Closing the Loop →

Published 6 Hours Ago  ·  All posts on Mar 25  ·  

One of the most valuable things a notebook does is help you close open loops—those things you said you’d figure out and then never quite did.

You know the ones. Questions you need to answer. Decisions you keep avoiding. Things that pop into your head at 2am because your brain won’t let them go.

Here’s a simple system: When you write something that needs follow-up, mark it in the margin with a double-line arrow pointing at the text. Put a small sticky note flag there too.

Now when your notebook is closed, you can see these flags poking out. Open to any flag and you’re right back at that open loop, with the full page of context.

When you’ve decided or done the thing:

  1. Remove the sticky note
  2. Strike through the arrow
  3. Write the date
  4. Add a page reference to where you recorded the resolution

Both pages now reference each other. The loop is closed. You have a record of both the question and the answer.

This is where the notebook earns its keep. You’ve been thinking about questions for days or weeks, but you haven’t had to hold all of it in your head simultaneously.

ɕ

This is part of a series about Hand-Write. Think Better.—a method for people who feel overwhelmed to start simply writing more on paper. Get the book →

Regrets →

Published 3 Days Ago  ·  All posts on Mar 21

Do I have a lot of regrets? Yes.

And they’re all stories that involve other people. Like, in hindsight I think: *facepalm* How did I think that was the right choice?!

For example:

Nearly 20 years ago, I rented a jack hammer to break up the concrete sidewalk right against one side of our house (not along a street, but between us and the neighbor.)

You should make jack hammer sounds here. Now make more. And yet more. For like an hour.

It was pretty flippin’ hot too, and eventually one of my neighbors— from across the street— diagonally across the street, someone who I knew by sight but hadn’t really talked to— a guy named Ron— appeared around my corner with a classic, red and white Igloo carry-cooler with a bunch of cold Budweiser in it.

I stopped long enough to exchange a few words.

But for some damn reason, I didn’t stop long. I didn’t dismiss his beer exactly (it isn’t a brand I’d choose)— but I didn’t drink one. I didn’t really even stop to talk. I certainly didn’t make him feel welcome. I said something like, “I need to finish this.”

And— no surprise— we never talked much— heck, I’m not sure we ever spoke after that.

He died years ago.

Just about every time I walk along the side of my house (there’s a paver-stone path there now) I regret not taking five. farking. minutes. to talk to a fellow human being, who went to the trouble to bring over cold beer on a hot day.

How did I think that was the right choice?!

ɕ

Difficult passages →

Published 5 Days Ago  ·  All posts on Mar 19  ·  

I don’t wear down my nails over some difficult passage in a book; I’ll make one or two forays, then if that fails I’ll give up. My mind is only really made for leapfrogging. What I don’t make out at the first attempt, I strain to see through an even deeper murk at every renewed effort.

~ Michel de Montaigne

slip:1570.

Upended, then smashed →

Published 7 Days Ago  ·  All posts on Mar 17  ·  

That career of yours leads over a clif. To leave such an exhalted life, you have to fall. And once prosperity begins to push us over, we cannot even resist. We could wish to fall only once, or at least to fall from an upright position, but we are not allowed. Fortune deos not only overturn us: It upends us, and then smashes us.

~ Seneca

slip:4a1569.

Creating my own sacred space →

Published 10 Days Ago  ·  All posts on Mar 14

I’ve been working on myself a long time— structured prompts, journals going back years, books chosen deliberately. That practice is mine, and it’s working. But there’s something I can’t yet do: Know that Jesse is also in it. Or that Mike showed up this morning and set something down for me. I have no way of feeling I’m not the only one.

I didn’t want a group chat. Group chats are about response and obligation. I post, someone reacts, the thread pulls all of us back in. (Or it gets washed down the screen by all those other messages.) I didn’t want a social network either, with its metrics and its performance. I wanted something closer to what a good café used to be for writers: A place where you showed up, do your own work, and just know that others were there too. The ambient awareness of shared striving. No agenda.

The ephemerality matters. I wanted a space that wasn’t an archive. It’s not for posterity. Posts disappear automatically because the point is showing up now, not curating a record of having shown up. Presence, not pursuit.

I called it Temenos because that’s exactly what it is — a sacred precinct, a piece of ground cut off from ordinary use. Jung used the word for the protected psychological space where transformation happens. That’s the room I wanted to build. Small. Quiet. No notifications. No likes. Just the slow accumulation of people doing the work, leaving a trace, moving on.

ɕ

Discipline →

Published 11 Days Ago  ·  All posts on Mar 14

What do you do when you don’t feel like it? Especially then.

~ Seth Godin, from Our practice

It’s been said that discipline is how you earn freedom; freedom in the sense of being able to do what you want with your time. Freedom, with a capital, is of course an inherent right. I tend to add systems and queues (a fancy word for piles of stuff to do) to both get things out of my head and to impose some order.

But to answer Godin’s question specifically: When I really don’t feel like doing any of the things I’ve set myself up for, I step back and survey. Because it’s usually a sound indicator that I’ve got too many things I’m imagining I’m going to get done.

ɕ

There’s more than we can ever do →

Published 11 Days Ago  ·  All posts on Mar 14  ·  

While I’m distracted by doing all the things I really need to do I know deep down I’m avoiding all the things I really need to do

~ Jesse Danger, from Robbing Peter to pay Paul

My friend Jesse writes now and then. It’s not that what he writes is good (it is), rather it’s that what he writes is very often in sync with what I’m thinking. This one sat a bit before I hit publish, so if you go over, there are few more things to read published since.

I often (“constantly” almost works here) talk about how my default mode is to sit before the computer and do stuff, when the default mode I wish I had was— frankly, anything other than touch a computer. The key to unlocking that is to fixate on this: The computer is a tool. Tools are technology for doing something. Therefore, as I head towards a computer, what exactly am I going to do, and what exactly is the definition of done (so I then know to go back to the normal life I wish I had)?

This? The point was to sit with this thought, and to attempt to shine some attention towards Jesse’s writing. Done.

ɕ

You are not alone →

Published 11 Days Ago  ·  All posts on Mar 13

When I set out to document the inner workings of sludge, I had in mind the dull architecture of delays and deferrals. But I had started to notice my own inner workings. The aggravation was adding up, and so was the fatigue. Arguing was exhausting. Being transferred to argue with a different person was exhausting. The illogic was exhausting.

Chris Colin, from That Dropped Call With Customer Service? It Was On Purpose

First I want to just say: You are not alone. That complex thing— that bureaucracy you’re trying to wade through— those phone systems, web site chat bots, email exchanges… we are all facing that. That’s the first piece. Take a breath and realize that the problem is not you. Yes, you may have actually broken whatever it is you’re trying to fix… or, you’re trying to save some moeny… or, countless other things that will lead you into the maze of twisty passages, all alike. But the problem is not you. Exceptional things happen, and—counterintuitively—they happen frequently. It’s not you.

Second I want to say that the best way to move through the sludge of a stupefyingly vast bureaucracy is to take good notes. As soon as you realize you are entering the realm of bureaucracy sludge, start taking notes. Put your notes into something dedicated—a single digital file, a separate notebook, a tablet, or just grab a stack of recycled paper and staple the corner. Start every note with the date. Write as much as you can and CRITICALLY after each interaction—each email or message you read, each phone call you attempt—take the time to READ your notes and THINK about what happened and make MORE NOTES right there.

This second part will NOT, in the least, make you more successful at “winning.” But it will save your sanity. Not having to rely on your memory will go a long way towards preserving your sanity.

ɕ

How we feel about it →

Published 12 Days Ago  ·  All posts on Mar 13  ·  

We don’t get to choose what happens to us, but we can always choose how we feel about it. And why on earth would you choose to feel anything but good? We can choose to render a good account of ourselves. If the event must occur, Amor Fati (a love of fate) is the response.

Ryan Holiday

slip:4a1568.

Seven dwelling places →

Published 14 Days Ago  ·  All posts on Mar 11

This morning I was rummaging through a notebook and I was reminded of a great article I’d read about Saint Teresa of Ávila. More specifically, I was reminded that I had wanted to add some self-reflection prompts about Saint Teresa’s “seven dwellings” ideas. And then after some searching I realized I’d never even posted about the article either— or at least, I can’t find it here in the blog… I digress.

Imagine your inner self as a new love interest. You would get to know them by spending time and doing things together. Similarly, to know yourself better, you intentionally carve out space for introspective reflection.

Skye C Cleary, from Saint Teresa of Ávila

slip:4upyie20.

Self-knowledge. That’s the first dwelling place.

ɕ