Notes: July - September 2023
Idea generation, idea definition, idea circulation, idea polishing, self-definition, preparation for self expression.
Hey all! Here’s another edition of jdeas I’ve had circulating in my mind for the past few months. I’m not going to lie: I did very little to polish these ideas. It’s very rough, but I feel like I need to let it go and work on the next thing. I’ve been very busy at work and at home and the summer has been hot so I’ve just been having trouble writing.
July 3, 2023
“Reality is squishy.” That’s the only phrase I can use to describe the idea in my head. Let me try to explain:
When someone loses their job, they’re able to adapt to a new cheaper lifestyle.
When a main thoroughfare is closed people go another route or don’t go at all. Life goes on mostly uninterrupted.
When you get rid of a few possessions, you don’t even miss them.
When you get new possessions you quickly get used to them and start looking for another new thing. Hedonic adaptation.
I’m overwhelmed by my 2 children, but my mom raised 7. How?
When a natural disaster occurs causing people to lose everything, that’s when they come together to take care of each other and feel closer to their community than ever.
1 hour of focused work can be more productive than 8 hours of unfocused work. There’s a principal that states that the time needed to finish a task will stretch to fill the time allotted for that task to be worked on.
Tim Ferris’ book The 4 Hour Work Week talks about the 80-20 rule. The Pareto principle states that for many outcomes, roughly 80% of consequences come from 20% of causes. So he advocates focusing on making the top 20% of your customers happy because they’ll bring you 80% of your revenue.
What we think are hard constraints in life end up having more flex than we thought.
In my time travelling in Africa, I learned that a car with 5 seats can carry 12 people.
2 families can move into one house together. How do they make it work?
Gas prices going up means people take fewer trips, but probably aren’t necessarily less happy.
I guess what I’m saying is I’m surprised at our ability to adapt and innovate. When things go wrong, we find a way to deal with it or live without.
When you go through an intense life moment like having a child, you find a way to make it through. You never would have thought you could sleep so little or work so hard or pay so much attention to a pair of toddlers running around causing sheer destruction, but you find a way. Some less important things fall by the way side. And you just keep making your way though each successive moment presented to you. In that way, reality and life are magical. Reality does things that you’d never expect it would be able to do. You can do and witness amazing things, being part of reality and all.
Some people think for years about how to quit their job and start traveling full time. But others just do it. They jump and build their parachute on the way down, so to speak. Others are just going along in a certain way of life with no intention of changing and then they’re forced to. There’s a cancer diagnosis. There’s an accident. You lose a job. And then what? Well your forced to find a new path. Completely unplanned and most the time you figure it out. It’s also more gratifying because the universe or God or whomever gave it to you. You didn’t choose it.
I love Melissa because she doesn’t hesitate and ruminate on what to do. She just does and then she figures it out later. I’m the opposite. Maybe I’m too cautious. She gives me the courage to jump into life. She helps me to think “well if we mess it up, at least we tried.”
I think life is like navigating a rushing river with no paddle. you can kind of paddle with your hands around to avoid big boulders, but you’re mostly at the mercy of wherever the river decides to take you. Sometimes the river will run you straight into a boulder. You hit a hard edge, it hurts, you shake your head and you have to go around, you have to adapt. Sometimes it’ll wash you ashore, but you can’t stop, you have to jump back in.