MNTS #18
[Week 37/ Year 2023] Writer's Block, Plato, Rubin, Murphy, Guzey, Slater, Michael, Thompson, Mayer, Get your jags up son
Mainly, Notes To Self - my weekly attempt to compress everything noteworthy I read, watched, listened to, and discovered during the past week.
New Post
Musings: Writer’s Block - my soggy attempt to write my way out of my writing funk.
Reading
Started The Republic of Plato, it’s the final book we are reading as part of the inaugural Other Life book meetings.
The Creative Act by Rick Rubin - finally picked this one up and have been enjoying reading a few (short) chapters each morning to start my work day.
The Delerium of Reason: On William Gibson’s Neuromancer (1984) by Justin Murphy
There's nothing to protest, only new games to play.
Omens of exceptional talent by Alexey Guzey
ask questions that make people they talk to smarter and more specific
Alarming Average Screen Time Statistics (2023) by Exploding Topics
The average American spends 7 hours and 4 minutes looking at a screen each day.1
“Master of Change” by David Epstein
A “having” orientation is one in which you define yourself by what you have: a certain job, income, house, car, skill, and so on. A “being” orientation is one in which you define yourself by your essential values: creativity, intellect, wisdom, kindness, authenticity, and so on. A “having” orientation is fragile to change because everything you have eventually shifts and can be taken away. A “being” orientation is much more rugged and flexible because those core attributes are portable, durable, and open to being applied flexibly during change
Elements of Amazon’s Day 1 Culture by Daniel Slater - this was a follow-up to the Rory Sutherland podcast I mentioned a couple weeks back where he mentions the Two Way Door concept.
Recognize two-way doors. While some decisions are one-way doors, others are two-way doors, meaning they are reversible, and you can correct mistakes quickly.
Don't wait for all the data. If you wait until you know everything, you are probably being too slow. Most decisions only need about 70% of the information you wish you had.
Disagree and commit. People can disagree, but once a decision is made, everyone must commit to it. This saves time versus trying to convince each other.
The Thrill of the Heist: Incentivizing Cultural Engagement by Michael - been thinking on this one over the last couple weeks and it’s inspired me riff on a similar idea in the future.
Cowen's insight is a great tool for our engagement with culture, but you can imagine how they can also be applied in parenting. Just as we can 'reframe and incentivize' to appreciate art more deeply, it can be adapted to steer our children's focus and heighten their interest in learning.
Listening
Podcast
Derek Thompson is my favorite Atlantic writer and he divulged a handful of strategies that I will be incorporating into my own writing.
To include:
Thesis, antithesis, synthesis to structure an argument
Binary formula for interesting = importance + novelty
Rants serve as an attractor for evidence you’re on the right track
Use of the rhetorical device antimetabole by repeating a phrase in reverse order. Antimetabole is used to create emphasis on certain concepts through verbal associations that are easily remembered.
Example: “Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country,” - JFK
Literary technique called chiasmus which is the A-B-B-A order of words or phrases.
Example: “Fair (A) is foul(B), and foul(B) is fair(A)” - Shakespeare
Naming ideas to makes them more memorable (Taleb is the master)
This next one started auto playing and I totally got sucked in. Not a huge John Mayer fan, but the insights and discussion about his creative process were highly insightful and entertaining. This one was unexpectedly fun.
Random
On a jag /jagging - A concept that was completely alien to me until I listened to the John Mayer and Derek Thompson podcasts where they both used the turn of phrase. Mayer says the longer you can jag the better musician you are and Thompson uses it to describe reading several books by the same author in short succession.
The definition according to Cambridge Dictionary:
Jag: a short period when someone behaves repeatedly in a particular way or does a lot of a particular thing:
a crying/sneezing/coughing jag
She says she's on a health jag.
Other examples:
He was a sensitive person, prone to crying jags.
Apart from a few late-night chocolate jags, my diet is pretty good.
He began stealing things and then went on an arson jag.
His entire first novel was written during a 90-hour jag.
I've been on a jag lately of making different salad dressing recipes trying to find the perfect one.
Until next week.
Stay spirited, stay resilient.
Andrew
This doesn’t seem to include work related screen time
"The Thrill of the Heist: Incentivizing Cultural Engagement by Michael - been thinking on this one over the last couple weeks and it’s inspired me riff on a similar idea in the future."
Super curious!
"Naming ideas to makes them more memorable (Taleb is the master)"
This also reminds me of something Rory Sutherland pointed out: "The term "Designated Driver" - a testament to the power of naming, makes the concept feel more concrete and legitimate. Previously, non-drinkers at social events were often labelled as spoilsports. However, with the introduction of the term "Designated Driver", by shows like Friends dramatised the Designated Driver role as accepted behaviour and soon the idea became normalised the act of abstaining from alcohol. Suddenly it becomes not just acceptable, but commendable and responsible."