On this day

October 2nd

Bias

October 2

These stories illustrate two truths. 1) I’m a big ol’ nerd, and 2) the goodness and badness of memories fade over time, but the badness fades faster—that’s the fading affect bias. Some bad memories even become good memories, while good memories rarely become bad memories.

~ Adam Mastroianni from, https://www.experimental-history.com/p/underrated-ideas-in-psychology

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Like Mastroianni, I’m clearly susceptible to this bias. One thing that I use to fight it, is to write myself honest thoughts after things happen. A lot of the pleasure from something is the anticipation—the imagining of the enjoyment from some expected experience. That’s pretty easy to remember to journal and it happens without effort in the days leading up. But after the fact, I usually take a big chunk of time and decompress. What did I really think when I got hit in the head that one time at that thing? …or when I fell? …or got sick? The best adventures are when I look back and think: “ugh, that sucked. I’m glad I did it.”

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You had me at “tree”

October 2, 2022

“A tree is a little bit of the future,” Wangari Maathai reflected as she set out to plant the million trees that won her the Nobel Peace Prize. But a tree is also an enchanted portal to the past — a fractal reach beyond living memory, beyond our human histories, into the “saeculum” of time.

~ Maria Popova from, https://www.themarginalian.org/2022/04/07/peattie-giant-sequoia/

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I recently flew from Philadelphia to Seattle. At one point in the journey I gazed down at the Cascade Mountains from the miraculous perch of technology that is an airliner, staring silently at countless trees in countless valleys.

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Merlin Mann

October 2, 2021

Some time around 2005—if memory serves, which it probably doesn’t—I discovered the work and blogging of Merlin Mann. Back then, he was neck-deep in a project called 43 Folders: Time, Attention, and Creative Work. It’s self-described as, “[a] website about finding the time and attention to do your best creative work.” The first post there is dated 2004, and the last is gloriously frozen in place from 2011.

There are so many things to mention about that project. Ahhhhhhh, the halcyon days when we all thought “website” was a cool word. (I’m now in the “web site” encampment.) Mann is the guy who, for better [my opinion] or worse [many others’ option], brought “inbox zero” to everyone’s awareness. He also spent years experimenting with processes, and I went on a magical, multi-year journey experimenting with something called the “hipster PDA.” If forced to choose, I’d say Mann is the guy who most greatly influenced my process thinking.

There’s a phrase in cooking, mise en place, meaning to have everything in its proper place before starting. (The classic example of failure in this regard is to be half-way through making something only to realize you’re missing an ingredient and having to throw away the food.)

Well Mann is the guy who—in my opinion—has done the most to improve processes for knowledge workers and creative people. I’m not sure if he’s ever said it explicitly, but a huge part of what he did was to elevate knowledge workers and creatives by cultivating a mise en place mindset.

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Others’ thoughts on what exactly is resilience

October 2, 2015

(Part 11 of 37 in series, Study inspired by Pakour & Art du Déplacement by V. Thibault)

A key point from the following podcast is the idea that resilience is not a “broad” skill, but rather something that you develop in a particular aspect of your life. Being resilient in social circumstances is not directly related to being resilient in a violent (eg, combat) circumstance. So that’s something to keep in mind: In Parkour, we’re practicing and developing our resilience in the context of MOVING, and moving is something we do every day.

So that’s what we’ve taken, that idea of resilience and we’ve applied it to human beings and we tell people, you should just bounce back. Bounce back, bounce back. I actually believe human beings can’t bounce back. The reason why you can’t bounce back is because you can’t go back in time. So the 19 year old Marine who leaves for Afghanistan is never going to be 19 again. Parents who lose a child are never going to be the same parents again. The entrepreneur whose business goes bankrupt is never going to be the same entrepreneur again. So what resilient people are able to do is not to bounce back from hardship but they’re able to integrate hard experiences into their lives in such a way that they become better. That’s what I think is really at the heart of resilience.

~ Eric Greitens, from “Resilience With Eric Greitens“

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The link it to a transcript of a podcast, (I recommend just skimming the transcript,) from my ridiculously long queue of podcasts. I was skimming through the list culling a few episodes and realized this one was apropos of the current section from Thibault’s work.

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1953 Ford Jubilee tractor

October 2, 2013

1953 Ford Jubilee: Anyone interested in a tractor? Good condition, running and everything works, 3-point lift, brush hog, scraper/snow blade… fully working, but it is also a collector’s item if you’re into antique tractors.

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