now, would you like me to introduce you to other candidates? Maybe we can shave a couple of months off of you filling this position.”

What you should say (if you’re not an engineer): “Damn, I guess I should have studied engineering.”

What you should say (if you’re a little put out by that comment): “Well, you know, salary is only one component of the total compensation package. In terms of total compensation, we’re probably looking at something like $FILL_IN_NUMBER_HERE.” (Suggested calculation: take the package value from your last company and add 5~10%. If you don’t know how to calculate the value of your compensation package, learn that, but as a rough guesstimate salary + 30 ~ 50% for full-time employees in professional roles and the multiplier tends to scale up as your base salary scales up.)

P.S. I double majored in making things and making things up. The joking comes from a place of love. OK, love and schadenfreude, in solution with each other.

Listen To What People Tell You. Repeat It Back To Them.

Properly run negotiations are not jockeying contests, they’re persuasive exercises. (We’ll give the company a pass on the “what’s your number?” question because it is an established social ritual that they get one free pass at screwing you. You still don’t have to cooperate with it, though.) You know what people find persuasive? Their own words. People love their own words. When you talk to them, you should use their own words. Seriously, watch the eyes light up.

Did the solicitation for the job say “We are seeking someone with strong skills at scaling traffic in a fast-moving environment”? Pick out the key words. Scaling traffic. Fast-moving environment. “Scaling traffic” doesn’t sound like how I’d phrase it if I were writing or speaking for myself, but if you’ve just described your need to me as scaling traffic, by golly I will tell you how great I am at scaling traffic. Reinterpret or rephrase the (true!) bits of your own story such that it fits the narrative framework which they have conveniently told you that they are going to respond to. Did you previously work at a small business which was unencumbered by lots of process? Sounds like a fast-moving environment, right? Call it exactly that, then.

Micro-tip: Take notes during job interviews and salary negotiations. It’s easy: go to the convenience store before the job interview, buy a writing instrument and a $1 notebook, jot down occasional notes when appropriate.

Can I do that?! Of course you can. Do you know anyone who you’ve ever thought “Man, I thought they were competent, but then it turned out they had a notebook so I had to write them off?” No. Taking notes says “I’m attentive and detail-oriented and I care about what you say.” (Make sure you can take notes without playing with your pen or otherwise appearing to fidget.) In terms of specific things that should get your pen moving, among others, I would focus on specific words they use and concerns they have so that you can come back to them later in the conversation. Numbers are another good thing to hit the notebook, because numbers should only ever trend in a direction of “Better to you,” so you don’t want to do something stupid like saying “So how many days of vacation was that again?” and let a 24 suddenly become a 20. (You might think “I’m going to write down the offer so I have proof of it for later.” Get offers written, that goes hopefully without saying, but get it written by them and/or follow-up the discussion with an email recapping the important points and asking if you understood them correctly. Your notes will not convince their HR apparatus to honor the agreement in event of a retroactive miscommunication, but an email from their decisionmaker likely will.)

People say the damnedest things. For example, someone might spontaneously volunteer during a job interview that they’ve been interviewing for the position for six months. (None of my clients would ever say that, of course, but then again one would hope none of their consultants would chop five figures off their own invoice with an email.) If they say the position has been open for six months, take a note of that. During the salary negotiation, if they have a pricing objection, one of your first responses should be “I appreciate that this is a little more money than you might have been thinking about, but this is an opportunity to get this position filled without delaying your business by another six months. What is the value of that six months of execution to you?” (Conversely, don’t say stupid things during job interviews such as “I need this job because…” You never need a job. Being needy means that the party who is not needy has automatic leverage over you: your BATNA to the negotiation is very poor. Instead of being needy, aim for “I’m enthusiastic about the opportunity with working with you, assuming we can come to mutually satisfactory terms.”)

Micro-tip: Notice how often I say “We” and variations on “mutual win.” Those work pretty well. The only thing better than “We” is “You” (and variants), because people care a heck of a lot more about their problems than about your problems. (This advice is stolen shamelessly from Dale Carnegie.) This means that a) you should talk about their problems, concerns, and wishes and b) you should guard against your own natural tendency to bring up irrelevant things like your own problems, which typically will not help you sell the decisionmaker on adopting the mutual win you’re proposing. Similarly, I generally try to phrase things positively rather than score debating points. (“You just said X, but that was contradicted by your earlier statement Y, which means…” wins debating points but does not win friends and influence people. You might try something like “Good good, but taking into account your earlier concerns about Y…”)

Research, Research, Research

Many people will tell you that you should familiarize yourself with the approximate salary range for the position in your region. This advice is easy to act on (go to a salary aggregation site, guess what “the position” is, pray that this gives you a better number than rand(40000,120000)), but it leaves a lot to be desired. It is 2012. Facebook and LinkedIn exist. You should, before any job interview, have intimate knowledge of the target company. Prospective peers within the company are one obvious way to get it. So are ex-employees, folks who’ve had dealings with them professionally, etc. Key things you want to learn:

What do they value?

Who do they value within the company? (Roles? Titles? Groups?)

What does the career path look like for successful people within the company?

Roughly speaking, how generous are they with regard to axes that you care about?

Do they have any compensation levers which are anomalously easy to operate? (For example, if you asked around, you might hear a few people say that a particular firm pushes back modestly on out-of-band increases in salary but they’ll give in-the-money option grants like candy.)

All the fuzzy stuff: what’s the corporate culture like? Yadda yadda.

You can even bring a lot of these questions to the job interview, which is (again) prior to the negotiation. (Maybe not “So are you guys tightwads?” but culture-esque questions like “What are the projects this company thinks are really key to its future and how would a motivated person go about getting on them?” are both a) totally fair game and b) will win you brownie points just for asking. Similarly, a lot of employees will, out of company loyalty, attempt to sell you on taking the job with the company by trading you very useful information.)

The more you know, the more options you have when doing negotiation, because you’ll have more things and more motivational things which you can offer in exchange for things you want. It will also help you avoid making mistakes like e.g. getting into a rigid classification system where the classification you’re aiming at will make forward advancement towards your goals very difficult. (Example: there are some companies where Product and QA are run like separate fiefdoms which haven’t forgotten the most recent war, and in those companies getting hired as an engineer may not be a career enhancing move if you like making things for a living. There are other companies where people cross-function in those responsibilities all the time and applying for a job advertising as “Support Engineer” makes lateral moves onto customer-facing projects trivial. You can find which one you’re applying to by taking any engineer out for coffee.)

New Information Is Valuable And Can Be Traded For Things You Want

There was a post recently on Hacker News about someone’s experience with a job offer from Google. They wanted more money. The recruiters offered to think it over, and came back with the reply that Google’s food benefit was worth a significant amount of money, with a calculation to back it up. That is a pretty brilliant reply. Google’s food benefit is about as old as the company. Approximately all people wanting to work at Google are aware of its existence. However, the explicit calculation of what it is worth is new, so if you bring up that calculation, by implication you’re offering newly found value to the negotiation. This successfully convinces people that they didn’t really need that extra money. It is so successful at this that Google recruiters apparently have this entire interaction scripted, since multiple people report having the exact same experience.

You should steal this tactic. You are an expert in your own skill set, life story, and (ideally) value you can create for the company. However, the person you are talking to is not. If they ever resist about something which you want, consider reaching into the treasure chest that they are buying mostly blind and revealing one of the many glittering jewels inside. They are going to get them all anyhow if they buy the chest, but each one you bring out decreases the perceived risk of buying it and therefor increases its perceived value.

Company: We can’t see our way to $88,000.

Applicant: Well, I know you do a significant amount of business with your online store. At my last company, I increased sales by 3% by $YADDA_YADDA. What would a 1% increase in sales be worth to you?

Company: Well, I don’t have that figure in front of me, but…

Applicant: Would it be safe to say “millions of dollars”?

Company: That sounds about right, yeah.

Applicant: Great, I can’t wait to get started. Getting me that extra $4,000 would make this a much easier decision. Considering that this is conceivably worth millions to you, we’d be silly not to do business with each other.

Company: I’ll see what I can do.

Applicant: Let me help give you some options! [See below.]

(This hypothetical applicant is doing well on the negotiation but apparently needs to do more research on what conversion optimization specialists can get away with charging these days. Here, let me help: six figure salary with all the usual perks as an employee, “senior engineer project rates” through “you might not believe me if I told you” as a consultant.)

Anyhow, simply by bringing attention to something which was hopefully already in bold print on their resume, they just increased their perceived value to the company, thus justifying the company moving a lever which (again) the company isn’t really sensitive to at the end of the day.

You Have A Multi-Dimensional Preference Set. Use It.

Don’t overly focus on your salary number. It is important (of course), but there are many parts of your compensation package, and many more things that you value. Should you and the other party reach an impasse on any part of it, offer to table that part of the discussion (to be returned to later) and bring up a different topic. You can then trade improvements for concessions (or apparent concessions) on the earlier topic.

Employer: “We were thinking $80,000.”

Applicant: “$80,000 is interesting (*) but not quite where we need to be to get this done. Do you have any flexibility on that number?”

Employer: “I think I can convince HR to approve $84,000 but that is the best I can do.”

Applicant: “I appreciate that. $84,000, huh. Well, it isn’t quite what I had in mind, but the right package offer could make that attractive. How much vacation comes with the package?”

Employer: “20 days a year.”

Applicant: “If you could do 24 days a year, I could compromise on $84,000.”

Employer: “I think I can do that.”

For those keeping score at home: the applicant never gives up anything but the employer will walk away feeling he got a good deal.

* Micro-tip: “Interesting” is a wonderful word: it is positive and non-commital at the same time. If they tell you a number, tell them it is an “interesting” number, not a “wonderful” number.

Hopping around the offer also helps you defuse common negotiating tactics like “I have to go to $EXTERNAL_AUTHORITY to get approval of that.” (This is in the negotiation playbook, because it works well: it injects an automatic delay in the process, and gives you a scapegoat for refusing a request while not being guilty of the refusal yourself. You should strongly consider having an $EXTERNAL_AUTHORITY of your own. Significant others work well. Note that in the US your would-be employer is legally prohibited from breathing about the subject of your marital status, so something like “We’ll have to talk that over” or “That sounds reasonable, but I’ll have to run it by the family” has the dual virtues of being a socially acceptable reason to delay any major decision while also being equally available to unattached young’uns. I talk shop with my family all the time. I’ll certainly continue discussing employment with my family after it includes my fiancee, too.)

Anyhow, say your decisionmaker says that approving deviations from the company’s salary structure is outside of his discretion and those evil ogres in HR will likely deny his request. That’s fine. Express sympathy with him, because he just said he wants to give you more but can’t, then refocus the discussion on things which are within his personal authority. (Vacation days, work hours, project assignments, travel opportunities, professional development opportunities, and the like are good areas to probe at.) You can then use the unspent “You wanted to do something nice for me” obligation which he just acknowledged on one of the things which he has authority to grant you.

For Your Further Perusal

I’m deeply indebted to a few buddies of mine, principally Thomas at Matasano and Ramit Sethi, for teaching me to be less of a doormat in terms of negotiation. Thomas has forgotten more than I’ll ever know about doing negotiations with clients. Check out Hacker News search with [tptacek negotiation] for some good advice, or (if you’re in Chicago) take him out to coffee.

Some years after I wrote this article, Josh Doody, one of my buddies, wrote the literal book on salary negotiation. If you learn best from books, I recommend it. If you’d prefer more personalized advice, he has that available, too.

(Patrick McKenzie, patio11)

145. Effective Learning

26 July 2023 09:35

1. Do not learn if you do not understand
2. Learn before you memorize – build the picture of the whole before you dismember it into simple items in SuperMemo. If the whole shows holes, review it again!
3. Build upon the basics – never jump both feet into a complex manual because you may never see the end. Well remembered basics will help the remaining knowledge easily fit in
4. Stick to the minimum information principle – if you continue forgetting an item, try to make it as simple as possible. If it does not help, see the remaining rules (cloze deletion, graphics, mnemonic techniques, converting sets into enumerations, etc.)
5. Cloze deletion is easy and effective – completing a deleted word or phrase is not only an effective way of learning. Most of all, it greatly speeds up formulating knowledge and is highly recommended for beginners
6. Use imagery – a picture is worth a thousand words
7. Use mnemonic techniques – read about peg lists and mind maps. Study the books by Tony Buzan. Learn how to convert memories into funny pictures. You won’t have problems with phone numbers and complex figures
8. Graphic deletion is as good as cloze deletion – obstructing parts of a picture is great for learning anatomy, geography and more
9. Avoid sets – larger sets are virtually un-memorizable unless you convert them into enumerations!
10. Avoid enumerations – enumerations are also hard to remember but can be dealt with using cloze deletion
11. Combat interference – even the simplest items can be completely intractable if they are similar to other items. Use examples, context cues, vivid illustrations, refer to emotions, and to your personal life
12. Optimize wording – like you reduce mathematical equations, you can reduce complex sentences into smart, compact and enjoyable maxims
13. Refer to other memories – building memories on other memories generates a coherent and hermetic structure that forgetting is less likely to affect. Build upon the basics and use planned redundancy to fill in the gaps
14. Personalize and provide examples – personalization might be the most effective way of building upon other memories. Your personal life is a gold mine of facts and events to refer to. As long as you build a collection for yourself, use personalization richly to build upon well established memories
15. Rely on emotional states – emotions are related to memories. If you learn a fact in the sate of sadness, you are more likely to recall it if when you are sad. Some memories can induce emotions and help you employ this property of the brain in remembering
16. Context cues simplify wording – providing context is a way of simplifying memories, building upon earlier knowledge and avoiding interference
17. Redundancy does not contradict minimum information principle – some forms of redundancy are welcome. There is little harm in memorizing the same fact as viewed from different angles. Passive and active approach is particularly practicable in learning word-pairs. Memorizing derivation steps in problem solving is a way towards boosting your intellectual powers!
18. Provide sources – sources help you manage the learning process, updating your knowledge, judging its reliability, or importance
19. Provide date stamping – time stamping is useful for volatile knowledge that changes in time
20. Prioritize – effective learning is all about prioritizing. In incremental reading you can start from badly formulated knowledge and improve its shape as you proceed with learning (in proportion to the cost of inappropriate formulation). If need be, you can review pieces of knowledge again, split it into parts, reformulate, reprioritize, or delete. See also: Incremental reading, Devouring knowledge, Flow of knowledge, Using tasklists
    

Ill-formulated knowledge – Complex and wordy

Q: What are the characteristics of the Dead Sea?

A: Salt lake located on the border between Israel and Jordan. Its shoreline is the lowest point on the Earth’s surface, averaging 396 m below sea level. It is 74 km long. It is seven times as salty (30% by volume) as the ocean. Its density keeps swimmers afloat. Only simple organisms can live in its saline waters

Well-formulated knowledge – Simple and specific

Q: Where is the Dead Sea located?

A: on the border between Israel and Jordan

Q: What is the lowest point on the Earth’s surface?

A: The Dead Sea shoreline

Q: What is the average level on which the Dead Sea is located?

A: 400 meters (below sea level)

Q: How long is the Dead Sea?

A: 70 km

Q: How much saltier is the Dead Sea than the oceans?

A: 7 times

Q: What is the volume content of salt in the Dead Sea?

A: 30%

Q: Why can the Dead Sea keep swimmers afloat?

A: due to high salt content

Q: Why is the Dead Sea called Dead?

A: because only simple organisms can live in it

Q: Why only simple organisms can live in the Dead Sea?

A: because of high salt content

Ill-formulated knowledge – Complex and wordy

Q: What was the history of the Kaleida company?

A: Kaleida, funded to the tune of $40 million by Apple Computer and IBM in 1991. Hyped as a red-hot startup, Kaleida’s mission was to create a multimedia programming language It finally produced one, called Script X. But it took three years. Meanwhile, companies such as Macromedia and Asymetrix had snapped up all the business. Kaleida closed in 1995.

Well-formulated knowledge – Simple cloze deletion

Q: Kaleida was funded to the tune of …(amount) by Apple Computer and IBM in 1991

A: $40 million

Q: Kaleida was funded to the tune of $40 million by …(companies) in 1991

A: Apple and IBM

Q: Kaleida was funded to the tune of $40 million by Apple Computer and IBM in … (year)

A: 1991

Q: …(company) mission was to create a multimedia programming language. It finally produced one, called Script X. But it took three years

A: Kaleida’s

Q: Kaleida’s mission was to create a … It finally produced one, called Script X. But it took three years

A: multimedia programming language

Q: Kaleida’s mission was to create a multimedia programming language. It finally produced one, called … But it took three years

A: Script X

Q: Kaleida’s mission was to create a multimedia programming language. It finally produced one, called Script X. But it took …(time)

A: three years

Q: Kaleida’s mission was to create a multimedia programming language: Script X. But it took three years. Meanwhile, companies such as … had snapped up all the business

A: Macromedia/Asymetrix

Q: Kaleida’s mission was to create Script X. But it took three years. Meanwhile, companies such as Macromedia and Asymetrix had snapped up all the business. Kaleida closed in …(year)

A: 1995

Ill-formulated knowledge – Sets are unacceptable!

Q: What countries belong to the European Union (2002)?

A: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.

Well-formulated knowledge – Converting a set into a meaningful listing

Q: Which country hosted a meeting to consider the creation of a European Community of Defence in 1951?

A: France

Q: Which countries apart from France joined the European Coal and Steel Community in 1952?

A: Germany, Italy and the Benelux

Q: What countries make up the Benelux?

A: Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands

Q: Whose membership did Charles de Gaulle oppose in the 1960s?

A: that of UK

Q: Which countries joined the EEC along the UK in 1973?

A: Ireland and Denmark

Q: Which country joined the EEC in 1981?

A: Greece

Q: Which countries joined the EEC in 1986?

A: Spain and Portugal

Q: Which countries joined the EU in 1995?

A: Austria, Sweden and Finland

Q: What was the historic course of expansion of the European Union membership?

A: (1) France and (2) Germany, Italy and the Benelux, (3) UK and (4) Ireland and Denmark, (5) Greece, (6) Spain and Portugal and (7) Austria, Sweden and Finland

A poem that is hard to remember

Q: The credit belongs … (Teddy Roosevelt)

A: The credit belongs to the man who’s actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat; a man who knows the great enthusiasm and the great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who in the end knows the triumph of high achievement, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat

A poem split into easy items

Q: The credit belongs … (Teddy Roosevelt)

A: to the man who’s actually in the arena

Q: The credit belongs to the man who’s actually in the arena …

A: whose face is marred by dust and sweat (a man who knows the great enthusiasm)

Q: whose face is marred by dust and sweat … (The credit belongs)

A: a man who knows the great enthusiasm and the great devotions (who spends himself in a worthy cause)

Q: a man who knows the great enthusiasm and the great devotions … (The credit belongs)

A: who spends himself in a worthy cause (who in the end knows the triumph of high achievement)

Q: who spends himself in a worthy cause … (The credit belongs)

A: who in the end knows the triumph of high achievement (so that his place shall never be), etc. etc.

Less optimum item: cloze deletion that is too wordy

Q: Aldus invented desktop publishing in 1985 with PageMaker. Aldus had little competition for years, and so failed to improve. Then Denver-based … blew past. PageMaker, now owned by Adobe, remains No. 2

A: Quark

Better item: fewer words will speed up learning

Q: Aldus invented desktop publishing in 1985 with PageMaker but failed to improve. Then … blew past (PageMaker remains No. 2)

A: Quark

Or better:

Q: Aldus invented desktop publishing with PageMaker but failed to improve. It was soon outdistanced by …

A: Quark

Or better:

Q: PageMaker failed to improve and was outdistanced by …

A: Quark

Or better:

Q: PageMaker lost ground to …

A: Quark

Harder item

Q: a light and joking conversation

A: banter

Easier item

Q: a light and joking conversation (e.g. Mandela and de Klerk in 1992)

A: banter

(Dr Piotr Wozniak)

146. Only 2 Problems That Stop People From Achieving Anything

10 August 2023 09:16

Think about your biggest, most important goals. To be wealthier? Smarter? More impactful? A better person? Happier? Healthier?

What’s stopping you from achieving these?

If you ask the average person, you’ll hear things like: I’m not motivated enough, I don’t have enough money or time, I’m not smart enough, I’m not lucky. I don’t know the right people. These myriad reasons can overwhelm and confound us when we try to solve a problem or achieve a goal.

Renowned theoretical physicist David Deutsch has a fundamentally different perspective that I find extremely inspiring. In his book The Beginning Of Infinity (one of the top 10 books I have ever read), he argues that there are only two real obstacles to any problem: physics and knowledge.

Physics. Your goal needs to be possible according to the laws of physics. If it isn’t, then no amount of knowledge will make it possible. You cannot get to Mars in your Chevy Suburban, no matter how much you know about space travel.

Knowledge. If it’s physically possible, then the fundamental obstacle is always knowledge.

If that sounds a little crazy, first it’s helpful to understand the lens from which Deutsch looks at the world. He spends all of his time researching the most fundamental aspects of the most fundamental discipline, physics.

We, on the other hand, live on the opposite end of the spectrum. We think day-to-day rather than in billions of years. We think about things on the surface level rather than a fundamental level. We typically reason by analogy rather than First Principles.

We are so wrapped up in our daily challenges, that it’s almost impossible to get as big-picture as Deutsch does and see the fundamentals. But when you look at the world from his perspective, it becomes obvious that knowledge is the key to achieving all of our goals.

In the book, Deutsch gives a fascinating thought experiment to explain his reasoning. In my opinion, it is the best thought experiment that has ever been created to show knowledge’s primacy.

The Thought Experiment That Demonstrates That Knowledge Is Power

Imagine taking a cube the size of our solar system and putting it in empty intergalactic space. There would basically be nothing in the cube except hydrogen atoms. Granted, there would still be over one million tons of matter contained in the cube, but it would be spread out over a vast distance.

To most of us, we’d look at this cube and say that it’s empty and useless. To Deutsch, this emptiness is actually teeming with potential life.

Deutsch explains, “In a comprehensible universe, if something isn’t forbidden by the laws of physics, then what could possibly prevent us from doing it, other than knowing how? In other words, it’s a matter of knowledge, not resources.”

In the book, he explains how, if you had the right knowledge, you could vacuum up all of the atoms into one spot. Then a nuclear fusion reactor could combine those atoms into any other element. Finally, a 3D printer with a one-atom resolution could transform those atoms into humans and a space station that could support those humans, or anything else for that matter.

Each step in the thought experiment is possible according to the laws of physics. The only thing missing at each step is the right knowledge.

Granted, actually getting to the knowledge on how to build a fusion reactor could take a team a several lifetimes in today’s world. But, that’s not the point. Simply replace fusion reactor with your actual goals, and you’ll see the thought experiment’s power.

An Example Of The Thought Experiment In My Life

Take behavior change as an example. About 6 years ago, I attempted to create a daily reading ritual from 8–10pm after our kids had fallen asleep. Despite wanting to, I almost never followed through. It wasn’t until I made a study of habit change that I found proven ideas to experiment with. Soon, I found a formula that I followed consistently. In the end, the problem wasn’t the kids. It wasn’t lack of time. It wasn’t fatigue. The real reason I wasn’t consistent is because I didn’t have the right knowledge on how my mind works.

Furthermore, the only reason I knew to value spending my free time learning was because of knowledge I had learned about it’s importance. Before then, I had thought of learning as a nice to have, but not essential.

Dissect any problem you’re facing, and you’ll notice a similar pattern.

Many people argue that action is more valuable than knowledge. Their case: if you don’t take action on what you know, then the knowledge has no value. This argument misses the point that to follow through on difficult habits that have a long-term pay-offs actually requires knowledge.

Many people also argue that emotions and limiting beliefs are fundamental: If you don’t even believe you can, then no amount of knowledge will help. But this misses the point that beliefs about self worth are based on knowledge of self. With the right knowledge, we can change our self-image into something that empowers us. In addition, let’s say we fear failure. With the right knowledge, we can represent failure differently in our mind, so that our fear diminishes. We can study how others successfully deal with failure and model them.

As all great thought experiments do, Deutsch’s thought experiment teaches us important lessons about how reality works…

What we can learn from Deutsch’s thought experiment:

The fundamental obstacle is always knowledge. As you get more and more fundamental on the root causes of any problem after stripping away the proximate causes, it becomes more and more apparent that knowledge is the fundamental challenge. In other words, challenges like lack of resources (e.g., money, time, and relationships) are real challenges that hold people back, but they are not fundamental. There are many things out of our control that impact our success: upbringing, genetics, parents, the country we are born in, to name a few. These play huge roles in our life. At the same time, there is a case to be made that, of the things we can control, knowledge is the most fundamental and important.

Knowledge is the ultimate lever to solving problems and achieving goals. In the same way that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, solving our problems at a fundamental level gives us way more leverage than just addressing them at the surface level. Therefore, the first thing we should do when solving a complex problem or pursuing a goal is thinking about what knowledge we need.

Every problem is a knowledge search problem. Inventor Charles Kettering once said, “A problem well-stated is a problem half-solved.” Deutsch’s thought experiment is a problem well-stated. It frames all problems as knowledge search problems. With this framing, whenever we have a challenge, we can ask ourselves, “What knowledge am I missing? How can I most quickly find that knowledge?”

There are two places we can find the knowledge we need. First, there is OPK (other people’s knowledge) such as people in our network and the Internet, which is a store of humanity’s knowledge. This is where we should go first, because virtually any problem or goal that we have has been solved/accomplished in whole or in part by many people throughout history, some of whom who wrote books, created videos, or other materials sharing the approaches they used. Second, there is what I call the orchard of undiscovered knowledge. This is the knowledge which exists theoretically, but just hasn’t been harvested by humanity yet. In this orchard, the trees are full of fruit. Our job is to find the ripe fruit that is ready to be picked. This ripe fruit is knowledge that is one leap of insight away from being discovered given our current collective knowledge.

Learning how to learn is one of the most valuable skill sets we can develop. If finding knowledge is essential. Then the ability to find better knowledge faster and use it is the ultimate skill. Learning how to learn is that skill set.

Bottom line: Knowledge is power

“If you can define the problem differently than everybody else in the industry, you can generate alternatives that others aren’t thinking about.” ― Roger L. Martin, Opposable Mind: Winning Through Integrative Thinking

Deutsch’s thought experiment squares well with what I’ve experienced and have seen in the real world. Over the last several years, I’ve deeply studied and written about many of the most successful entrepreneurs and leaders in history (Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Bill Gates, etc.) and I’ve noticed how highly they value knowledge. They have billions of dollars at their disposal. They employ thousands of the world’s smartest people. Yet they’ve still made time for deliberate learning throughout their entire career.

Here’s how these entrepreneurs and leaders see the value of knowledge differently:

Following the 5-hour rule is key (despite being extremely busy). Warren Buffett, for example, has spent 80% of his time throughout his career reading and thinking. In Bill Gates, Warren Buffett And Oprah All Use The 5-Hour Rule, I show how many of the most impactful people spend at least 5 hours per week in deliberate learning.

Knowledge compounds upon itself. As Benjamin Franklin said, “An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.” Based on this insight, they Learn How To Learn better so they can maximize the rate at which knowledge compounds. Learning How To Learn is the equivalent of investing at a high interest rate. When you invest money at a high interest rate, every dollar you put in yields more money in the future. The same is true for the knowledge you put into your head.

The value of knowledge is increasing while the value of physical things is dropping fast. We are at the beginning of a period of what renowned futurist Peter Diamandis calls rapid demonetization, in which technology is rendering previously expensive products or services much cheaper — or even free.

They learn across domains. In How Elon Musk Learns Faster And Better Than Everyone Else, I show how many great entrepreneurs think across domains to generate novel insights. Interestingly, The founders of the five largest companies in the world — Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Warren Buffett, Larry Page, and Jeff Bezos are all polymaths. In short, all of the best knowledge in the world isn’t concentrated in just one field. So the top entrepreneurs become polymaths.

They understand knowledge at a fundamental level. They understand that the fundamental building block of knowledge is mental models. Therefore, they deliberately collect and use mental models.

They have honed their ability to make decisions based on what they’ve learned.

They have honed their ability to turn knowledge into results. The value of knowledge isn’t in the knowledge itself. It’s in our ability to turn the knowledge we learn into hacks and habits, tactics and strategies that create real-world results.

Six years ago, these insights inspired me to make a big shift in my life. As I shared earlier, despite, being busy with a company and two young kids, I decided to make time for deliberate learning across all of the most important areas of my life. I reasoned to myself: if the busiest people in the world can find the time, so can I.

So, after the kids went to bed, I immediately went to Barnes & Noble and spent 1–2 hours in deliberate learning until the store closed. I also spent 6 hours or so each weekend focused on learning and growth. Very quickly, I saw that the time I was putting in was paying off on multiple levels. The business was growing. I was becoming more healthy. I was becoming a much better writer.

Because I saw the value of learning compounding in real tangible ways, I consciously carved out more and more time for learning. Today, I spend 4–5 hours every business day combing through academic studies, reading books, thinking, interviewing great thinkers, and receiving coaching. This extra time has helped me to quickly achieve my most important goals. For example, it has helped me write more thoughtful and unique articles that are seen by tens of millions of people. It has helped me think at a deeper level about the complex problems I face as a parent and an entrepreneur that I previously wasn’t even able to wrap my head around.

Bottom line: For whatever we want in life, knowledge of how to do it is the key lever to make it happen. Impact, money, purpose and happiness — all of these require the right knowledge. Knowledge of what actions to take, how to make better decisions, how to get ourselves to take action when we don’t feel like it.

(Michael Simmons)

147. A Culture of Writing at Your Company

18 August 2023 10:13

From recruiting, to brand momentum, to instilling customer confidence, to using what you’ve already built as marketing, publishing as a team creates a magnetic asset: a library of content that attracts the right customers, hires, investors, and attention to your company.

1. Write to create leverage for your career

A well-constructed blog post is a career asset for the author, silly as it may seem. When you detail how you think about things, or how you approached a tricky project, you reveal more about yourself than any predictably unblemished resume could ever hope to. Projects and portfolios are cardinal companions to the modern resume.

But not everyone’s work results in something immediately reference-able. I call this the “Portfolio Problem.” Your colleagues in People Ops/HR, for example, primarily work on internal company projects. There’s often nothing public-facing to point to once the work is done, even though they’ve dedicated just as much effort as anyone.

This is where writing can be your ally. Leah Knobler, People Ops at Help Scout, built a bit of a niche following for herself with posts on everything from planning company retreats to replacing our all-hands meeting with video. And although she authored the pieces, they were a shared win; successful projects from her department were now visible to all.

Highlighting this opportunity to present shared accomplishments is often key when convincing your colleagues to write. I’ve yet to work with a single contributor who didn’t have reservations about taking too much credit, for good reason. Team players prefer “what we accomplished” to “what I did.”

2. Write to promote diversity on a company platform

I see this as “capital D” diversity, which means diversity in its many forms: diversity of contributors, diversity of disciplines, and diversity of thought.

If diversity matters to you, your public platform should match your intentions and inner-workings. When the marketing team have the only bylines on the blog you are, by definition, not representing the entirety of your company.

My colleagues deeply cared about us running an inclusive publication; yours likely feel the same way. You can turn this passion into action by pointing out that such a publication is contingent on having a varied group of contributors — you need a variety of people, expertise, and opinions to properly represent the people who work here, and you can’t do it alone.

3. Write to better understand your work

Writing grows the business and the team, but it also grows the individual; you don’t know what you know until you try to write it down. Writing to understand is just as important as writing to be understood.

Here is where your experience as a writer can energize everyone else. Emphasize that the exercise of writing is as valuable as the asset of a finished article. Writing extracts ideas from your head, lays them out, pieces them together, and helps you assess where you stand. When writing about one’s work, a prevailing personal motive is to fulfill what George Orwell calls historical impulse.

The desire to see things as they are, to find out true facts and store them up for the use of posterity.

For those who like a challenge, you can point out that publishing your thoughts raises the stakes and thus raises your standards; brains forgive fuzzy abstractions, but audiences (and editors) do not.

4. Write to pay it forward

There isn’t a single person working in an internet business that hasn’t benefited from the hard-won experience others freely share in blog posts, forums, and tutorials. We readily take as much information, guidance, and encouragement as we can carry — it feels good to offer up some of our own in return.

When you start publishing as a team, you’re sure to hear, “But everything worth discussing has already been said,” or, “I don’t have any unique opinions to share.” This is how you address these concerns.

Remind people that a beginner is born every minute, and every idea can be seen from multiple perspectives. It often takes hearing something a certain way for it to finally click. Your particular vantage point could provide that moment for someone else.

The push

Writers love the mystique of, “How do they do it?” Truth be told, nonfiction involves less rain-dancing and sacrificial black magic than writers would have you believe (for fiction, all bets are off).

And if you want people to contribute, you need to fully expose how editing and publishing actually work. You can start with the following steps.

1. Set clear, achievable standards

To successfully introduce colleagues into the mix you must set reasonable expectations while holding firm to your editorial standards. You can’t let a bad piece slip by just because “they worked really hard on it.” But you also need to be careful of imposing unrealistic or confusing requirements; publishing needs to feel possible.

Here’s where documenting your editorial strategy pays for itself ten times over. Unless you plan on forcing contributors to live in a land of abstraction, where “quality” is defined by how you were feeling that day, you need to write down what the company publication is about, how you prefer to communicate, and what a valuable post for readers generally looks like.

2. Outline the publishing process

When I first kicked off team writing, I asked around about what would be helpful to cover in a few docs. Multiple people wanted to know how submitting to the blog actually worked. Whoops. For the longest time I was the only writer; I hadn’t considered the benefits of mapping out the nitty-gritty process.

Don’t make the same mistake. Step-by-step instructions make contributing more approachable. You can use the Five W’s to get the gears turning and build a starter list of common questions your colleagues might ask you. After you get feedback and surface points of confusion, you can add to your list.

Who:

is the person I should chat with when I have an idea?

will edit my first draft?

from my department should read/approve the post?

has final say on what gets published?

What:

makes for a really good article?

steps do I need to own during this process?

do I need to include in my initial pitch?

When:

should I have a first draft done after my pitch is approved?

should I review the first round of edits?

can I expect my post to be published?

Where:

do we catalog our article ideas?

does my first draft live once it’s done?

should I put article assets (images, etc.) for my post?

Why:

[these questions are often specific to the individual]

3. Explain the purpose of editing

Handing over a fragile first draft and getting back deletions and critique in return can take the wind out of your sails. Editing becomes less distressing when everyone knows what it’s for and how it works.

At Help Scout, we used the Venn diagram above to capture what editing meant to us. “Good” writing is fiercely subjective and painfully inscrutable, so a single graphic can’t cover it all. It can, however, plainly set the bar.

Concentrated. Explain big ideas in a small space with no words wasted. We constantly looked for sections, paragraphs, and sentences that could be distilled or removed entirely.

Vivid. The art of being unquestionably clear and memorably imaginative. Finding common ground between author and reader, such as explaining an advanced concept with a familiar analogy or metaphor, is the best way to quickly establish a connection and share ideas with a wider audience.

Incisive. Good writing is a campaign against cliche. When you’ve lots of experience in a discipline, ideas trotted out ad nauseam become obvious and boring. Avoid those—don’t patronize readers, leave out everything that can be inferred, and push the conversation in a productive direction.

When discussing editing, emphasize the role of substantive editing versus how line and copy edits work; while the latter are vital for publishing polished material, your colleagues shouldn’t stress themselves over adverbs and passive voice. You and your editor will help with that so they can focus on their ideas.

To this end, beware of editing articles in a way that causes the author to feel like a “special guest” instead of the star. Great editors are like great mentors; they don’t control your story, they help you realize it. Have the courage to challenge and shoot down sloppy thinking, but don’t let a rigid grasp squeeze out the personality from other people’s prose.

Editors create fine stories by typing on a keyboard composed of human beings. Knowing which key to hit when and how hard to press it is both art and craft.

— David Carr, The New York Times

4. Provide guidance with writing prompts

For a plan to go the distance, working on it has to become habit. Relying solely on outside influence, like the marketing team pestering people to write, can etch out short-term wins but is ultimately an exercise in futility. Anything that feels like a homework assignment is done begrudgingly, if at all.

The fix is to use writing prompts. Prompts work because they’re a set of guidelines that also act as internal cues to identify when you’ve come across a potentially good story. Because writing prompts are questions raised around the work you’re already doing, they’ve a number of inherent advantages.

Prompts are mostly evergreen. You can update your list of prompts when you find other meaningful examples, but effort spent on your initial list pays dividends for quite a while — carefully considered reasons to write have a long shelf-life.

Prompts make writing approachable. A blank canvas imposes the burden of infinite scope. People crave direction as much as they crave inspiration. Good writing prompts focus on common patterns people can notice and connect to so they have an accessible place to begin.

Prompts are a catalyst to write. Prompts incite action because they’re natural reminders to write as a response to observations and experiences. Once you’ve encountered a prompt, you’ll see it in your day-to-day, and viewing the world with this writer’s lens can shift how you react. “Searching for an answer but not finding a good one” can go from mildly frustrating moment to potential article idea.

Prompts get people to think critically about the by-product of their work. All of our work creates by-products in the form of questions raised, lessons learned, and challenges overcome. Harvesting this outgrowth puts contributors in a position to share ideas and stories they’re most intimately familiar with.

Diana Smith

, Director of Product Marketing at Segment, created a starter list of prompts in a presentation she gave to her team on how to write for the company blog. They’re good examples to model when you begin creating your own prompts.

Publishing is a team sport

When you relegate “content” to a single bullet point in the marketing departments AORs, you speak volumes about how you value communication. Your customers, and the brand you’ve worked so hard to build, deserve better than that.

Although writing is a deeply personal and often emotional act, publishing is a team sport.

(Gregory Ciotti)

Some blogging myths

A few years ago I gave a short talk (slides) about myths that discourage people from blogging. I was chatting with a friend about blogging the other day and it made me want to write up that talk as a blog post.

here are the myths:

myth: you need to be original

myth: you need to be an expert

myth: posts need to be 100% correct

myth: writing boring posts is bad

myth: you need to explain every concept

myth: page views matter

myth: more material is always better

myth: everyone should blog

myth: you need to be original

This is probably the one I hear the most often – “Someone has written about this before! Who’s going to care about what I have to say?“.

The main way I think about this personally is:

identify something I personally have found confusing or interesting

write about it

The idea is that if I found it confusing, lots of other people probably did too, even though the information might theoretically be out there on the internet somewhere. Just because there is information on the internet, it doesn’t get magically teleported into people’s brains!

I sometimes store up things that I find confusing for many months or years – for example right now I’m confused about some specific details of how Docker networking works on Mac, but I haven’t figured it out enough to be able to write about it. If I ever figure it out to my satisfaction I’ll probably write a blog post.

Sometimes when I write a blog post, someone will link me to a great existing explanation of the thing that I hadn’t seen. I try to think of this as a good thing – it means that I get a new resource that I couldn’t find, and maybe other people find out about it too. Often I’ll update the blog post to link to it.

A couple of other notes about this one:

technology changes, and the details matter. Maybe the exact details about how to do something have changed in the last 5 years, and there isn’t much written about the situation in 2023!

personal stories are really valuable. For example I love my friend Mikkel’s Git is my buddy post about how he uses Git. It’s not the same way that I use it, and I like seeing his approach.

a bit more about my love for personal stories

I think the reason I keep writing these blog posts encouraging people to blog is that I love reading people’s personal stories about how they do stuff with computers, and I want more of them. For example, I started using a Mac recently, and I’ve been very annoyed by the lack of tracing tools like strace.

So I would love to read a story about how someone is using tracing tools to debug on their Mac in 2023! I found one from 2016, but I think the situation with system integrity protection has changed since then and the instructions don’t work for me.

That’s just one example, but there are a million other things on computers that I do not know how to do, where I would love to read 1 person’s story of exactly how they did it in 2023.

myth: you need to be an expert

The second myth is that you need to be an expert in the thing you’re writing about. If you’ve been reading this blog, you probably know that I’ve written a lot of “hey, I just learned this!” posts over the years, where I:

Learn an interesting thing (“hey, I didn’t know how gdb works, that’s cool!”)

Write a short blog post about what I learned (how does gdb work?)

You actually just need to know 1-2 interesting things that the reader doesn’t. And if you just learned the thing yesterday, it’s certain that lots of other people don’t know it either.

myth: posts need to be 100% correct

I try to my make my posts mostly correct, and I’ve gotten a bit better at that over time.

My main strategy here is to just add qualifiers like “My understanding is..” or “I think..” before statements that I’m not totally sure of. This saves a lot of time fact checking statements that I’m honestly not sure how to fact check most of the time.

Some examples of “I think…s” from my past blog posts:

I think people are replacing “how many golf balls can fit in the Empire State Building” with more concrete [interview] questions about estimating program runtime and space requirements.

I think the most important thing with bridges is to set up the route tables correctly. So far my understanding is that there are 2 route table entries you need to set: …

Etsy uses PHP, which I think means they can’t have long-lived persistent TCP connections

I think the MTU on my local network is 1500 bytes.

I still don’t know if all of those statements are true (is it true that PHP programs can’t have long-lived persistent TCP connections? maybe not!), so the qualifiers are useful. I don’t really know anything about PHP so I don’t have much interest in fact checking that PHP statement – I’m happy to leave it as an “I think” and potentially correct later it if someone tells me it’s wrong.

I do tend to overdo the “I think that…” statements a bit (bad habit!) and sometimes I need to edit them out when actually it’s something I’m 100% sure of.

myth: writing boring posts is bad

The reality of publishing things on the internet is that interesting things get boosted, and boring things get ignored. So people are basically guaranteed to think your posts are much more interesting that they actually are, because they’re more likely to see your interesting posts.

Also it’s hard to guess in advance what people will think is interesting, so I try to not worry too much about predicting that in advance. I really Darius Kazemi’s How I Won The Lottery talk on this topic about how putting things on the internet is like buying lots of lottery tickets, and the best way to “win” is to make a lot of stuff.

myth: you need to explain every concept

It’s common for people writing advanced posts (like “how malloc works”) to try to include very basic definitions for beginners.

The problem is that you end up writing something that feels like it wasn’t written for anyone: beginners will get confused (it’s very hard to bring someone from “I have no idea what memory allocation is” to “in depth notes about the internals of malloc” in a single blog post), and more advanced readers will be bored and put off by the overly basic explanations.

I found that the easiest way to start was to pick one person and write for them.

You can pick a friend, a coworker, or just a past version of yourself. Writing for just 1 person might feel insufficiently general (“what about all the other people??“) but writing that’s easy to understand for 1 person (other than you!) has a good chance of being easy to understand for many other people as well.

writing has gotten harder as I get more experienced

Someone who read this mentioned that they feel like writing has gotten harder as they get more experienced, and I feel the same way.

I think this is because the gap between me and who I’m writing for has gotten a bigger over time, and so it gets a little harder for me to relate to people who know less about the topic. I think on the balance having more experience makes my writing better (I have more perspective!), but it feels harder.

I don’t have any advice to give about this right now. I just want to acknowledge that it’s hard because someone who read a draft of this mentioned it.

myth: page views matter

I’ve looked at page view analytics a lot in my life, and I’ve never really gotten anything out of it. Comments like this one mean a lot more to me:

Hey, @b0rk. Just wanted to let you know that this post really helped me to improve my skill of understanding a complex concept. Thanks! :)

If it helps one person, I figure I’ve won. And probably it helped 10 other people who didn’t say anything too!

myth: more material is always better

I appreciate the work that goes into extremely deep dive blog posts, but honestly they’re not really my thing. I’d rather read something short, learn a couple of new things, and move on.

So that’s how I approach writing as well. I’ll share a couple of interesting things and then leave anything extra for another post. For me this works well because short posts take less time to write.

This one is obviously a personal preference: short posts aren’t “better” either, I just like them more.

But I often see people get tripped up by wanting to include EVERYTHING in their blog post and then never publishing anything and I think it’s worth considering just making the post shorter and publishing it.

some notes on pedantic/annoying comments

Someone who read a draft of this mentioned struggling with comments that are pedantic or annoying or mean or argumentative. That one’s definitely not a myth, I’ve read a lot of comments like that about my work. (as well as a lot more comments where people are being constructive, but those ones aren’t the problem)

A few notes on how I deal with it:

The “don’t read the comments” advice has never worked for me, for better or for worse. I read all of them.

I don’t reply to them. Even if they’re wrong. I dislike arguing on the internet and I’m extremely bad at it, so it’s not a good use of my time.

Sometimes I can learn something new from the comment, and I try to take that as a win, even if the thing is kind of minor or the comment is phrased in a way that I find annoying.

Sometimes I’ll update the post to fix mistakes.

I’ve sometimes found it helpful to reinterpret people being mad as people being confused or curious. I wrote a toy DNS resolver once and some of the commenters were upset that I didn’t handle parsing the DNS packet. At the time I thought this was silly (I thought DNS parsing was really straightforward and that it was obvious how to do it) but I realized that maybe the commenters didn’t think it was easy or obvious, and wanted to know how do it. Which makes sense! It’s not obvious! Those comments partly inspired implement DNS in a weekend, which focuses much more heavily on the parsing aspects.

As with everything I don’t think this is the “best” way to deal with pedantic/annoying comments, it’s just what I do.

myth: everyone should blog

I sometimes see advice to the effect of “blogging is great! public speaking is great! everyone should do it! build your Personal Brand!“.

Blogging isn’t for everyone. Tons of amazing developers don’t have blogs or personal websites at all. I write because it’s fun for me and it helps me organize my thoughts.

(Julia Evans)

148. Main Ideas of Complex Systems

14 September 2023 11:30

Emergence: This principle holds that the collective behavior of a system arises from the interactions of its parts, and this behavior is not predictable just by understanding individual system components.

Adaptation: Complex systems often have the ability to adapt or evolve in response to changing conditions in their environment. Adaptability is a key feature of a complex system.

Non-linearity: In complex systems, the output is not proportional to the input. Small changes can have disproportionately large effects, and vice versa.

Interconnectedness: The elements in complex systems are interconnected in such a way that altering one element can have cascading effects throughout the system.

Feedback Loops: These are mechanisms by which the output of a system can circle back and influence its input, leading to patterns of dynamic, recursive evolution.

Self-Organization: Systems may self-organize, forming patterns and structures without a central authority directing this organization.

Path Dependence: The history of a system matters, and the past states of a system can influence its present and future states.

Bounded Rationality: In complex systems, agents often make decisions based on limited information and bounded rationality, which affects the system's dynamics.

Fractal Structure: Complex systems often exhibit fractal structures, with self-similar patterns appearing at various levels of scale.

Chaotic Dynamics: Complex systems can exhibit chaotic behavior, where long-term predictions are impossible due to sensitive dependence on initial conditions.

Multiscale Nature: Complex systems often operate on multiple scales, both in space and time. Understanding a system fully may require understanding it at many different scales.

Modularity: Systems often contain discernible modules or clusters, a collection of nodes that have more and denser connections with each other compared to nodes in other modules.

Robustness and Fragility: While complex systems can exhibit a great deal of resilience and robustness, they can also be fragile, with vulnerabilities that can lead to catastrophic failures.

Network Topology: The structure of the networks within a complex system (how its elements are connected) can have a significant impact on its behavior.

Diversity and Redundancy: The presence of diversity and redundancy in complex systems can enhance their resilience and adaptability.

Heterogeneity: The components and agents in complex systems are often not identical but have different properties and behaviors, which can contribute to the rich, complex behavior of the system as a whole.

Far-From-Equilibrium Dynamics: Complex systems often operate far from equilibrium, in a state of continuous change and flux, driven by a constant flow of energy and matter.

Learning and Memory: Systems can have mechanisms for learning from experiences and retaining a memory of past events, which influence future behavior.

Optimization and Trade-offs: Complex systems involve optimization processes where various conflicting objectives are balanced, and trade-offs are made to find feasible solutions.

Spontaneous Order: In many cases, the order in complex systems arises spontaneously, without being planned or directed by any agent.

Coevolution: In biological systems, for instance, species co-evolve, each one shaping and being shaped by the others in a dynamic interplay.

149. Wealth

05 Oct 2023 22:08

"Wealth is not a number. I don’t think it can be characterized very well by a number. It is the set of all transformations that you are capable of bringing about. That is your wealth. And if optimism is true, then there’s no limit to wealth." (David Deutsch)

The use of the term "transformation" in David Deutsch's definition of wealth is significant because it captures the essence of dynamic change and impact. Unlike terms like "effect" or "alteration," which might imply smaller or more superficial changes, "transformation" suggests a fundamental or holistic change in state, form, or appearance.

Here's why "transformation" is a powerful term in this context:

Agency

It denotes an active capability. You're not just passively accumulating resources; you're actively converting your capabilities into something new and impactful.

Breadth

"Transformation" can apply to a wide range of changes—personal, social, technological, environmental, etc. 

Depth

The term suggests not just any change, but meaningful, substantial change. 

Potential for Growth

The concept leaves room for continual expansion and refinement, a continuous process rather than a one-time event. 

Implies Value

Transformation usually implies a shift towards improvement or higher value.

By focusing on "transformation," Deutsch emphasizes not just what you have, but what you can do—how you can apply your resources, skills, and knowledge to bring about meaningful changes, thereby becoming "wealthy" in a more comprehensive sense.

In this view, a billionaire with poor family relationships would have limited "wealth" because their capability for meaningful transformations is restricted to the financial domain. Their lack of strong interpersonal relationships could imply a limitation in their ability to effect transformations on a personal or emotional level.

Wealth, in Deutsch's sense, is a multidimensional construct that goes beyond financial resources to encompass a broad range of capabilities for effecting change. It would take into account not just financial acumen but also emotional intelligence, relational skills, intellectual breadth, and more.

According to Deutsch's definition of wealth, the ultimate proof of your capability to bring about transformations is to actually enact those changes. It's a bit like the saying "the proof of the pudding is in the eating." You can assess your potential and indirect indicators as much as you like, but the most direct measure of your "wealth" in this sense is the tangible transformations you've been able to make in various aspects of life—be it personal, professional, or communal.

This framework places a strong emphasis on action and outcome, making it fundamentally different from a financial or asset-based definition of wealth, which can be more passively accumulated.

(ChatGPT)

150. Don’t Share Your Goals

25 October 2023 11:01

Goal is closely tied to your identity (Peter Gollwitzer)

Person praise and not process praise (Reed College study)

When positive feedback signals progress it actually decreases motivation (Ayelet Fishbach)

Negative feedback decreases motivation for a beginner (Ayelet Fishbach)

151. But if we don’t make her do maths…

26 October 2023 13:48

From the archives: Posted on 25th January, 2000

“After visiting the ‘Puzzling Parenting’ stuff, I went to the Taking Children Seriously site and read Sarah’s wonderful article about math(s). It got me wondering. I am imagining a kid, no—a family of three kids. The kids are, um, 10, 12 & 15. The parents have resisted the urge to push academics on them. They have not done any academic math(s). They play video games, chat on the internet, build lego stuff, build tree-houses, etc. Would somebody write for me a description of life from here on? Tell me a story, that includes the 15 year old becoming a scientist. I am just having trouble picturing them starting math so late… Would somebody help me with this idea?”

And later:

“The concern is genuine. Without knowledge, how do we come to be who it is we are ‘meant’ to be? And is there not a point, developmentally, where it can be ‘too late’?”

NO. I am sure it can’t be “too late.”

“What I really want is a way to picture life from here for, say, the oldest one (15, was it?). Does she begin with fractions and decimals”

Maybe. Probably not.

“and work her way up to algebra, then calculus?”

Calculus is almost certain to follow, rather than precede, algebra, yes.

“Does she start at the local community college”

Quite possibly.

“in remedial classes?”

No, in normal classes.

“What does such a life LOOK like?”

Well OK, if you really insist on knowing, I’ll tell you. I know all the details except her name, so let’s call her Anna.

Sometime this year, Anna’s previous interest in Lego, treehouse-building, the internet and computer games will all come together and draw her attention to a major TV documentary about how stunts are arranged in movies. She will start building such stunts in the garden, each more ingenious than the last, using all sorts of props and filming them on a video camera. One day, a physics teacher will walk past and see her doing this. Calling to her to give her advice about how to balance a particular arrangement of planks, he will inadvertently cause her to fall fifteen feet onto the grass, fortunately causing only a broken toe.

Anna will have to wait three hours for treatment in the emergency room, which could have been excruciating (because the slightly addled person waiting on her left suffering from chronic whiteboard-marker poisoning will be a mathematics teacher eager to plug the gaps in her home education), but in the event, it will pass quickly because she will get into conversation with the fascinating person waiting on her right, a huge lady called Agnes. Turns out Agnes’ ex-husband used to do stunts in Hollywood and she used to help him before she found out about some of the other stunts he pulled—but that’s another story. Anyway, now she owns three successful cafes in town and has just bought two more and wants to go up-market. She’s been talking to an advertising agency about making a series of ads for the local TV. She hasn’t liked any of their ideas so far, but soon finds that Anna is bubbling with great ideas for how to advertise high-class restaurants using movie-like stunts. Agnes will be surprised and delighted to hear that Anna actually has videos of several stunts she has arranged single-handed (with a little help from her little brothers) and will tell her her to drop by at her office next say.

Next day Anna will hobble along to Agnes’ office above one of her restaurants, currently being re-fitted with the new up-market decor. Agnes will love the videos, and will commission Anna to design five stunts for the new series of ads, and execute them for the TV people. Anna will earn three thousand dollars for this, but think no more about it until six months later when the advertising agency will offer her a similar job, albeit for only $500. She will accept, because even though it’s a lot of work and the materials alone will cost almost that much, she will enjoy it enormously. The following week, someone will let the agency down and they will phone around in desperation for anyone they know who can do a firework display. Anna will never have done such a thing, and technically it’s illegal, but she will agree to step in to help them out. Not only will the display be a great success, but Anna will meet and fall instantly in love with … the computerised timing device that the agency gave her to time the fireworks. She will ask if she can borrow it, and for the next year it will spend far more time in her garage than at the agency, for she will think of more and more ways to use it to do wonderful stunts, and also special effects. She will also start editing her movies on the agency’s professional computerised editing system.

One day in the cutting room, she will meet a pro who is engaged in a science documentary. He will be a mathematics graduate—who has forgotten all the maths he ever knew and will now be spending all his time filming animals mating. So they won’t talk about maths but she will show him how to hide some of the more repulsive aspects of his footage using a difficult timed transition on the editing machine, and in return he will introduce her to his boss, whose next documentary will be about the NASA robots that will one day explore Mars. Anna will be hired as a technical assistant on that documentary, and will dazzle everyone with the exciting stunts she will think of to demonstrate how these robots will behave on Mars. The boss will offer her a permanent job on the team, but she will refuse, because while at NASA, she will also have helped one of the astronomers out with making a promotional movie designed to persuade the government to fund more infra-red satellites. The problem will have been how to display, in an eye-catching and persuasive way, the complex data that demonstrate why such satellites are better than ground-based telescopes. Anna will succeed at this so well that she will have persuaded herself too. She will spend the next two years working for one of NASA’a subcontractors, first in the publicity department, then designing user-interfaces for satellite ground stations, and then even some aspects of the satellites themselves.

All this will involve a lot of interactions between herself and astrophysics graduate students, but slowly the attraction of satellites will wear off, and she will realise that her real love is theoretical astronomy. She’ll read a book about calculus, do a six- month adult-education course in physics to fill in the gaps in what she’s picked up, and then apply to take an undergraduate degree in astronomy, complete it a year ahead of time and then be accepted for a PhD in quasar structure. At that point she will officially become a SCIENTIST.

Meanwhile she will have had two children with the NASA astronomer (who will have left astronomy to become an internet millionaire and failed miserably, but will by that time be blissfully happy again as a home maker), and she will worry that the children won’t achieve anything in life unless they have a good grounding in the basics, especially mathematics, but for some unaccountable reason the ungrateful little wretches will be digging their heels in and refusing to listen.

(David Deutsch)

What do you have against coercion?

“Coercion is a way of choosing between rival theories that is independent of the theories’ content, and depends only on which of the proponents of the theories is stronger. Coercion embodies the false theory that might makes right.”

– Sarah Fitz-Claridge

“What do you have against coercion?”

Disagreements can either be resolved through reason, or they can be dealt with coercively.

Think about the logic of what coercion does. Coercion is a way of choosing between rival theories that is independent of the theories’ content, and depends only on which of the proponents of the theories is stronger. Coercion embodies the false theory that might makes right. So it can’t be part of a rational system. It introduces irrationality into the knowledge-creating system and gives the wrong answer.

As William Godwin wrote:

“The right of the parent over his child lies either in his superior strength or his superior reason. If in his strength, we have only to apply this right universally, in order to drive all morality out of the world. If in his reason, in that reason let him confide.

[…]

Let us consider the effect that coercion produces upon the mind of him against whom it is employed. It cannot begin with convincing; it is no argument. It begins with producing the sensation of pain, and the sentiment of distaste. It begins with violently alienating the mind from the truth with which we wish it to be impressed. It includes in it a tacit confession of imbecility. If he who employs coercion against me could mould me to his purposes by argument, no doubt he would. He pretends to punish me because his argument is strong; but he really punishes me because his argument is weak.”

– William Godwin, 1793, Enquiry Concerning Political Justice, and Its Influence on Morals and Happiness, VII.II p. 370

That argument by William Godwin applies just as much to more subtle, covert forms of coercion, as it does to physically violent punishment. Whatever technique we use to compel our children, no matter how ‘gentle’ we think we are being, the effect on the child’s mind is the same.

In the absence of coercion, our child’s thinking can be flowing with ideas, questions, guesses, exploring, wondering about things, making bold explanatory conjectures, coming up with creative potential solutions, noticing when some of those candidate solutions don’t hold up under scrutiny and dropping them, noticing when one seems to solve the problem, noticing and wondering about new things, creating new guesses, explanations and ideas, and so on. That is the natural thing human minds do in the absence of interference in that rational knowledge-creating process.

Coercion throws a spanner in the works. It cuts off or adversely diverts the flow of thinking. It bungs everything up. When you introduce staticity or stuckness into the system, that means that in those areas of stuckness, nothing can change, no improvement can happen, no errors can be corrected: coercion interferes with learning.

When we coerce our children, we are in effect saying that we are right and they are wrong. It is as if we parents think we have the final truth. As if we have forgotten that we are fallible so might well be horribly mistaken even when it feels as if the thoughts in our mind are the revealed truth.

What example are we giving our children when we coerce them? In effect, we are teaching them that it is legitimate to get your way by coercing others. Is that really what we want to be conveying to our children? Might does not make right.

Coercion impedes the growth of knowledge. The moulding and shaping to which well-meaning parents subject their children does not just impede their children’s learning in the moment, it also tends to interfere with the children’s on-going capacity to correct errors. It hobbles their ability even to identify errors. It pushes for stasis, everything staying the same, doing the same to your own children as your parents did to you, then your children doing the same to their children as you did to them, and so on down through the generations. No improvement. Coercion hobbles progress. Progress of the entire world.

For how many more generations are we going to keep blighting our children’s lives and the future of the world by passing down all this hobbling coercion?

Problems are soluble!1 And we can solve them! Not perfectly, not infallibly: we are human beings not omniscient infallible gods! Yet despite our lack of knowledge, we human beings have made progress in the world. We have corrected many errors. How many more we could correct were we not systematically interfering with the growth of knowledge by coercing and hobbling our children? Incidentally, isn’t it wonderful that we human beings are so acutely aware of so many errors needing to be corrected? Another reason to celebrate humanity! Noticing errors helps us correct them! From each new and (we hope) better problem situation, we see new problems to solve, new errors to correct. Enjoy each new vista! Have fun! Play! Live! Love!

(Sarah Fitz-Claridge)

Taking ourselves seriously

“One of the special benefits of being a parent is that our children often show us the no-go areas of our own thinking—the fixed ideas hitherto impervious to reason. Our children have had fewer years in which to entrench their biases, so they are often more genuinely reasonable than we are with all our entrenched not-open-to-question ideas. They can thus help us to see what we may have been unable to see before. And when we see, we have improved our thinking, which improves our own life too, as all improvements do. The more we see, the more seriously we are thereby taking ourselves.”

– Cody Baldwin

“We do not see our children grow up, and change, and grow old, but they do. Thus there are no solid bodies. Things are not really things, they are processes, they are in flux.”

– Karl Popper, 1962, 2002, Conjectures and Refutations, (Routledge), Back to the Presocratics IX, p. 194

Our minds are physical things that are constantly in motion. They aren’t made out of something that is beyond understanding, but they also aren’t ever a static thing. Something physical is always happening as we think—some electricity is moving about, some molecules are changing to different molecules, or some other explainable thing. Sure, there are always gaps in our understanding, there is always mystery to be had, but in principle we can understand what is going on inside ourselves. And those physical, explainable parts that constantly move around when we think are connected with the rest of our body.

Imagine a scary spider, fangs dripping with venom as it drops down from a spindly thread directly above your head. This image in your mind alone may have just changed and affected your entire body! Even if we can’t explain or express in words every little thing that is happening at every instant, this is all part of our reasoning, our thinking. Knowledge not expressed or not expressible in words (also called “inexplicit knowledge”) is really useful if we need to do something quickly or are encountering something for the first time for example. We could not do without inexplicit thinking. We do not have direct conscious, explicit access to our inexplicit knowledge, yet it evolves and improves just as our explicit explanations improve: through reason. People tend to think of reason as being explicit  reasoning, but it need not be explicit. In the case of inexplicit knowledge, it is not explicit.

Consider the following precepts:

“Think for yourself.”

“Do as you’re told.”

Obviously, you cannot “think for yourself” and “do as you’re told” at the same time. If you are doing what you’re told, you are not doing what your own reason is suggesting you do, but what someone else thinks you should be doing.

Relying on someone else’s reason can be useful, sure, especially in a pinch, if you yourself think that that is a good idea, but then it is still your own reason informing your actions, as opposed to your actions going against your own will.

That is to say, if someone is freely choosing to do what someone else is telling them to do (as opposed to doing as they’re told against their will), they have a reason for it even if they may not be able to explain it if asked to do so.

But when we expect people (e.g. children) to just do as they’re told without question, as if they do not have their own minds and their own reason and their own moral agency, we are asking them to do the impossible. We are asking them to turn off their reason and become some kind of mindless robot and ignore and deny both their inexplicit and explicit knowledge. We are in effect saying that in order to be good, they must act wrongly according to their own reason. And that if they do what seems best to them, they are bad. This puts them in an impossible position.

To get at it from a different angle, even if we can explain why we ourselves want (or do not want) to do something, we will never know all possible reasons that someone else may want (or not want) to do that same thing. The marketing slogan “Just Do It,” encompasses this alignment of wants and reasons by acknowledging that once we have a reason to do something, and our feeling lines up with that thing, we should “just do it.” But if someone else tells you to “just do it,” the magic is gone, isn’t it?

“You have had tons of sweets today! You’ll get a cavity! Just brush your teeth! …In the time we have spent arguing about it, you could have already done it. Don’t think about it too much! If you don’t stop arguing and just do as you’re told and brush your teeth, there will be no sweets for you tomorrow!”

Consider the kind of relationship with knowledge, one’s self, and one’s thoughts that these kinds of demands express—that in regard to our own bodies, our own reasons, wants, and desires are not as important or meaningful as other people’s:

“You’ve had a bunch of sweets, you’ll get a cavity,” sets the reason we should brush our teeth as being out of fear of pain, even if that’s not the only reason we might choose to brush our teeth, while simultaneously justifying the authoritative language of the commands that follow. Further, it makes us out to be bad people if we choose not to brush our teeth, for example in order to test for ourselves the idea that sugar encourages the growth of harmful bacteria, leading to cavities.

“You could have already done it” suggests that criticizing what other people want you to do is an inefficient waste of time, and that not acting quickly against your own will makes you a bad person.

“Don’t think about it too much” says you are a bad person for thinking/reasoning.

“If you don’t stop arguing and just do as you’re told and brush your teeth, there will be no sweets for you tomorrow!” justifies punishment for not being obedient—for not acting against your own reason—and sets you up to feel as if you are a bad person for doing what you yourself think best the next time you eat sweets.

Some may say that parents saying something like the above would not hold themselves to their own standard, but I think this is false. Many people (read: adults) do try to hold themselves to the standards they set for their children. They do things they don’t want to do, because they feel like they have  to, and this blocks them both from not having to do the thing (by automating it or whatever), and from making it fun (by putting on some headphones or something). They thereby trap themselves in miserable, stressful self-coercion. Many people undervalue what they want to do compared to what they think other people want them to do. They think that they need to be obedient, without understanding or feeling good about why they have chosen to do so. Doing this to yourself is bad enough. But doing it to someone else, such as your child, is even worse, because now it is not just yourself and your own reason you are violating and harming, it is another person.

“The golden rule is a good standard which can perhaps even be improved by doing unto others, wherever possible, as they want to be done by.”

– Karl Popper, 1945, 1966, The Open Society and Its Enemies, Volume 2: The High Tide of Prophesy, revised, addendum 1 (1961), p. 386

(see also: this tweet)

Parents who hold themselves to this irrational standard sometimes justify their coercion with an appeal to stoicism, as if stoically doing something you don’t want to do, avoiding thinking about it too much, with a smile on your face, were a good thing to do! Suffering with a smile becomes virtuous! The grain of truth in stoicism is that managing not to be completely destroyed by something terrible is better than being unable to carry on. But we can do so much better than that! And if we all stoically suffered instead of creating real solutions that do not involve anyone suffering, how would things ever get better? How effective can our efforts to make progress be if we keep violating reason and doing what does not seem best instead of acting rightly by our own lights, our own ideas?

This way of looking at problems separates us from the reality of being in the process of solving them. Every justification one makes for suffering becomes a blockage. Rather than being in the process of creating a solution to a problem, we are now denying that there is a problem, and we are actively avoiding using our creativity and reason. It makes the creation of a solution (the fun part) into a burden to be placed on someone else’s shoulders—a pseudo-‘solution’—a never-ending regression, always appealing to some greater authority.

“Happiness is a state of continually solving one’s problems, they conjecture. Unhappiness is caused by being chronically baulked in one’s attempts to do that. And solving problems itself depends on knowing how; so, external factors aside, unhappiness is caused by not knowing how.”

– David Deutsch, 2011, The Beginning of Infinity, (Penguin Books), A physicist’s history of bad philosophy, p. 318

Taking our child’s wants/desires/concerns seriously involves taking ourselves seriously, too. When we understand that each person, including our child, should do what they themselves think right/best, and that no good can come of people acting wrongly, or not  doing what they think best according to their own standards, we understand that the same is true for ourselves too. Accepting that a child disagrees with our teeth-brushing theory—that the child has reasons for disagreeing—is the same as criticizing ourselves:

“Wait, why do I brush my teeth? Maybe my teeth-brushing theory is objectively mistaken? No one has to do anything. And anyway, if I didn’t do it twice a day, every day, forever, would I absolutely get a cavity? Some people who don’t brush and floss do seem to get cavities; others don’t. Maybe there are lucky genes involved, and teeth-brushing is of more marginal benefit than conventional wisdom suggests? And is it really the end of the world if we do end up with some cavities? Cavities hurt, sure, but they aren’t that bad, right, and our dentist is nice and understanding and very skilled at filling cavities without causing pain. When I was kid, why didn’t I like brushing my teeth? Have I sort of institutionalized (self-coerced) myself into brushing my teeth? Is the child’s reluctance to brush and floss a reaction to our crazy coercion? Does it hurt? Would a sensitive toothpaste help? Have we explained that flossing only hurts when you first start doing it? What about using flosser sticks instead of the floss that cuts delicate finger skin? Does the child dislike the taste of the toothpaste? Do I myself even like the taste?! Could we find or make a better tasting toothpaste? What if it tasted good AND we could actually eat it!? Wait, they do have gum and candy that helps with dental hygiene already, right? What if we had some sort of nanobot that could clean our teeth for us, or even rebuild our teeth? What if there was some kind of video game that would make the teeth brushing more fun? What about teeth brushing music, brush to the beat (Brush Brush Revolution)? I really do like the way teeth brushing feels, but I have a nice expensive toothbrush, so maybe my child might like a nice cool fancy toothbrush that feels good, too! Or what if we worked on and designed one together when we had free time? Or what about water flossers? Some people prefer that teeth-cleaning system. Or what about the painless, effective blue light teeth-cleaning system our dentist mentioned? Maybe we all might prefer that to brushing and flossing?”

“An unproblematic state is a state without creative thought. Its other name is death.”

– David Deutsch, 2011, The Beginning of Infinity (Viking Penguin), p. 63

There are infinite problematic scenarios we can imagine besides brushing teeth. If we accept that we want and can create more knowledge than we have, and that we can be mistaken even about the behaviors we have created to govern our own lives, I think we can feel the elation and joy of a world with infinite creative possibilities again, just like kids sometimes seem to do so effortlessly.

When we notice and start questioning coercion, both of our children and within our own minds, even fixed ideas that have been impervious to reason for a long time can suddenly become improvable. Fixed ideas in our thinking systematically fail to take ourselves (and others) seriously. When we have a fixed idea in our mind, even if another part of our mind wants something different, or disagrees with the fixed idea, it is stuck. Not open to criticism. And that hurts us. We have to inure ourselves to the pain.

One of the special benefits of being a parent is that our children often show us the no-go areas of our own thinking—the fixed ideas hitherto impervious to reason. Our children have had fewer years in which to entrench their biases, so they are often more genuinely reasonable than we are with all our entrenched not-open-to-question ideas. They can thus help us to see what we may have been unable to see before. And when we see, we have improved our thinking, which improves our own life too, as all improvements do. The more we see, the more seriously we are thereby taking ourselves. So taking our children seriously necessarily also helps us take ourselves as well as everyone else seriously, and it accelerates growth and improvement more generally, perhaps in a way that we haven’t felt in a long time.

(Cody Baldwin)

Creativity and Tidiness

“Tidiness is a thing which is foisted upon children, and it results in all sorts of unpleasant things for them like boredom and having their privacy invaded, and so they get nervous and uptight about their personal space, and sometimes this translates itself into hang-ups about tidiness which they then pass on to their children.”

– David Deutsch

From the archives: First published in Taking Children Seriously 21, 1996: David Deutsch interviewed by Sarah Fitz-Claridge

Many readers will know David Deutsch for his contributions to Taking Children Seriously and to the Taking Children Seriously List on the Internet, and perhaps as co-author of Home Education and the Law. Some will also know that he is a theoretical physicist who has, among other things, pioneered the new field of quantum computation. There is a major article about his work in the October 1995 Discover magazine (the issue was devoted to “Seven Ideas that could Change the World”). He is often quoted in the media and regularly makes appearances on television and radio programmes. You may have seen his programme on the physics of time travel in BBC 2’s Antenna series. [See also his two life-changing best-selling books: The Fabric of Reality and The Beginning of Infinity]

Recently, David was featured in the Channel 4 science documentary series, Reality on the Rocks, in which the actor, Ken Campbell, asked leading scientists about the nature of reality. Those who saw Reality on the Rocks may have caught a glimpse of David’s extraordinarily untidy study, at his home in Oxford. Ken Campbell was so struck by its untidiness that he talks about it in his one-man show, Mystery Bruises. He relates the story of the Japanese film crew who, upon asking to tidy up David’s home before filming there, were told that they could do so, on condition that they returned everything—every piece of paper, every book, every computer disk—to the exact position where it had been on the floor or wherever, and how they did just that!

I put it to David that some might be surprised that someone so untidy could be so successful.

DAVID DEUTSCH: I can’t speak for other people, but in my case, I am fairly sure that I couldn’t be very productive without also being untidy.

SARAH: What makes you think that?

D: It is the style of working that I have always had, from childhood. I chop and change quite suddenly between different problems I am working on. For instance, at the moment I am pursuing several quite diverse projects…

S: What are they, by the way?

D: My biggest single project is writing my book; then there is some research into error correction and several other topics to do with quantum computers. I am writing a short story; I am completing a philosophical paper about parallel universes; I am also writing a computer program to compile concordances of documents. I have just finished writing an article that was inspired by an episode of Star Trek, The Next Generation; I am re-writing two old papers that I abandoned several years ago, one on probability and one on meme theory; and I am translating an old paper of Karl Popper’s from German into English, amongst other things…

Well, anyway, I’ll be sitting at the computer with two or three documents on screen, with the relevant papers and books for that in front of me or on my lap, writing, thinking, making notes, and then, without making a conscious decision to change over, I’ll find that my train of thought goes into one of the other lines. Whereas I was thinking about quantum computation, I’ll go on to thinking about Popper’s conception of objective truth, perhaps. Then I might translate some more of his paper, and then I’ll have a new idea, and so on. Each one of those open lines of thought corresponds to a different set of papers, books and other stuff lying around here—not only in my study but all over my home.

When I go to bed, the resources for all the different lines of thought are left open, some of them in my office, some of them in my bedroom, some elsewhere. I never have to predict when I am finished for the day. I frequently change my mind and work for another five minutes, or another five hours.

By the way, since I work at home, my research can be more integrated with my other interests than perhaps is possible for other people. I also chop and change between what is conventionally called “work” and what is conventionally called “recreation”. I make no distinction between these things. There are no discontinuities in my day. I read novels, play video games, watch television, and so on. Here is a TV guide open amongst the other papers. There is a tennis racket and balls. (I only ever play tennis with people I find interesting to talk to.) There is a note reminding me that I have a meeting with two students tomorrow.

Obviously if I were to tidy each of these things away when I had finished with them, I would not be able to change nearly as often as I do from one train of thought to another, and when I did there would be discontinuities. When I next wanted a particular item, I’d have to go and fetch it from the shelves or filing cabinet or wherever, and that means that there would have to be a gap, during which I would have to know that I had finished doing one thing, and know what I was going to do next.

But in general I don’t know that. Knowing what one is going to think about next is a substantive piece of knowledge about one’s own thought processes, which may not be all that easy to generate, and can be expensive. In my case it is very expensive in both time and effort.

S: What do your colleagues make of your untidy ways?

D: Nothing, really. In my field, untidiness in the working environment is not uncommon. Perhaps most people are not as untidy as I am, but off-hand, I can’t recall many creative physicists who are tidy. One of them was my old boss, John Wheeler. Tidiness is only one of many ways in which he is unusual; perhaps it is connected with another extraordinary thing about him, namely that when he writes out calculations, they are always correct first time, rather as Mozart is said to have written music.

S: So how does Wheeler get round the difficulties that you said would impede your research if you were tidy? Does he only work on one thing at a time?

D: Oh no! Quite the contrary. Now that I come to think of it, I know that Wheeler does have many loose ends open at once, but only in his mind. So his office is tidy only because he doesn’t really use it! But for the rest of us—those whose ideas have to appear on paper and get changed and changed again, set aside and come back to, compared with other ideas, despaired over and dug out again hopefully—in effect our minds exist partly on this paper. Therefore if we have loose ends in our thinking, we must have loose bits of paper.

S: How do you know where to find anything? Don’t you lose things?

D: It is a feature of any filing system, however tidy, that information gets lost in it. That includes the filing system in our minds. Finding things is like picking up a train of thought. Losing things is like losing a train of thought. Yes, I do lose things, but I then I lose much more when I tidy things away.

S: Can you be sure you are not just rationalising this? Could it be that you just hate tidying up?

D: I can’t deny that I hate it! It is a fact that tidying up is boring. There are so many interesting things to do in life that doing boring things is hardly ever top of my list of priorities. The question here is not whether tidiness is boring, but whether it is necessary, or useful. I think that there are no good practical reasons to be anywhere near as tidy as is conventional in our society. Tidiness is a thing which is foisted upon children, and it results in all sorts of unpleasant things for them like boredom and having their privacy invaded, and so they get nervous and uptight about their personal space, and sometimes this translates itself into hang-ups about tidiness which they then pass on to their children.

But where tidiness does have an objective value, I am not opposed to it. There are respects in which I am very tidy.

S: Such as?

D: Well, one of them is folder discipline on my Macintosh. I have strong theories about how documents, applications and so on should be arranged, and I stick to that. It does take a lot of maintenance to do this, but I consider it worthwhile.

I just said that tidying up is boring—but I very much enjoy doing that sort of maintenance. I don’t know what that says about me! I am also very fastidious about fonts and layout and I am quite ready to spend half an hour changing the location of a picture by one millimetre just to get it exactly right; I suppose that that is because there, the tidiness is functional—the tidiness is part of getting my message across.

If I were a surgeon, I would probably be fanatically tidy about my surgical instruments, or about the organisation of my patients’ medical records. But I would be just as untidy as I am now about research papers lying around my office.

S: But in school, children get marks for neatness as well as for content.

D: Yes, unfortunately tidiness is measurable. Creativity isn’t. That shift in focus from substance to form is very antagonistic to creativity because creativity is about substance and not form. If somebody solves an important problem in physics, and gives a research seminar on it, but his slides are very untidy, nobody minds much. If somebody gives a beautiful presentation but has not solved a problem, then it doesn’t matter how beautiful his slides are, people still don’t think much of him.

S: But as a scientist don’t you need to be free of distractions and work methodically?

D: In my experience, scientific progress is never methodical. The answer to the question never comes from the route that one first thinks of. It never comes from even the hundredth route that one would have planned in advance. The conversation one has in the tea room is more important than the seminar that one is ostensibly attending. The paper that one comes across accidentally in the library is more important than the one that one went there to fetch.

Likewise, thinking that the research might be impeded by being ‘distracted’ suggests that there is some correct state of mind that you could be in that is not ‘distracted’—the state of mind which will lead to the answer, as opposed to the ‘distracted’ one, which won’t. But actually, since, as I said, scientific progress is very untidy and involves lots of back-tracking and it often involves going in a direction which one would have initially thought irrelevant, being ‘distracted’ is actually part of the very stuff of discovery, provided that one is distracted by things that seem to make sense.

S: You know, David, if you were a child you’d be deemed to have a short attention span!

D: No doubt. And it would be almost as false for me as it is when said of children. There is no such thing as “attention span”. People, unless they are inhibited by hang-ups or external forces, spend just as long on each topic as they find most conducive to their creative aims. This could mean channel-surfing with five seconds devoted to each channel, or it could mean reading a book for hours at a stretch. I think my own record for attention to one subject was a continuous period of 48 hours when I was completing my work on the quantum physics of time travel.

Surely the important thing about attention is whether it is applied to whatever is right for that person at that time, and what quality of thought accompanies it. Is the insight of a “eureka” moment to be denigrated because, on the face of it, it required only a few seconds of attention? Is a massive tome full of crackpot theories to be highly valued just because some crank spent every waking hour for ten years preparing it?

S: Wouldn’t it help your work to be more tidy? Wouldn’t it help you to know that every day you will sit down and work on such-and-such a piece of research from nine to five?

D: Again, I can’t speak for others but it certainly would not help me. I find that if I have to do something at a fixed time—for instance, I have to give a lecture—then I find myself increasingly unable to work in the period before the lecture, because I am aware in the back of my mind that whatever trains of thought I embark upon cannot be open-ended. This ‘planning blight’ often begins even on the previous day. That’s why I try to arrange my life so that there are as few fixed-time obligations as possible.

S: What if you were forced to be tidy?

D: Hmm. If I were forced to be tidy about, say, keeping reference books on the shelf, then in effect I could not use them. I would not be able to work with them. I suppose I’d have to evolve a different style of work, where I’d be working more within my own mind and less with books and papers. Perhaps that is how Wheeler got to be as he is…

To be forced to be tidy with correspondence would mean that I would become even more lax with it than I am now, and it might well mean that I would answer the letters I don’t really want to, and not answer those I do want to. To be forced to be tidy in general would mean that my work could not be as integrated with my life as it is. That would not be a fatal restriction, but it would reduce my productivity. What I would probably do is have an inner sanctum—a study or something—which remained untidy, whilst the rest of the house was tidy. That would mean I couldn’t be working on a paper while I was in bed, and I could not be writing a referee report while having dinner, and so I’d have less opportunity for work.

S: What about self-discipline. At school we were always told that we’d never amount to anything without self-discipline, in other words, if we failed to be tidy in our work.

D: That isn’t self-discipline. That is obedience. Real self-discipline is important in creative thinking. That is, one has to learn to allocate one’s mental and other resources in a way that promotes one’s own values, rather than in some other way, perhaps in a thoughtless way, or in a way which promotes someone else’s values. This is not something one can do just by following some fixed rules of tidiness; it is something one is learning throughout one’s life, and if, as is customary, one does not learn to do this in childhood, then whenever one begins creative work, one has to relearn this self-discipline in the right sense.

Creativity involves a combination of fanatical attention to detail, and open-ended chaos. One cannot tell which issues are going to be which: it is whatever arises out of the needs of the problem. For me, it is necessary to keep the inside of my computer in meticulous working order, more meticulous, by the way, than any parent or teacher could ever require of me, because the organisational rules I adhere to are too complicated to be easily checked.

S: What do you think one can do to help a child develop self-discipline in the right sense, in the sense you speak of, in regard to tidiness/untidiness issues and more widely?

D: Perhaps the most important thing is to make sure that the child has a space which is exclusively under his control. Then one should try hard not to have a preconception about what should be tidy and what should not be tidy—and what counts as “tidy”. Another thing is to encourage the child to form preferences about his environment and to help him act on them. For instance, honour his preferences about his space—what colour the walls are, whether there is a desk, or a box for the toys, and so on. Forming complex preferences about the use of one’s environment is necessary for creativity.

Let me put that another way. As I have said, a scientist’s study—with its papers and other resources in a certain configuration—is an extension of his mind. So just as academic freedom is necessary for progress in science, freedom of thought in the wider sense—including the freedom to dispose one’s working environment in the way one chooses—is equally essential.

Children’s lives and ‘work’ are automatically integrated (except when forcibly separated by school and suchlike), because their lives consist of learning. So if you intrude into their bedroom, which is usually the only private space they have, you are intruding into their minds. Then they will not be able to learn to use that space creatively, and the development of their creativity will be disabled.

Being forced to enact someone else’s idea about the disposition of one’s working environment is tantamount to enacting someone else’s idea of what one’s mind should be. Some people’s view of education is precisely that—that one is making the child’s mind into what one thinks it ought to be. But if that were the case, there would never be any progress, because children would be just like their parents, and students would be just like their professors. The best professors that I have known—in the sense of the ones who have the most brilliant students—allow their students to set the agenda not only in terms of the subject matter being studied, but of the method by which it is studied, including whether the student works at home or in the lab. The ones who rigidly control their students tend to produce students who contribute to the professor’s own projects but never make it in their own right.

How can I overcome the antirational memes disabling my creativity, with my disabled creativity?!

Sarah Fitz-Claridge

“Just like when we coerce our children or other adults they react badly and seem to become more intransigent, the same is true of ideas in our own mind. Fighting yourself is a battle you can’t win, by definition.”

– Sarah Fitz-Claridge

“How can I overcome the antirational memes disabling my creativity, with my disabled creativity?!”

“If anti-rational memes mess with your critical faculties, how can you ever overcome them? Don’t you need to be able to criticise them to abandon them?”

See also:

If anti-rational memes are compelling me to coerce my children, what hope is there?!

What are anti-rational memes?

(In answer to the question I was asked recently, of why I now do not necessarily mention anti-rational memes, the answer is that when I do talk about anti-rational memes parents often conclude that taking children seriously is impossible, and lose hope.)

We are fallible, and lack knowledge, and have all sorts of stuff interfering with our creativity; but knowing that anti-rational memes exist—that we all have such parts in our mind—it is possible to help such parts of our mind to relax their grip.

David Deutsch says that we can overcome some of them using our creativity, through conjecture, criticism and seeking good explanations—that you abandon them by understanding what is happening, and creatively solving the problems they cause.

So does that mean approaching such anti-rational parts of our minds with a coercive, infallibilist, brook-no-dissent spirit of “How dare you exist, you wicked, shameful part! I am going to force you to listen to my manifestly true fatal arguments, override you, overcome you, and abandon you. And don’t even think about complaining to me that I am being coercive! I’ll show you coercive! You deserve to be annihilated! You are evil!”?

No. Adding coercion even within our own mind has unintended deleterious consequences. What happens when you try to override an idea in your mind coercively rather than using reason is that the conflict is entrenched, or the area of entrenchment widened. Just like when we coerce our children or other adults they react badly and seem to become more intransigent, the same is true of ideas in our own mind. Fighting yourself is a battle you can’t win, by definition.

The trouble is that anti-rational memes being what they are, even if, instead of coercively fighting them to overcome and annihilate them, we are trying to abandon them using reason by refuting them through rational argument, logically, we are threatening their existence, so they resist, dig in, hide and fight. However rational and reasonable our straightforward explicit conscious arguments against them are, they experience our criticism as coercive—as an existential threat.

So I think we have to be emotionally-intelligent in our dealings with these anti-rational parts of our mind, meeting them where they are, at their own problem situation, seeing how it feels for them from their perspective, rather than just barging in with the critical arguments that seem so rational and unanswerable to us from our (or another part’s) perspective.

One way of doing this in practice is using Internal Family Systems self-therapy. When we notice such an anti-rational part (and unfortunately, we might not), we can go inside our mind IFS-style, and from the lovingkindness and inner wisdom of our emotionally-intelligent, calm, clear, compassionate, confident, connected, creative core Self, we can have a nice conversation with that part and gently and non-coercively help that part to relax deeply, leaving us free to move forward.

152. What learning really is

9 November 2023 10:00

Respect the ideas that came before you. They are the foundation upon which you build.

153. Mental strategies

9 November 2023 13:30

Episodic Future Thinking: Decision making

Scenario: Choosing Between a Relaxing Evening and Working on a Personal Project

Situation: It's a weekday evening, and you're faced with a choice: relax and watch a movie or work on a personal project related to personal knowledge management, a field you're deeply interested in.

Implementing EFT

Identify the Decision: Recognize that you're at a decision point: relax now or invest time in your project.

Envision the Future - Relaxing Evening:

Short-term Future (Tonight): Imagine yourself relaxing, watching your favorite movie. Feel the immediate comfort and enjoyment.

Long-term Future (Months Ahead): Visualize a future where this choice became a pattern. You're comfortable, but there's a sense of stagnation. Your project remains incomplete, and you feel a sense of missed opportunity in advancing your knowledge and skills.

Envision the Future - Working on the Project:

Short-term Future (Tonight): Picture yourself starting to work on your project. It might feel challenging initially to forego relaxation, but you're getting engaged in the work.

Long-term Future (Months Ahead): Now, imagine a future where you consistently chose to work on your project. You've made significant progress, perhaps even completed it. You have deepened your understanding of personal knowledge management. This accomplishment brings a sense of pride, expertise, and perhaps recognition from peers.

Contrast and Decide:

Reflect on both scenarios. While the relaxing evening offers immediate pleasure, working on your project aligns with your long-term goals of becoming a 'learning machine' and being highly productive.

Recognize that the choice to work on your project, although requiring more effort now, leads to a more fulfilling and goal-aligned future.

Act on Your Decision: Choose the option that aligns best with your long-term aspirations. In this case, it might be working on the project, as it directly contributes to your goal of personal development and expertise in your field of interest.

Conclusion

By engaging in EFT, you've mentally traversed both immediate and future implications of your choices. This process not only illuminates the short-term vs. long-term trade-offs but also emotionally connects you with the future benefits of actions that align with your long-term goals. As a result, it becomes easier to make decisions that favor your aspirations and productivity, even when they require sacrificing immediate pleasure.

Future Authoring: aligning with long-term goals and finding direction

Future Authoring is a structured, writing-based exercise that guides you through the process of articulating your vision for the future, setting detailed goals, and planning how to achieve them. It's a part of a broader set of self-authoring programs designed to help individuals understand their past, define their present, and plan their future. Let's walk through a step-by-step example of how Future Authoring might work for you, considering your background and interests:

Step-by-Step Process of Future Authoring

Reflection and Vision Creation:

Reflect on Your Life: Start by reflecting on your life experiences, strengths, and interests. 

Qualities You Admire:

Envision Your Ideal Future: Imagine your life in the next 3 to 5 years. What does your ideal future look like? 

A Future to Avoid:

Goal Setting:

Set Specific Goals: Break down your vision into specific, achievable goals. 

Short-term vs. Long-term Goals: Distinguish between short-term and long-term goals. Short-term goals might include reading specific books or attending workshops, while long-term goals could involve career advancement or mastering a new skill.

Plan of Action:

Detailed Steps: For each goal, outline specific steps to achieve it. This might include allocating time each day for reading, enrolling in courses, or networking with professionals in your field.

Timeline: Establish a realistic timeline for each goal. Setting deadlines can create a sense of urgency and help in tracking progress.

Anticipate Challenges:

Identify Potential Obstacles: Consider potential challenges or barriers to achieving your goals. This might include time constraints, resource limitations, or skills gaps.

Strategies to Overcome Challenges: Develop strategies to overcome these obstacles. For instance, if time management is a challenge, explore productivity techniques or tools.

Regular Review and Adaptation:

Monitor Progress: Regularly review your progress towards your goals. This helps in maintaining focus and making necessary adjustments.

Adapt as Needed: Be open to revising your goals and plans as circumstances change. Flexibility is key to effectively navigating the complexities of life and career.

In summary, Future Authoring is a process of in-depth reflection, goal setting, action planning, and regular review. It helps you articulate a clear vision for your future, set achievable goals, and devise a concrete plan to turn your aspirations into reality. Regularly revisiting and adapting your plan ensures that it remains relevant and aligned with your evolving interests and circumstances.

Daydreaming: to self-soothe

The goal is to relax and relieve stress. It is a form of escapism so be careful of abusing it. Ideally, use it as a last resort. It is for problems that cannot be addressed in the available time but you need to function.

Self-hypnosis for resolving inner conflicts and instilling new patterns of thought and behavior

Free form journaling and then applying the NLP metamodel to discover flaws in mental models

Journaling Phase: Begin with free-form journaling. Write about your day, your feelings, thoughts about your projects, or any topic of interest.

Analysis Phase: After journaling, revisit your entries with the NLP Meta-Model in mind. Look for patterns in your language and thought process. Use Meta-Model questions to explore these patterns further, seeking clarity and depth. Look for deletions (where information is missing), distortions (where reality is twisted), and generalizations (where specifics are lost), and use Meta-Model questions to delve deeper.

Reflection and Insight: This process can lead to profound insights into your own thinking and communication patterns. It can reveal underlying beliefs or assumptions that may be influencing your behavior and decisions.

154. Leverage

15 November 2023 15:54

I told my son, “You will marry the girl I choose.” He said, “NO!” I told him, “She is Bill Gates’ daughter.” He said, “OK.” I called Bill Gates and said, “I want your daughter to marry my son.” Bill Gates said, “NO.” I told Bill Gates, My son is the CEO of World Bank.” Bill Gates said, “OK.” I called the President of World Bank and asked him to make my son the CEO. He said, “NO.” I told him, “My son is Bill Gates’ son-in-law.” He said, “OK.”

Give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it, and I shall move the world.

(Archimedes)

In a strategic game of leverage where players attempt to outmaneuver each other using various forms of leverage, we can imagine a spectrum of skill levels ranging from beginner to master. Here's a breakdown of these levels:

Beginner:

Characteristics: Beginners have a basic understanding of leverage but may lack experience. They often use direct and obvious forms of leverage, like financial resources or overt persuasion techniques.

Strategy: Their strategies are straightforward, often relying on a single type of leverage, such as financial power or basic information advantages.

Intermediate:

Characteristics: Intermediate players understand different forms of leverage and start to combine them. They recognize the value of networks and information.

Strategy: They begin to use more sophisticated tactics, like combining financial leverage with social networking, or using information in more nuanced ways.

Competent:

Characteristics: Competent players have a good grasp of various leverage forms and start understanding the interplay between them. They are adept at using their network and knowledge effectively.

Strategy: Their strategies involve multiple types of leverage, often simultaneously. They might leverage relationships to gain information, which in turn is used to create financial or strategic advantages.

Skilled:

Characteristics: Skilled players have a deep understanding of leverage dynamics. They are adept at reading situations and people, using this insight to apply leverage more effectively.

Strategy: They use a blend of direct and indirect leverage tactics, often involving psychological and emotional factors, and are skilled in timing their moves for maximum impact.

Advanced:

Characteristics: Advanced players are highly adept at using and countering leverage. They understand the long-term implications of leverage strategies and are proficient in both offensive and defensive maneuvers.

Strategy: Their strategies are complex and multi-layered, often involving counter-leverage tactics. They can anticipate others' moves and prepare accordingly.

Expert:

Characteristics: Experts have an intuitive grasp of leverage in all its forms. They are highly adaptable and can quickly shift strategies as needed.

Strategy: Experts use a sophisticated mix of leverage types, often in subtle and indirect ways. Their strategies are not only about gaining immediate advantages but also about positioning themselves favorably for future interactions.

Master:

Characteristics: Masters of leverage operate at a level where their moves are often not immediately visible. They have a profound understanding of human behavior, systems, and strategy.

Strategy: Masters use leverage in a way that others may not even recognize until much later. Their approaches are deeply integrated, often influencing entire systems or networks. They anticipate and shape the actions of others, often several steps ahead.

In this game, each level represents a deeper understanding and more sophisticated application of leverage. As players move up the levels, their ability to integrate different forms of leverage and anticipate the moves of others increases, leading to more nuanced and effective strategies.

Being a master player in the game of leverage involves a comprehensive, nuanced understanding and application of various forms of leverage, along with an exceptional ability to anticipate, strategize, and influence outcomes. Here's a more detailed exploration of what it means to be a master in this context:

Deep Understanding of All Forms of Leverage: Masters have an extensive knowledge of different types of leverage - financial, informational, relational, technological, psychological, and more. They understand not just the strengths of each type, but also their limitations and interdependencies.

Strategic Long-Term Thinking: Masters think in terms of long-term goals and strategies. Their actions are not just about winning a single game or achieving a short-term advantage, but about shaping the field to their advantage over time.

Highly Developed Anticipation Skills: Master players excel in anticipating the moves of others. They can predict responses and reactions, allowing them to plan several steps ahead. This foresight enables them to maneuver effectively and often subtly.

Subtlety and Indirectness: Instead of direct application of leverage, masters often use subtle, indirect methods. Their tactics might involve influencing the environment around their opponents or shaping perceptions in a way that leads others to make decisions that favor the master’s objectives.

Adaptability and Flexibility: They are highly adaptable, able to change strategies swiftly in response to new information or changing circumstances. This agility allows them to stay ahead of their competitors, even in rapidly evolving situations.

Influence and Persuasion Skills: Masters are adept at influencing others, often without overt displays of power. They use persuasion, framing, and narrative control to guide others' thinking and decisions, often aligning others’ interests with their own.

Network Utilization and Creation: They excel in building and utilizing networks of contacts. Masters leverage these networks not just for information or resources, but also to exert influence more broadly.

Emotional and Psychological Acumen: A deep understanding of human psychology and behavior is crucial. Masters are skilled at reading people, understanding their motivations, and leveraging emotional intelligence to influence and negotiate.

Ethical Awareness (Even if Not Always Practiced): Masters understand the ethical implications of their actions, even if they choose to ignore them. They are aware of the moral boundaries they are pushing or crossing.

Reputation and Credibility Management: They are adept at managing their reputation, often cultivating an aura of mystery or respect that in itself becomes a form of leverage.

Systemic Influence: Masters operate not just at the level of individual interactions but can influence entire systems – be it a market, a community, or an organizational structure.

Resilience and Recovery: They are resilient, capable of recovering from setbacks and using them as opportunities for learning and strategic adjustment.

In summary, a master in the game of leverage is someone who skillfully integrates a deep understanding of various forms of leverage with strategic foresight, psychological insight, and adaptability. They influence not only through direct action but by shaping the environment and perceptions, always with an eye on the broader picture and long-term objectives. Their mastery lies in the subtle art of making significant moves while often remaining unnoticed until their goals are achieved.

155. Pick Yourself

21 November 2023 13:09

Opportunity is now disorganized

It used to be well lit. Apply to a famous institution, get picked. Get the agent of an agent or A&R person. Get picked. Get good grades… get picked.

Now, many of the “pickers” have little influence or power.

Instead of the reassurance that comes from someone else telling us what to do and then rewarding us when we comply, we each have the chance to show up and contribute. And, if we can, do it again.

It seems crowded and chaotic and uncertain.

And then we get to do it again.

It’s a cultural instinct to wait to get picked. To seek out the permission and authority that comes from a publisher or talk show host or even a blogger saying, “I pick you.” Once you reject that impulse and realize that no one is going to select you–that Prince Charming has chosen another house–then you can actually get to work.

If you’re hoping that the HR people you sent your resume to are about to pick you, it’s going to be a long wait. Once you understand that there are problems just waiting to be solved, once you realize that you have all the tools and all the permission you need, then opportunities to contribute abound.

No one is going to pick you. Pick yourself.

The artist who struggles in obscurity, unfairly ignored because he hasn't been picked–that's a poignant sight. But at some point, the artist has the obligation to seek a different path, one that isn't dependent on a system that doesn't deserve him.

It's easier than ever to imagine a successful project or career or organization that isn't dependent on being picked by those with power.

If you're frustrated that you're not getting picked, one plan is to up your game, to hustle harder, to figure out how to hone a pitch and push, push, push. But in the era of picking yourself, it seems to me that you're better off finding a path that doesn't require you get picked in order to succeed.

Are you doing what you said you wanted to do?

If you want to be a poet, write poetry. Every day. Show us your work.

If you want to do improv, start a troupe. Don’t wait to get picked.

If you want to help animals, don’t wait for vet school. Volunteer at an animal shelter right now.

If you want to write a screenplay, write a screenplay.

If you want to do marketing, find a good cause and spread the idea. Don’t ask first.

If you’d like to be more strategic or human or caring at your job, don’t wait for the boss to ask.

Once we leave out the “and” (as in, I want to do this and be well paid, invited, approved of and always successful) then it’s way easier to do what we said we wanted to do.

We have a chance to do work we’re proud of, and to do it for people who care. And maybe we can do it in a way that will lead them to tell the others. Traffic from an algorithm isn’t the point, it’s a random bonus.

No sense being a puppet, especially if you can’t be sure who is pulling the strings or why.

When we build something that works better when it’s shared, it’s more likely to be shared.

While it’s tempting to seek to be picked by authorities and found by strangers, the more reliable path is to organize and connect those that seek to be part of a tribe, to establish better cultural norms and then persist in making promises and keeping them.

“Follow me” on this journey is more difficult, but it’s also more effective than pleading “pick me.”

That once we pick ourselves, we have precisely what we need to do generous work.

It's easy to be seduced into believing that you must wait to be picked, and even easier to worship those that have. It's far more interesting and generous, I think, to find the leverage and the guts you need to produce, to become the impresario, the one who says 'go'.

Instead of trying to figure out what will get us picked, we might figure out if there's a way we can sell people on dreaming about what we have instead.

Perhaps you've decided that the idea of Pick Yourself is sort of a new-age mantra, a promise that everyone is entitled to what they want, right now.

What a shortcut it seems to be. A false promise, holding out that illusion that we can get what we want if we just raise our hand. Pick yourself, you win…

It's precisely the opposite.

If you want to be responsible for making music, make music. If you want to be responsible for writing, speaking, making change happen, go do that. Waiting to get picked is a form of hiding, not realism.

No, it’s not always possible for everyone to succeed by being the most popular, the most clicked on, the most liked. In fact, it will never happen. No one is promising that, I hope. What pick yourself means is that it’s never been easier to decide to be responsible for your own work, for your own agenda, for the change you make in the world. To have a chance to matter. Not to be finished right now, but starting now.

Pick yourself means we should stop waiting and whining and stalling.

The outcome is still in doubt, but it’s clear that waiting just doesn’t pay.

There's the hustle of always asking, of putting yourself out there, of looking for discounts, shortcuts and a faster way. This is the hustle of it it doesn't hurt to ask, of what you don't know won't hurt you, of the ends justifying the means. This hustler propositions, pitches and works at all times to close a sale, right now.

This kind of hustler always wants more for less. This kind of hustler will cut corners if it helps in getting picked.

Then there's the hustle that's actually quite difficult and effective. This is the hustle of being more generous than you need to be, of speaking truthfully even if it delays the ultimate goal in the short run, and most of all, the hustle of being prepared and of doing the work.

It's a shame that one approach is more common (though appropriately disrespected), while the other sits largely unused.

The ultimate privilege is to pick ourselves. To decide that the most important person to be chosen by is ourself. 

If you pick yourself as the chooser, if you give yourself the power to say 'go', I hope you'll respect how much power you have, and not waste it.

(Seth Godin)