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Twenty-two
Age is amusing. Getting older is a continuous process. We've made it a stepwise function. "Years" are the discrete blocks to gauge it by.
Nevertheless. Birthdays are points to reflect. To think about age and time. And, theoretically, they're unique. More unique than temporal holidays like New Year's Day.
People evolve and grow over time. I (currently) believe our past selves change alongside our present selves. Not the factual events that took place. The story we tell ourselves changes. Our view of the past changes. Our story that connects the dots between then and now changes.
Graphically, the dots themselves don't move. We redraw the curve through them. We uncover more information to improve the curve. Or, maybe, we've reasoned that the new curve makes sense. Even if we don't have the data to back it quite yet. The curve changes. Our trajectory shifts as a result.
Age is a conveniently discrete timepoint. Which means I get 22 dots to plot out before I connect them.
The dots
My game pieces. The set of events such that (A) they stick out in my mind and (B) age[event] = floor[time_alive[event]].
0 - the origin, I was born on Long Island, in New York.
1 and 2 - driving my parents crazy, probably.
3 - started playing basketball.
4 - started playing soccer.
6 - went to see The Black Crowes, my first concert. didn't get the memo that you sleep after the concert, not during.
9 - went to CSI sleep away camp. called my parents crying because I felt alone. also got my hands on iodine – camp instructors weren't as impressed by my metallic orange hands as I was.
13 - decided to go from public school to private school.
14 - started high school, learned what an AP course was, got my first laptop.
15 - became terrified of Chemistry.
17 - tore my ACL, went to therapy (physical and mental), rehabbed. Wrote my first line of code, went to the Galapagos Islands – my first time out of the country, built a computer. Moved to Atlanta, started college.
18 - joined an immunoengineering cancer research lab, competed in my first hackathon, started journaling.
19 - started ballroom dancing, took my first job at a startup, launched my personal site and blog, and planted the seeds of my own startup.
20 - took my second and third jobs at startups. also, COVID-19 pandemic!
21 - went full-time on my startup; learned a lot about leadership, relationships, and work-life balance. Moved to Memphis, started learning salsa :)
The current curve
4 years ago feels like forever. 3 months ago feels like a lifetime.
Bitbucket Journal Jared, Journal I Jared, Journal II Jared, and Journal III Jared are completely different people. Journal IV Jared will be similarly unique.
I remember each of them, though. Reading the lines brings me back. To both good times and bad times. But they all remain my times. And I can smile at all of them. They taught me so much.
I'll never forget opening an even older notebook to see the words "BREAK FREE" scrawled in all caps and underlined. I had forgotten writing them until then. I was immediately reminded of how I felt at a low point during my ACL recovery.
That low point was a positive inflection point. From there, I worked to understand my values. I identified what I wanted to change. I was able to build my own foundation.
The people I've gotten to know as friends have been so amazing and supportive.
The teams I've been so fortunate to contribute to taught me how to lead and deliver results.
The relationships and subsequent breakups taught me so much about communication, people, and myself.
The mentors in my life have guided me through so many decisions.
Resilience, gratitude, and love. The three parameters that define the current curve of my life.
My trajectory
Here I am, 22 years after being born.
I feel like my trajectory points up. It's currently positive. For that, I'm grateful.
I'm incredibly excited about the vision we've set at Augment Health.
I also have 5 personal goals for the next 5 years of my life:
- Grow my relationships. Become closer with my existing friends, while also making new ones.
- Positively impact 1000 people's lives.
- Be healthy.
- Spend 500 hours volunteering.
- Be fluent in Spanish.
I have no clue what the rest of Journal IV will say. But I can't wait to read it and start inking Journal V.
Quotes
I'll close with a few pieces of "wisdom." From myself to myself. All written out of love and compassion. Extracted as reminders for me. Maybe helpful to someone else.
"The only thing worse than being bad is not showing up" (January 12th, 2019)
"But perhaps that's the blessing of these moments. You can have great moments, but the greatest moments are the endings because they mark a new chapter" (June 18th, 2021)
"I need to always finish strong, because I might not get a redo" (February 14th, 2021)
"Don't let "what if," get in the way of "what is," looking back. Don't let "what is," get in the way of "what if," looking forward" (June 17, 2021)
"It'll be a big week this week. It always is. Let's do this" (March 3rd, 2019)
Thank you
Thank you for joining me on this journey. Thank you for everything - past, present, future, and everything that's drawn in between.
Here's to the future. Here's to twenty-two.
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What’s Next?
A Memory
“Stand up if you’re living the dream.”
The speaker’s voice echoes through the auditorium to the new students.
I stand up, smiling. My internal monologue acknowledges that this wasn’t the exact plan, but it’s my plan now and I get to own that.Ferst Center at Georgia Tech is where my journey over the last 4 years began. Maybe not physically or administratively, but mentally.
At that moment, I separated myself from the past. I knew what needed to change personally and I was ready to do that.I ended high school with a list of things I wanted to change. I found myself at the intersection of multiple friend groups, but not particularly close with many people. I also realized that I was living to work on meaningless assignments that took up my time but didn’t stoke my desire to learn or to live.
Georgia Tech was not on my list of schools until 5 days before the application deadline, when a friend asked, “are you applying to Georgia Tech?” And I thought, “yeah, why not!”
A Reflection
In May, I had the honor of graduating from Georgia Tech. Words can only begin to describe how grateful I am for the family, friends, teammates, and mentors that have supported my growth over the past four years. Even more so, I’m grateful that I’ve had the opportunity to watch those around me grow and move towards their goals, both personally and professionally.
It’s been incredible to work on so many projects during my time at Georgia Tech, from researching how we can engineer the body’s immune system to treat cancer, to improving stroke treatment at Motus Nova, to collaborating with the Mayo Clinic on a noninvasive intracranial pressure monitor, to name a few. I’ve learned a ton, including sales at a recruiting SaaS startup.
It’s also been amazing to live in Atlanta for four years. I’ve loved the city (despite the humidity) and I’m so happy to see it continue growing.
A Lesson
I truly believe that a few core principles have helped me to reach the place I am.
- Seize the path and make it your own.
- Talk to people and lead with value. Help others and show you care in every interaction. The people you meet and interact with are the ones that will help support you and create the future.
- Please take care of yourself first and then really think about what you’re optimizing for. Your GPA (insert any other metric here) doesn’t matter if you don’t make it through.
A Mission
As I reflect on my life so far and where I want to go, I’ve put words to what’s been on my mind for a long time: help people at a fundamental level.
I believe that this statement embodies virtually everything I do. Whether it’s helping a friend in need, developing a new technology, or even yo-yoing, I’m working to bring positive energy into the world.
A Look Forward
I’m incredibly fortunate to be able to say I’m still living the dream.
Maybe “what’s now and what I am dreaming about” is a better title. I have no clue what my life looks like 3 months from now. And that’s okay. Better than okay actually — incredibly exciting. Here’s a quick rundown of what I’m doing and where I want to go:
My main focus moving forward is Augment Health, where we’re working to improve people’s experiences with medical care and treatment, so people can live holistically healthy lives instead of being held back by their medical conditions. We’re starting by giving people back their bladder sensation so they can get rid of urine collection bags.
In tandem, I’m working on outlining my next steps for personal development. I’m rebuilding my journaling practice, working on reading more books, and improving my personal productivity systems. I’d also like to continue yo-yo-ing, ballroom dancing (let me know if you want to learn or are looking for a partner) and learning yoga (Apple Fitness+ has really gotten me into it).
I’m excited to continue working on Jaredigms, my own little microcosm that hopefully lets people gain a glimpse into my mind and my life.
I would also like to give back to the community. I learned delayed gratification only works for so long and I know I need to make an impact now, while still investing in the future. I’ve been mentoring at hackathons and taught beginner ballroom dance lessons during my last semester at Tech, which was a good start. I want to do more.
Above all, I want to continue meeting people, building relationships, and learning what motivates everyone.
If we haven’t spoken in a while, I’d love to catch up. If we’ve never spoken, I’d love to learn more about what you’re working on, what you’re trying to do, and if there’s anything I can help out with (bonus points if you mention this article 😄). I’m looking forward to hearing from you.
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Minimum Viable Education
Generally, more information helps people make better decisions. If that's the case, it makes sense for people to gather as much information as possible.
However, acquiring and processing information takes time. Time is a fundamental resource and currency. As a result, time spent acquiring or processing information that doesn't impact the person is wasteful, similar to dumping clean water into the ocean. In the water case, it's easy to see the waste. In the information case, we often don't know what information we will or won't need in the future. Measuring the added value from the learning process also complicates matters.
It appears that we're crowding out spontaneous, real-time learning that comes from living life for structured, pre-emptive lectures that go too deep without connecting the high-level dots. This might make sense in higher level and specialized education, once someone has an interest in learning more in a particular direction. For children, curiosity, critical thinking skills, and a basic amount of information are vital.
Right now, it seems like we use schools to bombard people with information in the hopes that some of it sticks. What if we change that up? Instead of framing it as "let's throw this at the wall and see what sticks," and increasing the amount that sticks by throwing more at the wall, can we frame that as "what's the minimum amount of information we need to stick," and optimize for stickiness?
This post is part of the Daily Blogging Challenge. The theme for this article was "Waste." Thanks to Chris Hannah for sharing the challenge and Jeff Perry for organizing it!
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Yes
When I was younger, my dad would regularly listen to music in our living room. Music playing also meant I'd be asked who created a particular song. Correct answers usually included Eric Clapton or John Mayer. Particularly infuriating answers would include The Who and Yes, due to the nature of their names.
"Who's playing right now?"
"I don't know, Eric Clapton?"
"No, The Who!" (but asked like a question – thanks dad)
"I already told you, I don't know"
"It's The Who!" (again, intentionally phrased as a question)
or
"Who's playing right now?"
"I don't know, Eric Clapton?"
"Yes"
I'm happy because I got it right
"No, not Eric Clapton, the band Yes."
Well that's annoying.
It was surprisingly difficult for me to figure out which person or group was playing a song. I generally guessed from the pool of people I'd already heard of. I was much better at remembering the lyrics. Later, I looped albums enough on my own to remember the songs by their first few notes and associated those songs with the album artist (especially John Mayer and Pearl Jam's albums).
Today's theme made me think of Yes's "Shock to the System." Here are a few other songs by Yes that I've really enjoyed over the years:
- Lift Me Up
- Silent Talking
- Angkor Wat
- Wondrous Stories
- Roundabout
This post is part of the Daily Blogging Challenge. The theme for this article was "Shock." Thanks to Chris Hannah for sharing the challenge and Jeff Perry for organizing it!
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Finding the next piece
When I was younger, I really enjoyed building LEGO sets. I would open the box, take out the bags, and proceed to empty those bags onto the floor. Then, I'd sit or lie on the floor, with the instructions on one side, the current state of the set in the center, and the shallow pile of colorful pieces on the other side.
The most difficult part of building these sets was digging through the pieces to find the one I needed for the next step. Extensively organizing the pieces seemed to take too long and this was before the pieces were split up into sequentially numbered bags for ease of building. Usually, finding pieces is easy – you scan the pieces and find the one you're looking for.
However, sometimes I'd spend what felt like an eternity looking for a single piece (looking at you, 4865b).
Then I'd stand up. I'd walk around the shallow pile of LEGOs, surveying it as I moved, and quickly notice the piece I couldn't find before.
Standing up and moving around meant that I was physically changing my perspective looking for the piece. It helped me to break out of my limited mental image of the LEGO pile, which I had created from only a single angle, and look at drastically different versions of that pile. Once I was in these new situations, it was very straightforward to find that piece.
It's surprising how effectively this can apply to any aspect of problem solving and even life. By shifting perspective, both physically and mentally, we can find ideas and solutions that we would never have noticed from our previous vantage point.
The ability to shift perspective is a skill in itself and requires effort to practice. That activation energy makes it very easy to forget about its power. Actions as simple as getting up and walking around have helped me with shifting physical perspectives.
I've personally found writing and especially journaling are effective tools for achieving mental perspective shifts. They enable me to give each perspective their own space on a page so I can go put on a new lens without forgetting the old ones.
Effectively shifting and leveraging perspectives to analyze problems is vital for creating the best solutions.
I wholeheartedly recommend walking and journaling (although maybe not at the same time) as a way to build and improve the skill.
This post is part of the Daily Blogging Challenge. The theme for this article was "Perspective." Thanks to Chris Hannah for sharing the challenge and Jeff Perry for organizing it!
Photo by Xavi Cabrera on Unsplash
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Do you wear your watch on your left wrist or your non-dominant one?
For a long time, I've wondered whether the proper way to wear a watch is on my left wrist or on my non-dominant one.
According to Wikipedia, this wouldn't be a problem for about 90% of people (source), because those two are the same.
The problem is, I'm left-handed.
On the one hand, watches are typically made to be worn on the left wrist. The crown sits to the right of the watch's face, so it is easily accessible with the right hand. Since right-handedness is so common, this really opens up the number of watch choices I have. However, on my Apple Watch, using the scribble feature is a simultaneous test of both my patience and my dexterity since I'm forced to use my right hand to write.
On the other hand, it makes sense to keep the watch out of the way of day-to-day activities by putting it on my non-dominant (right) wrist. If I'm writing, there's no watch case or band preventing my wrist from resting on the table. Also, I'm much more dexterous with my left hand than my right hand, so the crown and other features would be easier to manipulate.
To keep my options open, I could just flip the watch and have the crown face away from my hand. Unfortunately, I don't think I'd be as cool as Jimi Hendrix's playing an electric guitar upside down.
I typically wear watches on my left wrist because it feels "right," although now I'm thinking about trying it out on my right wrist for a week or two. I didn't wear watches very often when I was younger, but the Apple Watch has made a much more compelling case for me to wear it.
This post is part of the Daily Blogging Challenge. The theme for this article was "Watch." Thanks to Chris Hannah for sharing the challenge and Jeff Perry for organizing it!
Header photo by Tadeusz Lakota on Unsplash
Picture of Jimi Hendrix from Wikipedia.
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The luckiest people in the world
If you're reading this, you probably exist. If you're human, that means you were probably born.
I want to take a moment and recognize the chances of your birth. What are the odds that a single living cell originated from the early Earth's primordial soup? What are the odds that single cell would form a symbiotic relationship with an absolute powerhouse of a cell (the mitochondrion!) and then group together with other cells to form a multicellular organism? What are the odds that small multicellular organisms would grow into the thoughtful beings we are today. And what are the odds that, once all that happened, you would be born?
You, as an individual, are beautiful, smart, and unique. You also have a distinct perspective and set of experiences that you can share with the world. There's nobody else like you. Based on my preliminary calculations, the odds of someone else being exactly like you are 1 in 7.8 billion, at best. Probably orders of magnitude closer to zero than that. Yet here you are.
I feel like our birthdays might be the luckiest moments of our lives. On top of that, we get to live now. That means we also have the unique opportunity to change the future. This is actually the only point in time that can do that. Not only are we incredibly lucky for existing, but we're incredibly lucky for the opportunity in front of us.
We've already built a lot of incredible things during our time here. There's still a long way to go. Let's do it together.
This post is part of the Daily Blogging Challenge. The theme for this article was "Chance." Thanks to Chris Hannah for sharing the challenge and Jeff Perry for organizing it!
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Trajectories
Wake up. Sit up. Get up. Brush teeth. Change into video call clothes. Get on video call.
End result: all set for meeting.
Sometimes slip into the alternative: Wake up. Check phone. Sit up. Check phone. Get up. Check phone. Brush teeth. Check phone. Change into video call clothes. Check phone. Get on video call. Check phone.
End result: still ready for call. Different trajectory. Routine time expanded. More rushed now. Rushing causes mistakes. Attention may be split or key decisions under-analyzed.
New alternative: Wake up (earlier). Sit up. Get up. Brush teeth. Write morning pages. Change into video call clothes. Get on video call.
Same end result. New trajectory. Less rushed, more thoughtful. Longer routine time, but spent mindfully. Better start today.
Humans react to situations. Reactions follow a trajectory set by routines. Choose the right routine for the desired reaction, then carefully tune and examine. Start in the morning - it's easier to start a trajectory than divert it.
This post is part of the Daily Blogging Challenge. The theme for this article was "Routine." Thanks to Chris Hannah for sharing the challenge and Jeff Perry for organizing it!
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The density of fun
The density of matter is defined as the amount of mass per unit volume. This is expressed as m/V. This gives us an idea of how heavy a certain volume of a material may be.
In the same way, there's a density of fun. Here, we can define it as the amount of satisfaction per unit time. This is expressed as s/t. This theoretically gives us an idea of how fun a certain activity will be.
Eating chocolate will be much more satisfying than eating a rock. Eating a rock will also probably take you a lot longer. As a result, eating chocolate has a higher "fun density" than eating a rock. In theory, we'd always prioritize high-density fun over low-density fun. Why would you ever eat a rock if you can eat chocolate instead?
The problem is that, while physical density remains relatively constant under similar conditions, fun density can vary a lot. Maybe you're craving a rock today, so its satisfaction level increases by a thousand.
Not to mention the economics principle of diminishing marginal returns. Maybe that first bite of rock gives you fifty thousand satisfactions but you break a tooth on the next bite so you get negative ten thousand satisfactions. In two bites, your satisfaction level has changed by sixty thousand.
Depending on how many bites it takes you to get through that rock (and how many teeth you have left at the end), you could have hundreds of different satisfaction levels associated with the same activity. That's hard for your brain to keep track of, so it can be hard to actually figure out how many satisfactions an activity will give you until you do it.
Also, your satisfaction-ometer is broken – thanks evolution. Flashing lights max out the needle because paying attention to rapidly changing signals, like a landslide or a bear running at them, helped your ancient ancestors to survive. Now, the computer in your pocket can put those rapidly changing signals on overload. Before you know it, you're looking at pictures and videos of people and animals doing crazy things. For an hour. Oops, two hours.
That first video was probably really funny. In 15 seconds, you might've gotten two hundred satisfactions. That's a fun density of 13.333333333333333333333333333 satisfactions per second (SPS) – not bad. After 2 hours, you probably don't quite remember anything you've already watched. And now the pressure of the work you've been procrastinating is starting to get to you. You got the +200 at the beginning, but now you're at a net -1000 satisfactions. That means you're at a net fun density of -1.39 SPS. The flashing lights and the first video tricked your brain into sticking around.
Contrast that with going for a walk or a run. For me, walking has a pretty linear fun function. Let's put it at 600 satisfactions per minute. In 15 seconds, you'll only get 150 satisfactions. The video clearly wins. But if you go for a 15 minute walk, your net fun density hits 10 SPS. Upon further analysis, walking is way better than getting sucked in by The Almighty Algorithm.
In addition to the high variability in satisfactions and your broken satisfactionometer, there's the problem of quantization of fun time. Rather than being continuous, time exists as packets. It probably doesn't make sense to go for a 5-second walk. There's also some prep time involved. As a result, fun density has to be considered with the packets of time required to achieve that fun. For a walk, 10-15 minutes is probably a good block. Other things may take more time. This acts as another barrier when analyzing an activity's SPS. Rather than fully analyzing free time, we often only analyze what's in front of us.
15 seconds fits way more easily than 15 minutes into anyone's day. But then that 15 seconds becomes 5 minutes in the same time block and can extend to 30 minutes or more over the course of a day. Reorganizing the day to create a continuous 30 minute block would enable you to sieze so many more satisfactions!
In summary, diminishing marginal returns, big flashing lights (really little flashing lights flashing synchronously), and short-sighted time packet analysis make it very difficult for our brains to determine what is high-density fun and what is low-density fun in the moment. It requires much more deliberation and conscious thought than I thought.
Overall, I expect that taking some time to analyze the satisfactions per second distribution function (SPSDF) will actually serve to increase your daily intake of satisfactions and lead to a much more enjoyable life, where you can actually learn to cook, to ballroom dance, or to yoyo.
If you're interested in funding or conducting research into the quantisation of time, the satisfactionometer, or rock-eating, let me know.
This post is part of the Daily Blogging Challenge – this week is a warmup and the full challenge will kick off in March. The theme for this article was "Play." Thanks to Chris Hannah for sharing the challenge and Jeff Perry for organizing it!
Photo by Artem Kniaz on Unsplash
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Paul's perfect picture
Paul pulled out his phone, expanding the button on the back to more easily hold it in his hand. He presses the screen and the camera app opens. He pulls a lens attachment from his pocket and puts it over his phone camera with a flourish. Turning around, his attention on the window into the world created by his screen, Paul searches for the perfect scene.
The window pans across the evening landscape – it crosses over a village in the distance, a bright and sandy beach with a glistening ocean, the beginning of a forest with young but sturdy trees. The moonlight beams down, almost as though it follows the phone's lens. Paul pulls a mini tent from his pocket and perches it over the lens to block the moon's direct light.
Paul walks towards the beach and saunters over to the edge of a short cliff, finding a nice vantage point over the beach. Instantly, he sees his target. A turtle was in the middle of the beach, laying eggs.
He opens his bag using the extra-grippy zipper attachments. They make it so much easier to open the bag. He pulls out his organizer cube and grabs the tripod. Placing the tripod on the ground, he slots the phone's grip into the connector.
Having perfected everything, from his lighting, to the camera position, to his bag's ease of use and organization, he quickly aims the phone at the turtle's nesting spot and presses his SuperFast PictureTaker2000™ to take a picture. The camera makes an audible "click."
Paul taps his phone to open the picture he had taken so expertly. His jaw dropped as he beheld the small sand bump at the center of the screen. Looking up, he realized the turtle had disappeared and that small bump in the sand was the only remaining evidence of its prescence.
After taking a few moments to gather all of his belongings and pack them into his bag, Paul set off to return home before midnight.
Arriving home, Paul unloads his pockets before running to his room and turning on his computer. He opens the Valdivian Dawn store, searches "faster camera setup and aim," and clicks the first result for the SuperFast AutoFocus 9000™. Paul adds it to his cart, selects 2-day shipping, and hits the "buy" button. Paul smiles, glad that he'll never miss an incredible photo again.
This post is part of the Daily Blogging Challenge – this week is a warmup and the full challenge will kick off in March. The theme for this article was "Accessories." Thanks to Chris Hannah for sharing the challenge and Jeff Perry for organizing it!
Photo by Sebastien Gabriel on Unsplash
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The Flower
It's a bright, sunny day. A small cup sits on the kitchen window sill, full of dirt. A child stares expectantly at the dirt.
"When will it grow?" asks the child, as he waters the dirt.
"Be patient, it takes time," responds the parent.
"Okay," says the child, skeptical that he's being told the truth.
After an hour or two sitting at the window sill, staring, the dirt remains unmoved. The boy leaves his spot and goes to play with his toys. He received a new dinosaur for his birthday a few weeks ago.
Over the next two days, the child continues in this manner. Sitting at the window sill, waiting, unsure what will happen. Making sure to water the dirt.
On the third day, it rained. The boy went to check the cup of dirt and was surprised to see a small green chute coming out of it. Excitedly, he ran to his parent and said, "look, look! It grew!"
His parent responded, mirroring the boy's excitement, "look at that!"
The boy spent the next three hours energetically watching the small green chute. The small green chute stood, slightly tilted to one side, and returned the boy's stare.
Over the next three days, the child continues watching and watering the plant each day. Again, the boy goes to play with his dinosaurs, his excitement dulled by the lack of growth.
The following day, the boy noticed that the chute was considerably bigger than a few days ago. It was strange how suddenly that chute shot up. Once again, excitement. "Look how tall it is!" exclaimed the boy. "Yes, it's grown so much!" responds the parent.
The child continues watching the plant each day. For another two days, the boy excitedly waters and stares. For the next two days, the boy waters and stares with a bit less energy.
"Why did it stop growing? Is it dead?" asks the boy.
The parent asks, "do you remember when your plant was just a cup of dirt?"
"Yes," responds the boy, recalling that sunny day a couple of weeks prior.
The parent follows with, "do you remember when your plant was short?"
"Yes," responds the boy, recalling the short chute that had appeared, much to his excitement.
"Well then, you need to trust in the process. Give it time – beautiful things grow at their own pace," replies the parent.
"How long will it take?" asks the boy.
"Think about how the cup of dirt suddenly turned into a short plant and that short plant suddenly turned into a taller plant. You won't always notice the growth, but it's there. Keep watering your plant and checking it and you'll know when it's ready," explains the parent.
"Okay," says the boy, running to grab his watering can.
--
"Look, look, look! It grew!!" exclaims the boy.
"What?" responds the parent as they wake up.
"Look at my plant! It became a flower! Look!" says the child, energetically displaying the cup of dirt.
The flower's beautiful orange petals were glowing in the early morning's light. The green chute had transformed into a beautiful flower.
"It's so beautiful," reflects the parent.
"Look what I did!" says the boy, grabbing his parent's hand.
"I already see," responds his parent.
"No, come here!"
"Okay," says the parent, following the boy
Entering the kitchen, there are now ten cups of dirt on the window sill, lined up edge to edge. There is one gap in the line.
The child runs and places the cup he's holding to fill the gap. He then dashes to his watering can and goes down the line, gingerly adding water to each of the cups. He stops briefly at the grown flower's cup and admires it for a moment, before continuing to water the rest of the cups.
"The flower grew! I know these flowers will grow too – I just have to wait, water, and believe, even if it doesn't seem like they're growing," observes the boy.
His parent smiles, nods, and looks at the beautiful flower that had bloomed on the window sill.
This post is part of the Daily Blogging Challenge – this week is a warmup and the full challenge will kick off in March. Thanks to Chris Hannah for sharing the challenge and Jeff Perry for organizing it!
Photo by Dalibor Perina on Unsplash
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Analog automation
To automate or not to automate, that is the question.
In terms of technology, automation tends to have a clear tradeoff – put in a bit of time now to repeatedly save time later.
The time you save later isn't just the time spent doing the task. The time spent pondering the task and the mental energy it takes to remember the task can also be time sinks on their own.
Habits act like "analog automations," or automations of the organic form. They are triggered by certain states of the system (the human) and its surroundings, involve an action, and achieve a particular, usually consistent, result.
While we have to wait for Apple to release new Shortcuts features so we can automate our phones, our brains already have a full complement of features that we can work with. The developers of humanity have spent billions of years developing those folds and connections!
Many people have investigated habits and their relation to the mind, from Aristotle to James Clear, BJ Fogg, and Charles Duhigg. The summary is that habits directly influence, and even determine, our lives and we can cultivate excellence by building habits.
You can't just program analog automations the same way you can use digital ones. Habits can take a while to form and are sometimes counterintuitive in nature. This can create an illusion of a huge barrier to entry with minimal payoff since the horizon is so far away.
It's very common and obvious to look at both the short and long-term tradeoffs of technological automation since the time scale can be relatively short overall. There's a clear cost to adopt new habits that can take way longer than writing a few lines of code.
Maybe it's time that we fully consider the tradeoffs of analog automations – that increase in cost appears to have a disproportionately large impact if you pick the right habits.
The benefits of regularly practicing gratitude, exercising, and thinking far outweigh the perceived costs of automating them.
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Top 5
In no particular order, here are 5 of the top products I've started using over the past few months that I absolutely love!
No affiliate links here – just genuine recommendations!
Hey
Hey is a new email service that turns email on its head.
It has special sections for emails you want to see right away (the imbox), emails that belong in a "news feed" (the feed), and emails that are transactional (the paper trail).
Nobody can get to those sections unless you give them explicit permission – random emails and newsletters don't deserve the same attention you give your family and friends, and Hey helps make that reality.
I also enjoy the ability to move away from Gmail/Google services and onto a more independent platform that takes privacy much more seriously. And the user experience is so much better, so the privacy benefits are the cherry on top.
I'd totally recommend Hey for email – I've never felt more on top of my email before!
Ghost
Ghost is a blogging platform, similar to Wordpress, but with much nicer default themes and much more lightweight, in my opinion.
It makes the writing process a breeze since the built-in web editor is absolutely beautiful. It also has a few other awesome features - built-in newsletters and the ability to tag and add images to posts.
I love that I'm able to host it myself, which means that I own all of my data and I'm no longer at the mercy of Google, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or any other data clearinghouse that masquerades as a social network.
My blog is entirely hosted on Ghost and required minimal setup to get up and running.
Ghost is awesome and it's created one of the best writing experiences I've ever had.
DigitalOcean
DigitalOcean is a virtual private server (VPS) provider – they offer flexible servers at very reasonable prices. Having brief experience with AWS, GCP, and Azure, DigitalOcean feels like they've really prioritized the user experience.
I use DigitalOcean to host my Ghost blog, which means that I'm even further in control of my content. DigitalOcean got me up and running in 1 click thanks to their 1-click app marketplace.
I've had an awesome experience so far and was able to take advantage of some introductory credit through the GitHub Student Developer Pack.
Big shoutout to DigitalOcean for offering the most usable dashboard and services out of the providers I've used.
Apple Watch
I was pretty uncertain whether I would actually use an Apple Watch – I rarely wore normal watches and I was also trying to cut down on the screens in my life. It didn't make much sense to add another screen.
Since getting one (as a Christmas gift), I've worn it every day. It's one of the most exciting devices I've had in a while.
As counterintuitive as it is, I think it's actually decreased my screen time! Instead of having to open my phone to check notifications and send texts, I can take a quick look at my wrist. The limited screen size makes it much harder to get distracted by other apps.
I don't even have to bring my phone anywhere I go since I can take calls, send messages, and talk with Siri, so I traded off a phone screen for a watch screen.
On top of that, the activity and exercise tracking is awesome. I've established a sort of dependence on closing my rings, which is a super positive habit in my opinion. Right now I have them set so I close them in a normal day if I do a ~30 minute workout, which pushes me to work out every day. This has helped me a lot with staying active while so many other responsibilities are pulling on me.
The battery life is also surprisingly solid – one full charge lets me track my sleep and get through my day before needing to charge it again.
Overall, I love the watch – I'm still figuring out which face configuration works best for me, but after almost 2 months of wearing it, I still get excited when I use it.
Apple Fitness Plus
Apple Fitness Plus is like Netflix for workouts. Apple has some awesome trainers that record videos for a variety of workout types. Yoga and HIIT have been my favorite types so far, especially Dustin Brown's yoga flows.
The videos pair with your Apple Watch to track your workout and also display your stats, such as your heart rate and your rings, on the screen.
During the COVID pandemic, where going to the gym is a bit more difficult, it's been amazing being able to work out and exercise from inside my apartment.
Previous semesters, I've found myself wishing I was more active but not having time to go to the gym.
With a yoga mat and a bit of floor space, Apple Fitness Plus has helped me get some activity in almost every day.
Summary
These are some of my favorite products I've started using over the past few months.
I'd love to hear if you've tried any of these, or if you're going to, and what you think!
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Helluva Dance Competition 2021 - American Smooth
This weekend was the first weekend of Helluva Dance Competition at Georgia Tech! This is my 3rd time participating with Hannah and it was a lot of fun!
Here are the videos for the American styles we danced:
Waltz
Foxtrot
Tango
Rumba
Cha Cha
Swing
Full Playlist
Here’s a link to all of these videos in a single YouTube playlist:
2021 Helluva Dance CompetitionShare your videos with friends, family, and the world
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Podcast Appearance! HealthCare QualityCast Episode #99
I had the opportunity to chat with Jarvis Gray on his podcast, the HealthCare QualityCast. Big thanks to Nicole Cable for putting us in touch!
I was really impressed that Jarvis made our conversation feel like we were old friends getting back together, even though it was our first time meeting.
We covered leadership & healthcare and also dove into some of the principles I use to guide my life and my work!
Here's a link! Give it a listen, I'd love to hear what you think:
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