Every year, former Wired editor Kevin Kelly comes up with a list of bits advice he wish he had known. This year he has 103 bits of advice. Here are my favorites.
There is no such thing as being “on time.” You are either late or you are early. Your choice.
Ask anyone you admire: Their lucky breaks happened on a detour from their main goal. So embrace detours. Life is not a straight line for anyone.
You’ll get 10x better results by elevating good behavior rather than punishing bad behavior, especially in children and animals.
You will be judged on how well you treat those who can do nothing for you.
Your time and space are limited. Remove, give away, throw out things in your life that dont spark joy any longer in order to make room for those that do.
Aim to die broke. Give to your beneficiaries before you die; it’s more fun and useful. Spend it all. Your last check should go to the funeral home and it should bounce.
To keep young kids behaving on a car road trip, have a bag of their favorite candy and throw a piece out the window each time they misbehave.
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Hey Friend,
Hopefully, this shows up in your mailbox like each past newsletter did. I decided to switch back to Revue due to their integration with Twitter. The kids are back in school (full time!) and things are back to somewhat normal in terms of work and school schedules.
Labor Day just passed and we’re into the home stretch of the year. I’m hoping we don’t hit a major surge with Delta going into the winter (get vaccinated!), but I’m feeling good heading into the last quarter of 2021.
Remote work empowers those who produce and disempowers those who have succeeded by being excellent diplomats and poor workers, along with those who have succeeded by always finding someone to blame for their failures. It removes the ability to seem productive (by sitting at your desk looking stressed or always being on the phone), and also, crucially, may reveal how many bosses and managers simply don’t contribute to the bottom line.
Instead it was a year in limbo: school on stuttering Zoom, school in person and then back home again for quarantine, school all the time and none of the time. No part of it was good, for kids or parents, but most parts of it were safe, and somehow, impossibly, we made it through a full year. It was hell, but we did it. We did it.
2020 was definitely one of the most difficult years ever. Things aren’t completely back to normal, but I’m SO THANKFUL that in our school district, the kids are safely back in school.
Vox’s Explained series on Netflix is excellent. They’re 3 seasons in and each episode is interesting. This episode on “The Next Pandemic” was filmed in 2019. Really. You can’t watch it without thinking how the US, and most countries in the world, completely botched their response.
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This post originally appeared as an issue on my newsletter. If you’d like to get early access to my posts, please consider subscribing.
My good friend sent me a link to this YouTube channel (also available as a podcast). It’s called the Order of Man and on Fridays, the host, Ryan Michler, just riffs on random topics. On this episode, he tells a story about running into some young boys who are dressed in fantasy warrior costumes and are pretend fighting. He finds out that it’s called LARPing, which stands for Live Action Role Playing. He goes on and says a lot of men are just role playing their way through life and not living up to who they really want to be. It’s a good discussion. He toes the line of being too masculine, but never really crosses it. I thought he had some really good points. One of them being, you need to surround yourself with other men. It sounds weird at first but it makes sense and it really hit home for me.
We are social creatures by nature and we need social interaction with other human beings. We all need a support system. We need friends. I can speak from experience that when I got married and especially after I became a father, those friendships fell to the wayside. My priorities were my wife and my family. And there is nothing wrong with that. We are husbands and fathers and we are wired to protect and provide. There is also a downside to that. We tend to forget that we also have needs and if we don’t have social interaction, bonds with other men who are just like us, we start to break down. I know it sounds dramatic but that’s what happened to me. I wasn’t myself and everything else around me suffered. I wasn’t the best husband, father, or employee that I could be.
I think a lot of us fall into this hole of doing our jobs as husbands and fathers and forgetting who we were before all of that. It’s important to remember we can’t do it all alone and we need that support system. To ground us. To motivate us. To vent to. To joke with. To drink with. To be the guy to listen to things and say “oh yeah that happens to me too” so the other person doesn’t feel like they’re in this alone. Because they’re not. We’re all just here trying to figure shit out. And it helps to know that you’re not the only one.
Before the links, I wanted to say thanks to everyone who has sent kind words and support. It’s cool that anyone reads this at all. And if it helps anyone, that’s awesome. Please share this with anyone who you might think would enjoy this.
I don’t care for Kanye’s life outside of his music. It’s quite sad what he’s devolved to, but this album is almost perfection. Easily my favorite Kanye album and in my top 3 all time.
Tweet of the Week
every night between the kids bath time and bed time I casually mumble that I forgot something in my truck then I go outside, sit in my truck and hide for about 20–30 minutes. last night she caught me and my lovely evening breaks are no longer
What parent can’t relate hiding from your parental duties for just a few precious minutes of quiet downtime? We all do this. For me, it’s a grocery store run. I had to chuckle at this one. What’s your favorite excuse to duck away from your kids?
This post originally appeared as an issue on my newsletter. If you’d like to get early access to my posts, please consider subscribing.
Perspective
We’re into December now, can you believe that? Thanksgiving was only last week. As difficult as this year has been, my family and I have plenty to be thankful for. Having each other, our health, and moving back to southern California easily top the long list of things we are thankful for. Looking back, we definitely won’t forget this year.
I learned this year to always have a different perspective when unfortunate things happen. I’ve read and learned from other people that this is key in changing your outlook, and ultimately your attitude and quality of life. The other night, I was lamenting that our place was messy. I stopped and thought to myself, I’m so lucky to have a family, two kids, and a dog, that make this place look lived in. If not for my kids, the dining table wouldn’t have crayons and toys strewn all over it. It’s all about perspective.
YouTube
For me, YouTube is my “TV”. It’s what I like to browse on my down time, when I want to zone out. I’ve always liked vlog type channels, when they’re done well. Casey Neistat is the first that comes to my mind. I’ve always wanted to try to do something similar, but for me. I posted this a LONG time ago and I had fun making it and looking back at it (I lived a different life back then lol). I’ve started making little videos for myself and posting to YouTube. They serve two purposes: to capture moments with my family and as a creative outlet for myself. Go to my channel to see what I’ve posted and I’ll embed the latest one below.
Links
Learn How to Appreciate What You Already Have – Another article talking about practicing gratitude but by “mental subtraction”. Basically, how much crappier would your life be if you took away something positive.
How to Be Rich, According to the Happiest Country in the World – Kind of going along with the happiness theme, what “rich” means in the happiest country in the world. tldr; “Do something active. Do something together with other people. Do something meaningful.”
An Oral History of ‘Marge vs The Monorail’ – Something that always makes me happy is when I watch this episode. Too bad Conan didn’t take part in this, but nevertheless, a great read.