That’s the first thing on my mind today, the importance of monotasking. (I didn’t charge my phone last night and I’m a little worried that the battery might not last me till I get to work… But no matter, I will do what I can with what I have)
It’s interesting to observe my own mind meander and circle around. It’s really good at doing that. MBTI theory- which I don’t care too much for anymore- would describe it as extraverted intuition. I see links and analogies and parallels everywhere and I can jump from this train to that with great ease. Indeed if you needed somebody to drive something off topic, I’m your man. This can be incredibly useful when the solution to a problem is not immediately apparent.
But it’s just a tool, and if all you have is a hammer then everything starts to look like a nail. And you need a range of tools to suck the marrow out of life, you need all the colours on the palette to paint a full painting. My rapid-fire chaingun connection-making mind comes at the expense of a more deliberate, measured sniper rifle sort of deep thinking. Perhaps I am not skilled at the latter because I invested most of all my points in the former. Perhaps I even developed the chaingun mind as a coping mechanism to avoid having to deal with focused, straightforward thinking- the kind that aims deep, sets a target and goes straight through it.
That’s it- sometimes there’s no good way around something and you just have to go straight at it with all your focus and effort and energy. You have to monotask. And I am not equipped to do this, I have not been trained to do this, I am not disposed to do this.
But it is a skillset I must and need to develop. Deep impact comes from deep effort, and skirting around is a parlour trick in comparison. (Well- not always, and I imagine there are people who have the opposite problem, who can’t pivot and change gears- the REAL challenge is to find a happy medium, to know the right tool to use in the right context.)
I firmly believe that in the context of human wellness almost everybody is capable of developing almost any non-extreme skill. Anybody can become a kickass sprinter- you won’t win the Olympics because you’ll be facing the best of the best of the best, but gou can definitely improve by leaps and bounds. Paul Graham said that if you could get somebody to practice drawing deliberately for 20 years you’d be surprised by how far they got. Richard Feynman had an average-ish IQ. The challenge is to apply yourself, which is what I need to learn.
I’ve been reading and listening to a lot of what Elon Musk had to say- solicit negative feedback, especially from friends. Think in terms of: what needs to happen? What’s the business model? Fantastic heuristics to be found all around.
Monotasking. My task here is writing, so even when I get distracted in my train of thought, at least I’m still writing. (I paused there for a second to check my WhatsApp. Lol! That’s the problem with talking about what you shouldn’t do instead of what you should, because of the suggestion effect… But I only checked it for a second, was mindful of the distraction and came right back here. Fuck yeah.)
The cool thing about writing is that it’s a record of thoughts, and looking back I get to see the path my mind took. I don’t even really have to explain how my mind works, you can see it for yourself by observing my train of thought, what I choose to focus on, how I express myself. I tend to repeat myself in several different variations, like an unsure artisr who has to use many strokes to draw something. Contrast this with Lee Kuan Yew or Christopher Langan (Outliers) for instance, both of whom write and speak in crisp, clear sentences. Those are deliberate sniper style thinkers (Ni rather than Ne, maybe). They say less but there is more value in what they say.
I think preferences do count, and you shouldn’t force yourself to try to change your personal style altogether. Rather, you experiment with something different then sit back and see how it influences your personal style. I think this is true for all forms of communication and expression.
When I’m doing work- writing posts for poached or my own blog for instance- I’m pretty good at coming up with ideas. I had over 80 drafts on my blog- many of which I combined and published a unsorted thoughts (maybe they’ll be useful to somebody).
I am well aware that my present style is suboptimal. Few people want to read this sort of messy, noisy writing. I don’t. Even those that claim they’re okay with it would prefer it if it were more consise and punchy (unless the meandering were to serve an explicit purpose). But I stick with it anyway because done is better than perfect and my bullshit perfectionism keeps me from trying.
So this is shitty writing, okay? It’s the shitty writing I have to do to get to the good stuff. I upload it because I’m an exhibitionist, because you never know who’s going to stumble on it and find it relevant to whatever they’re going through. You never know who’s going to offer you a job, or ask you out, or become a part of your life in a self-selected way- which is the best kind, because then you know more clearly that it isn’t a display of social obligation but a sincere communication of genuine love. (I suppose this might change if a blog gets so popular that the comments section develop into a community- but that is not an issue for me, and it’s not something I have to worry about.
In the meantime I deeply cherish the conversations I have here (or were initiated through contact here) and it is no exaggeration to say that the decision to blog might be the best decision I made in my life. It’s never just a single decision, of course. It’s a series of little ones, day in day out. Sometimes you leave it for an extended period of time. Sometimes it feels like it’s not even in your hands- it comes to you when it will and all you can do is just show up. Be present. Allow it to pass through you, the mortal, the conduit. It’s deeply humbling when you really get into it.
You’re not punished for your ego, you’re punished by your ego. Because it deprives you of the real magnificence of existence, and it burdens you with anxiety to deliver (which keeps you from taking the risks you need to take to do your best work) and a constant need to measure up, to be okay, to avoid failure, to not be mocked, to not be seen with mud on your face. Embrace it! Embrace the suck! Where did this fear and anxiety come from? Why are we scared and cold and shaking? It’s bad for health, in every imaginable sense. We don’t need to be so conflicted. We don’t need to be so torn at being conflicted. Breathe. Breathing is a privilege.
I wonder where that just came from. Lol. Battery is getting lower. I’m reaching work soon. A little bit tired and sleepy. Need to hydrate. I brought my facewash home and forgot to bring our back. I need to buy a light bulb and plastic bags and take a passport photo and do some credit card paperwork. I can save all of that for later.
Now I need to get to work and I need to monotask. To quickly figure out what my priorities are and what the most optimal tasks are and execute them. No pressure. I’m entirely capable. Our fear is not that we are weak but powerful beyond measure- there’s a cognitive dissonance there because it means that we might have been wrong all along, that we might have been ‘under-living’. Like the grandma who lifted a car to save her grandson, then wondered how her life might have turned out differently if she had rejected the voice in her head (“You can’t do it!”) earlier.
I experienced the same thing with my writing during my signals course. I wrote so much then, with pen and paper, that it seemed like I had been writing at 10% of my max capacity, or less. What did I do with that knowledge? Nothing. I wrote it off as a bizzare anomaly. It was too uncomfortable to acknowledge that all I had to do to write more was to do it offline, or to do vomits without editing. It would have meant that I was a bumbling idiot and I didn’t like being a bumbling idiot. So I ignored it. I ignored data that could have greatly accelerated my progress as a writer and thinker, which in turn might be useful to others. So I denied the universe ideas and perspectives (that don’t belong to me) because of my own selfish ego. That’s a pretty sad thought.