Author: Craig Constantine

A structure to work in

Published March 27, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 27  ·  

Having a clear structure to work in is completely different from making plans about something. If you make a plan, you impose a structure on yourself; it makes you inflexible. To keep going according to plan, you have to push yourself and employ willpower. This is not only demotivating, but also unsuitable for an open-ended process like research, thinking or studying in general, where we have to adjust our next steps with every new insight, understanding or achievement—which we ideally have on a regular basis and not just as an exception.

~ Sönke Ahrens from, How to Take Smart Notes (2017)

I know I’m reading the right thing when—POW—I feel like a whole bunch of loose threads in my mind suddenly make sense. I’m a master at plans and organizing. (Outlines, processes, Allen’s GTD system, etc..) But my current quest for a knowledge system began in earnest when I could no longer ignore the aching feeling that there was something I’m missing; there’s something I’m not doing correctly. Ahren’s point about “imposing structure” on oneself is the insight. There’s a time for that. (And again, I’ve got that sorted.) I’m gleefully skipping off into experimenting with a new structure to work in. This isn’t all clear to me yet, so these blog posts aren’t going to be perfectly clear either. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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but- ima- gah- werds-

Published March 26, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 26  ·  

Let’s consider another story, this time a tale of science fiction.

~ Stephen Pressfield from, Ins and Outs, Part Two

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“Ins and Outs.” That piece is short. It’s insightful. …and it’s about two movies that would definitely make my top 100, so there’s that.

Two things: The more I read from Pressfield, the more I want to open a bottle of scotch and weep that I will never write anything good.

And also, the more I read from Pressfield, the more hopeful I become that maybe something will absorb through my thick skull and mabye one day, just maybe, I’ll write something good.

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Better left alone

Published March 25, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 25  ·  

Many see the trees but not the forest, or bark up the wrong tree, speaking endlessly, reasoning uselessly, without going to the pith of the matter. They go round and round, tiring themselves and us, and never get to what is important. This happens to people with confused minds who do not know how to clear away the brambles. They waste time and patience on what it would be better to leave alone, and later there is no time for what they left.

~ Baltasar Gracián

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Generating great questions in real-time

Published March 24, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 24  ·  

Pick two

Pick any two ideas, presume they are connected, and present that connection as a question.

I’ll wager you’re thinking, “that’s easier read than done.” But, it is easy. Simply ask:

Is there a connection between X and Y?

Exercise: Pause here and think of a few random pairs of ideas. The faster you pull the ideas out, the better. Take two ideas and say the question in your mind. Are they not surprising, the trains of thought which spring up? If you manage to stump yourself in finding a connection, would it have been an interesting exchange if another person had been involved?

Where’s the trick?

The trick is right there in the very first line I wrote, in the first phrase:

Pick two ideas.

The two ideas are connected; that’s how your mind was able to pick them. The trick uses your mind’s built-in super-powers of observation and curiosity. To ask a great question, people focus on finding a question. It’s far easier to make a question out of something great.

Clearly the degree of greatness of your question depends on what ideas you pick. Fortunately, the more you pick-two and ask about the connection, the better you’ll get at picking better ideas. You’re refining your mental observation skills and refining your taste in which ideas will combine into a great question.

Complications

In mechanical watches, a “complication” is some additional function. Indicating the day of the week, the date, or the phase of the moon, are in reality not that different in terms of complexity; They are each simply a complication. It’s the total number of complications that impresses the watch aficionados.

I’m going to throw a bunch of complications on top of this idea. By analogy with the watches, I’m suggesting that no one of these is any better or more complex. Each complication is simply a possibility you could add. One of your goals, in any conversation I care to think about, is to have your tools and skills disappear in service of the conversation. Only through experience can you learn how complicated to make things. It varies based on every conversational parameter you can imagine. Sometimes, the barest simplicity is the best choice—“is there a connection between X and Y?”—and sometimes…

It’s not you, it’s me. If the question you’re posing might be too personal, taboo, etc. you can couch it in a dash of self-deprecation. “I know this sounds weird, but is there a connection between X and Y?” Your conversation partner can easily parry—in fact, people will automatically and subconsciously parry this way if they are uncomfortable—with, “Yes that’s weird. What sort of wacko would ask that?” Being a great conversationalist, you can then proceed in another direction. (Or press on!)

The joy of wonder. Rare, (and possibly psychotic,) is the person who isn’t sucked in when you express honest wonder. If you really are wondering—that is probably how you picked those two ideas in the first place—then it’s going to be obvious that you’re enjoying asking about the connection. “Oh, wow! Now I’m wondering if there’s a connection between X and Y.”

Grammar ain’t all that. Did you catch that? That last example wasn’t a question. Turns out, it’s not necessary to speak a grammatical question. All you ever need to do is convey that you have a question. In the Movers Mindset podcast I get endless mileage out of saying, “And of course, the final question: Three words to describe your practice.” Which is a statement stapled to a sentence fragment, and I don’t even pitch-up at the end to make it sound like a question. Statements using “wondering” are the obvious way to do statement-questions. But there are more: “I’m astounded I never realized there’s a connection between X and Y.” That one has a quiet little question—“is there actually a connection here?”—tucked in under the loud astonishment. There’s also, “I can’t believe I never noticed the connection between X and Y.” Even snarky, “…next you’re going to tell me X and Y are connected.” Complications sure, but filigree has its place.

There can’t possible be more

I’ve described this entire thing as if it were something you do once, (and then use the question.) Eventually, you can generate two, sometimes three or more, two-ideas-and-a-connection questions before the pause gets pregnant. With practice, you can regularly generate 2, and then choose the one you like better.

This is particularly important if you’re trying to lead the conversation—“lead” as in “let’s go for a stroll and I secretly want to show you my favorite bakery along the way,” not “I want to lead you to a mugging”. Being able to ask great questions is one thing, but being able to ask a series of great questions that lead to a through-line, however tenuous, is pure wizardry.

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Herbal bitters

Published March 23, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 23

Bitter herbs have a well-deserved reputation as digestive aids in most systems of traditional medicine, and in many systems of cuisine. The ability of bitters to support balanced secretion and motility, especially in the gastric phase of digestion, relies on a few important mechanisms that are mediated through taste receptors (T2R family) and involve neuronal, hormonal, and vascular effectors.

~ Guido Masé, from Herbal Bitters (2015) Herbal bitters

Bitter herbs have a role in appetite regulation, blood glucose management, and obesity. This is something I’m only just now learning. They have been used medicinal for, pretty much, all of recorded history, and the more medical science looks the better things are looking. More recent traditions have added “bitters” to drinks (an Old Fashioned is a classic example) but—say it ain’t so western culture!—the bitters at your local bar are more for taste then for function.

Anyway. The linked PDF paper was an eye opener.

Also eye opening: We sat around our kitchen table this morning tasting various bitters—the same way you’d do beer, scotch, wine… or any other tasting. Tres interessant!

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Appearance on the Coffee Stain podcast

Published March 22, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 22

I recently had the pleasure of talking with Artemis Gavriilidou about philosophy, coffee, three words, and much more on her podcast, Coffee Stain (episode published March 22, 2021.) I probably rambled exactly as much as you expect of me—but don’t hold that against Artemis! Lend her your ear.

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Right or wrong

Published March 22, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 22  ·  

Then the only proper response for me to make is this: You are much mistaken, my friend, if you think that any man worth his salt cares about the risk of death and doesn’t concentrate on this alone: whether what he’s doing is right or wrong, and his behavior a good man’s or a bad one’s.

~ Marcus Aurelius

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Mirror image of negative visualization

Published March 21, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 21  ·  

The fatalism advocated by the Stoics is in a sense the reverse, or one might say the mirror image, of negative visualization: Instead of thinking about how our situation could be worse, we refuse to think about how it could be better.

~William B. Irvine from, A Guide to the Good Life

I use negative visualization very often. “What could possibly go wrong?” is one of my favorite interjections. Everyone thinks I’m making a joke—and in part I am—but what I’m really doing is actually thinking about what could actually go wrong.

I’ve learned, (slowly after far too much struggle because: i dumb,) that the more simple I can keep my life, the better. I want to be clear: The complexity I wrestle with—and which wins and beats me down—is all stuff I’ve invented. Not simply accepted, but outright invented. Things I want to create or see get done or ways I can help when someone asks and on and on and on. My brain is a snow globe of ideas.

And that all springs from my apparently hardwired drive to make things better. So, practicing refusing to think about how it could be better.

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Vulnerability and transparency

Published March 20, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 20

The Untapped Power of Vulnerability & Transparency in Content Strategy

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Something I stumbled over the other day related to my recent efforts within the Movers Mindset project to find a focus vision and mission.

In the context of the linked article: What I’ve done with Movers Mindset has often been vulnerable and transparent. It hasn’t worked—”worked” being defined as, “made the project able to continue indefinitely while doing good things.” But it also definitely has not hindered my efforts.

I simply wanted to leave this here so that I can read it again at some future date.

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Contentment

Published March 19, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 19  ·  

The man of contentment seeks nothing that he doesn’t have and understands that whatever he has isn’t his to own

~ Wu Hsin

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Be the hornet?

Published March 18, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 18  ·  

Is it better to be the fly on the wall, or the hornet in the room?

I variously categorize conversations on a spectrum from formal to casual. Today I want to talk about conversations that fall in the middle. At the formal end would be police interrogations and then—perhaps—live, antagonistic interviews of politicians. At the casual end would be pillow-talk and long-term friends around a campfire with their preferred beverages. In the middle is fertile ground for great conversations.

So what exactly is in the middle? Therein lie conversations built on a shared intention: Two people who want to resolve a difference, who want to co-create something new from their individual experiences, or who are simply excited about taking a leap into the unknown experience that is a good conversation. It’s that third one which really calls to me these days.

The leap

I’ve now done enough recorded conversations to say two things:

I used to think I was doing interviews. In fact, I began using a process and format intentionally meant to create interviews; I showed up with things I was interested in and I wanted to learn more about from my partner. I soon discovered that when we veered away from the formal-end of the conversation spectrum, (away from the “interview” I had intended to create,) into the more middle-area of simply good conversation, that was when I most enjoyed the experience. My conversation partners clearly enjoyed it more, and the listeners did too. (“hmmmmm… maybe I am onto something here?” )

The first thing I have to say is that the form of the created artifact follows from the process.

If I use a process intended to create formal conversations, that’s what I’ll get, (more or less.) If I use a process intended to create more casual conversations, then I get that, (more or less.) The insight is that the process for creating casual conversation is not itself casual. The process is specific, rigorous, and frankly exhausting. It’s exhausting because I want to execute the process in order to create the best possible conversation, and I want to experience that conversation. That’s in contrast to my conversation partner who is only attempting to do the latter because they’re only aware of their desire to experience the conversation. They’re not aware of the process, and they probably shouldn’t be aware.

Each conversation—each performance, since I’m today talking about when we are recording—is better if we’re comfortable going just a bit farther than we might normally. This is where the process pays off. Everything I’ve done in preparation, and everything I do during the conversation, from the obvious to the subtle to the outright manipulative, is in service of creating the best space for that conversation.

The second thing I have to say is that to create good, casual conversations I have to help my partner leap.

Be the hornet?

I recently listened to Jesse Thorn’s interview of Werner Herzog for The Turnaround. If you’ve read this far, I can’t imagine you wouldn’t enjoy listening to that ~35 minutes of Thorn and Herzog.

In the conversations that I’m currently interested in creating and recording I simply cannot be the fly on the wall. I have to literally sit down with my conversation partner. But there’s an enormous range of engagement that I can vary. (More realistically I can only try to control this, as I’m always balancing the observer-process and the participant-creation experiences.) In my first recorded conversations there quickly became far too much of me performing, (and I’ll leave it at that for today.) Then followed me reigning myself in too far, then some relaxing back towards more of me, and currently I find that I like the amount of me that appears in the conversations.

After listening to Herzog’s thoughts on documentary film-making, (but he talks about a lot more than that in the podcast,) I now see that I need to work on being the active hornet in the room. This is the dimension where I actively lead the conversation—not upstage my partner, but actively lead in the way that two intimate dance partners have a leader, (and, yes, who is leading can change at any moment.)

I need to more often be the hornet. I need to more often suggest simply by my presence that a sting might be imminent. Then if they decline to leap, maybe, sting just a little.

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Josh Wit: Diabetes, training, and balance

Published March 17, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 17  ·  

Josh Wit: Diabetes, training, and balance

What drives personal growth, resilience, and connection in the face of challenges like health conditions and cultural transitions?

Diagnosed at age 18, diabetes has simply been a fact of life for Josh Wit. He discusses traveling to Germany and his experiences training and living with diabetes. Josh unpacks why he loves workshops and training with community. He shares stories of how diabetes affects his practice, and his thoughts on training and community.

I had to learn over a long period of time that, ‘Wait a minute! If I actually start listening to what my body’s telling me, the outcome is better even if it might hurt the ego at the time.’ That’s a huge practice.

~ Josh Wit (25:52)

Josh Wit is an engineer turned parkour practitioner, coach, and organizer. He is a parkour coach with the Brisbane Parkour Association (of which he is also the vice president), and has traveled globally to visit other communities and events. Josh has been training parkour for many years, despite being diagnosed with type 1 diabetes prior to beginning his training.

The conversation explores themes of personal resilience, connection, and the transformative power of movement practices. Josh shares his journey with type-1 diabetes, describing the challenges of managing health during intense physical activities like parkour. He reflects on how diabetes shaped his awareness of his body and pushed him toward a deeper understanding of balance, both physically and emotionally.

Another key topic is the influence of community and cultural experiences. Josh discusses his decision to move to Germany, motivated by a desire to immerse themselves in a different culture and to embrace their dual heritage. He also shares memorable experiences from international workshops, emphasizing the importance of learning from others and the sense of connection fostered through shared physical practices.

Takeaways

Learning from others — Acknowledging that much of personal growth and creativity stems from shared experiences and inspirations from others.

Managing diabetes through awareness — Balancing life and physical activity with diabetes requires heightened self-awareness and proactive management.

Impact of cultural immersion — Choosing to live in a different culture can provide profound personal and anthropological insights.

Transformational power of workshops — Structured, progressive environments in workshops can lead to significant personal breakthroughs.

Value of resilience and adaptability — Adapting to physical and emotional challenges teaches patience, balance, and self-compassion.

Resources

Brisbane Parkour Association — The organization where the speaker coaches and promotes parkour.

Yamakasi — The group known for pioneering parkour and their workshops.

Parkour Wave — The parkour community in Italy mentioned during the discussion.

Continuous Glucose Monitors — Devices discussed by the speaker as essential for managing type 1 diabetes effectively.

(Written with help from Chat-GPT.)

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Thoughts like this

Published March 16, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 16  ·  

To watch the courses of the stars as if you revolved with them. To keep constantly in mind how the elements alter into one another. Thoughts like this wash off the mud of life below.

~ Marcus Aurelius

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Now I feel like I can read this book

Published March 15, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 15  ·  

The things that worked out weren’t _supposed_ to work, so I realized on my birthday: I had no plan for after 40. As often happens at forks in the path—college graduation, quarter-life crisis, midlife crisis, kids leaving home, retirement—questions started to bubble to the surface.

~ Tim Ferris from, Tribe of Mentors

If you’ve not heard of this book, my pull-quote is from Tim’s Introduction… eight lines into the book. The book is 597 pages, and the pages of the book—not including the hard covers, just the pages—are 1-and-three-quarters inches thick. It’s can serve as a functional foot-rest in a pinch. (But interestingly, not as a doorstop since it’s mysteriously light for its size. I keep wondering if the back half of the book is hollowed out, as in a prison escape movie, hiding a whoopie-cushion full of Helium.)

Anyway, if you’ve not heard of this book, find a copy and start reading the Introduction.

This book arrived in our house November, 2018. I started into it and it is, as one would hope, chock full of stupidly interesting ideas from so many different people. I got through 64 pages before, for some reason which I only just today realized, I put it down one evening. And then I didn’t pick it back up for, well, two years. I mean I moved it around a lot, but whatever it was that made me _want_ to read the book, there was something else that made me _not_ want the book.

You ever have sand slipping through your fingers? I didn’t realize it, (until today,) but that’s what made me walk away from the book. Yes there’s some malarky and woo-wu in the book; But there’s so much that I want to dig further into. Back in 2018, what was I going to do with that? …blog about every other page? Instinctively I knew that wouldn’t do _me_ much good.

But today? Today I’m comfortable knowing that I can bump into ideas, mull them over, and produce a contextualized, reduced to something I’m interested, idea… and drop that into the Slipbox.

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I am not the only one

Published March 14, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 14

I think there are some specific reasons why Zettelkasten has worked so well for me. I’ll try to make those clear, to help readers decide whether it would work for them. However, I honestly didn’t think Zettelkasten sounded like a good idea before I tried it. It only took me about 30 minutes of working with the cards to decide that it was really good. So, if you’re like me, this is a cheap experiment. I think a lot of people should actually try it to see how they like it, even if it sounds terrible.

~ Abramdemski from, The Zettelkasten Method

If you’ve been following along with my personal knowledge system, Zettelkastën and Slipbox journey of discovery you might be interested in this deep, DEEP dive someone else wrote. This is one of the many things I read all over the place before beginning my experiments. I don’t agree with his “30 minutes … to decide”; It’s taken me a little bit /sarcasm longer than that. But I do agree with his assessment. And everything else in that link.

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Being valuable

Published March 13, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 13  ·  

Today’s society is characterized by achievement orientation, and consequently it adores people who are successful and happy and, in particular, it adores the young. It virtually ignores the value of all those who are otherwise, and in so doing blurs the decisive difference between being valuable in the sense of dignity and being valuable in the sense of usefulness.

~ Viktor Frankl

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Listening

Published March 12, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 12  ·  

As opposed to listening to refute, or listening to respond.

Sometimes I simply have a conversation. I find they spring up through a crack in the concrete: A random encounter begins with some words exchanged per social norm, and quickly expands as both sides shift their focus to the person before them. More often they push up through fertile ground; a social gathering where, “get together and socialize,” is literally on the agenda. My journey exploring conversation began with these found conversations; I simply found myself having cool conversations.

I soon learned that I love creating conversation. I began trying to create conversation, (between myself and one or more others,) initially simply for fun and later in the context of recording podcast episodes. I was surprised to find that having recording gear, an agenda (“I’d like to interview you about…”), and simply acting like I knew what I was doing, was sufficient to get things going!

If I truly do want to engage in a good conversations, it turns out that my actions follow automatically. I share things about myself and doing so invites the other person to share. I take things seriously which conveys that I value the interaction and what I’m hearing. I express my interest directly by asking questions about what—in the moment, not the day before—is interesting; questions which show the other person I’m generally curious. Overall, I demonstrate that I’m listening because I’m interested, rather than because I want to immediately do something with what I’m about to hear.

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Entry points

Published March 11, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 11

When I began trying to understand how a Slipbox would work for me, I think I was most stuck on the idea of entry points: Where and how would I find myself going “into” the Slipbox?

Turns out, I’m “in” the Slipbox a lot simply because I’m often adding things to it. So of course I run into other slips and ideas inside the Slipbox.

But I’ve had a lingering concern: What happens when I want to locate something in particular within the Slipbox?

All the instructions and guidance I see caution one to not try to structure the Slipbox from the beginning; cautions against trying to incept the perfect categorization of all the stuff you don’t yet realize you are going to want to add… They are correct; that way madness lies. And so I set off creating top-level slips.

But still that lingering concern: What happens when I want to locate something in particular within the Slipbox?

And so I’m stealing a trick from the even-older-than-Slipboxes/Zettelkastën methods of creating commonplace books: How to create an index on physical media (journals, blank books, or little paper cards going into a Slipbox!)

slip 4c is “Slipbox indices”
slip 4c1 is “people by last name”

Here I’m hacking the Slipbox addressing system. Yes, I’m leaving room for a later 4c2 that could be another index, by topic. But mostly, I’m making sure that the slips under 4c1 can then be letters— 4c1a, 4c1b, 4c1c and so on.

And here’s the hack from commonplace books: To Build an index that doesn’t get out of hand, take the first letter and the next letter which is a vowel.

Constantine > “co”
Washington > “wa”

Easy. But the following are not under “an” …

Anka > “aa”
Antisthenes > “ai”

And…

Armstrong > “ao”
Curie > “cu”
Einstein > “ei”
Epictetus > “ei”
Gracián > “ga”
Irvine > “ii”
Twain > “ta”

And so on.

If you’re wondering, that means there could be 26×6 slips in this index. (a-z gives 26 first characters, times a, e, i, o, u, y gives 6 second characters.) But in reality I’ve reached about 40 slips and I’ve not had to add another for a while now.

What’s on each slip? Just references to other slips in the Slipbox…

4c1wa has
Ward, William A — pj4.28
Wayne, John — 4a7
Ward, Bryan — 4b21
Washington, George — 4a19

It’s not sorted. It’s simply in the order I added those names. If the card overflows, I’ll add an identically addressed 4c1wa since the items on those two 4c1wa cards aren’t in any particular order.

What? Is it worth it? …yes. I’ve already gone in to add a person, only to discover they are already in the Slipbox somewhere completely different and that’s a connection I hadn’t noticed before…

BOOM! There’s the other part of the Slipbox I wondered about: How is this thing going to make new things fall out of my thinking.

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André Miller: Systema, farming, and philosophy

Published March 10, 2021  ·  All posts on Mar 10  ·  

André Miller: Systema, farming, and philosophy

How can modern individuals reconnect with their environment and integrate practices like farming, movement, and philosophy into their lives for personal and societal benefit?

Farming is André Miller’s way of life, a way that connects him physically to the land that feeds him. He discusses his relationship with athletics and his introduction to Systema. André unpacks how he came to his personal philosophy, and how it led him on the path to farming. He shares his thoughts on modern farming, and recreating connection with the environment.

If you really want good produce, you got to get it direct. And after harping on people with that for a couple of years, I started realizing, I can’t just tell people to go to the farmers market, I have to be the farmers market. When I say you should be eating these greens, I have to be able to put those greens in that person’s hand right then and there, if I’m going to help the person.

~ André Miller (18:44)

Andre Miller is a movement based farmer, personal trainer, and the owner of Roots Movement Farm in Oregon. He has his Masters degree in Physiology, and Bachelors degrees in both Kinesiology and Philosophy. At Roots Movement Farm, Andre combines his knowledge of movement and philosophy to create a farm where movement and nutritional medicine work together.

The conversation explores the intersections between movement, farming, philosophy, and martial arts. Farming is framed as an essential act for environmental and personal health, blending practical and spiritual growth. It is presented as a pathway to reconnect with nature and reimagine sustainable practices.

Systema, a holistic martial art, is highlighted for its focus on relaxation, breath work, and peace, contrasting with competitive martial arts. Philosophy is woven into these discussions, illustrating its influence on the integration of farming and movement practices as a unified approach to life.

Takeaways

Farming as a solution — Farming provides answers to environmental, health, and social challenges.

Systema’s holistic nature — Systema integrates survival with peace and breath work.

Integration of movement and nutrition — Movement and nutritional practices should be interconnected.

Reconnecting with nature — Activities like foraging and running can deepen awareness of the environment.

Philosophy in action — A philosophical foundation enhances understanding and practice in any discipline.

Farming inspired by forests — Adopting agroforestry principles can improve agricultural systems.

Resources

André Miller @rootsfitness_portland

Roots Movement Farm

Agroforestry — A sustainable approach to farming inspired by forests.

(Written with help from Chat-GPT.)

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