Category: Thoughts

Explore

Exploring a new city can be daunting at first. I knew little to nothing of how to get around and barely knew anyone here. I did all the research and tried to avoid routine for as long as possible to take advantage of all the opportunities. To expand my view of the surroundings I went on running tours of the area trying to uncover new places. This slower paced, in person exploration gave me a great feel for the city and where I wanted to venture next. Running out with no destination in mind, I used the few landmarks I knew to guide me back at the end of the day. Running, rather than driving connected me to the city first hand and exposed me to much of what the city has to offer. I noted restaurants, parks, concert venues, and trails to return to later. Physically exploring new areas instead of scrolling on a screen was a fruitful exercise, but I won’t let it stop. Build on my findings, explore more, and keep running.

Tags life, tips

Random Thoughts

Questions

Learn to control your biases and impulses around others. Stop and ponder “What are you thinking about? What’s going through your head?” Keeping these thoughts in everyday life humanizes others and allow you to better understand that we are all people with complex histories and emotions. Prodding with simple questions like “What do you think about? What are you thinking about? What do you mean? What are you working on?” Ground conversation on an emotional level and foster deeper connection. This is the type of conversation which brings us together and stimulates growth. It’s not superficial, but thoughtful, on a level helping us come to a better understanding of ourselves and others.

Video of the day

Tags life, philosophy, tips

Articles Journal Thoughts

Seeking to Become

You may be the average of the five people you spend the most time with ^[1], but more so, today, you are the product of who you were yesterday and the day before ^[2]. “The difference between who you are now and who you were five years ago is largely due to how you’ve spent your time along the way.” ^[3]

So, who are you seeking to become?

If you like who you are today, keep doing what you are doing. But if you want to change, work to retool the habits which defined you up until this point. You don’t have to appease social norms of being the same person you were yesterday. Buck the tread and become who you want to be. (Do you believe people can change? ^[4]) Fight club and Tyler Durden show that resetting can be the impetus for your new, desired self to take hold. You don’t have to set fire to all your possessions, but find what brings joy to your life ^[5] . Don’t let your possessions own you ^[6]. “If you can’t afford to lose it, you can’t afford it to buy it yet” ^[7]. So as spring rolls around here in the US, what cleaning will you be find? How will you shed your skin to let your new self shine?

Just connecting some things I came across recently. Here’s a non-chronological list:

^[1] “You’re the average of the five people you spend most of your time with.” – Jim Rohn
^[2] Change Making Problem – Wikipedia
^[3] Who are we seeking to Become – Seth Godin
^[4] The Personality Myth – Invisibilia
^[5] Life Changing Magic of Tidying up – Marie Kondo
^[6] “The things you used to own, now they own you” – Fight Club
^[7] Mr. Money Mustache – The New Yorker

Tags links, philosophy, quotes, read

Articles Thoughts

Perspective

Here’s a story from a TED talk on perspective:

A man walks into a bank in Watsonville, California. And he says, “Give me $2,000, or I’m blowing the whole bank up with a bomb.”

Now, the bank manager didn’t give him the money. She took a step back. She took his perspective, and she noticed something really important. He asked for a specific amount of money.

So she said, “Why did you ask for $2,000?”

And he said, “My friend is going to be evicted unless I get him $2,000 immediately.”

And she said, “Oh! You don’t want to rob the bank — you want to take out a loan.”

“Why don’t you come back to my office, and we can have you fill out the paperwork.”

Challenge your perspective and don’t make assumptions.

Quoted from Adam Galinsky: How to speak up for yourself
https://embed.ted.com/talks/adam_galinsky_how_to_speak_up_for_yourself

Tags life, quotes, ted, Video

Thoughts

Mindfulness Economy

Imagine our economy without advertisements. What would it look like? Facebook would not exist, Google would be a fragment of its current self, and for that matter, most tech companies propped up by VC money would be gone. Sports would only be seen in stadiums and played by athletes making minimal salaries. Media reliant on CPM would be no more. And that’s just the start.

We accept advertising as a way to subsidize the products we enjoy.

We sanction almost all aspects of our life to the effect of the attention economy. “Attention is a resource; a person has only so much of it. And yet we’ve auctioned off more and more of our public space to private commercial interests, with their constant demands on us to look at the products on display or simply absorb some bit of corporate messaging”.

How vastly different would the world be if we had to pay for things with our money rather than our attentions? We would be mindful of what we consume and wouldn’t by junk that looks nice online. Products may be more expensive, but imagine how improved they would be. The best products would survive by our recommendations to others. Real, in person recommendations. Not purchased reviews.

With our minds free from the barrage of stimulation, we could explore and share stories of our experiences. Maybe go see the world instead of getting the latest gadget. New ideas would spread by word of mouth and mindfulness would flourish as we place focus on our thoughts and emotions. We would become a more empathic people.

Businesses making products to better human kind would survive. Space exploration, solar, and entertainment would return to its roots with movie theaters, bookstores, live music, and Broadway shows. Writers will ensure the most important relationship is with the reader, not the advertiser.
And basic necessities like food and clothes would still be required, but stripped of their grandeur (stoicism) to their essential qualities: nutrition and function (with a bit of expression). Life would be more real and less inflated.

So how do we get there and how can it stick? Products should focus on real innovation and organic growth. We should not make something to get people addicted and hooked, but build a product to get people excited. Excited about life, growth, and being human.

Tags media, mindfulness, web

Journal Thoughts

Journal

One year and three months ago I wrote this in my journal:

“I want to start writing more for my blog. I am going to start by making an effort to sit down for five minutes (at least) and note what I am thinking about. Time seems to fly by lately. It would be enlightening to have a journal of past events to look back and remember what was going on in my life.”

In that time, I’ve amassed quite the collection of musings. I thought journaling would naturally overflow into blogging, and while it hasn’t yet turned out that way, the practice allows me to focus and make sense of things. Today I began reading what I wrote. We’ll see what comes of it, but I’m already happily surprised and excited to continue.

If you want to connect thoughts in your head, remember events in your life, or track growth over time, take a snapshot. Write it down. Make the nebulous, physical. As time passes, you can go back and reflect.

Tags mindfulness, philosophy, quotes, read

Books Thoughts

Three Questions

“Remember then: there is only one time that is important– Now! It is the most important time because it is the only time when we have any power. The most necessary man is he with whom you are, for no man knows whether he will ever have dealings with any one else: and the most important affair is, to do him good, because for that purpose alone was man sent into this life!”

From Three Questions by Leo Tolstoy

Tags philosophy, quotes

Thoughts

If you want to improve

“If you want to improve, be content to be thought foolish and stupid.”

-Epictetus

Tags quotes

Thoughts

Empathy

“If you believed what he believes, you’d do precisely what he’s doing.

Think about that for a second. People act based on the way they see the world. Every single time.

Understanding someone else’s story is hard, a job that’s never complete, but it’s worth the effort.”

-Seth Godin, Empathy is difficult

Tags quotes

Podcasts Thoughts

A Riddle

Thoughts from On Being – The Mind is a Difference-Seeking Machine (Transcript)

In her talk with Krista Tippett, Dr. Mahzarin Banaji presents many hidden biases within our culture and ourselves. From how we view people differently on Airbnb based on the the spellings of their names to analyzing political events in terms of the human condition, Dr. Banaji wants us to learn from others’ perspectives.

With some context, during in the conversation Dr. Banaji presents a riddle:

“The riddle goes like this: a father and his son were in a car accident. The father dies at the scene. The boy, badly injured, is rushed to a local hospital. In the hospital, the operating surgeon looks at the boy and says, ‘I can’t operate on this boy. He’s my son.’ How can this be if the father just died?”

Think about it for a moment.

80 percent today of people who read this riddle do not know the right answer.

Got it?

Leaving it to Dr. Banaji, “the surgeon is the boy’s mother … Duh”

Think it was the boy’s stepfather? At first, Dr. Banaji did as well. Unconscious bias is everywhere, the trick is learning to recognizing it.

Tags mindfulness, on being

Thoughts

Finish

Finish what you start. After overcoming the blank slate, we need to follow up on our intentions and complete what we set out to do. Once we begin, progress is easy. We don’t have much to compare against so we accomplish a large proportion of our overall work. However, when we start making actual progress and we face obstacles in the way of our advancement, we must endure. Do not mistake iterative progress with fully realizing your goal. It is easy to leave your previous work behind and pick up a new task to feel the same sense of early productivity. After all, 80 percent of the results is accomplished with 20 percent of the effort. However, it is the last 20%, 10%, and 1% that counts. It is in these moments when our ideas become realities. Don’t stop when things get difficult. It doesn’t have to be perfect, but when it is ready enough, show the world, take feedback with an open mind, learn from mistakes, stick with it, and be prepared to continue building on what you accomplished.

Tags life