This was written towards the end of June 2014.
Naivete
I naively hoped that I would be doing 2 word vomits a day, finishing all 1000 vomits within 2-3 years or so. Instead I got stuck at 130. I was burdened by bad bookkeeping- I had misnumbered a vomit somewhere, skipped a number, and published some vomits twice. This demoralized me. Also, I had a bunch of relatively crazy things going on in my life- not that bad on hindsight, but bad enough to break a fragile habit-in-the-making for an ill-disciplined bum like me. Lessons learned: proper filing and bookkeeping measures are important. Humble apologies to all the teachers who tried to drill this into me. I know better now.
Silver Linings
There are a couple of silver linings to me not having written for myself in months. The first is that I put some distance between myself and my writing. The second is that I was writing and continue to write a lot for work. Together, this gives me the distance I need to look at my old work dispassionately.
1: Unnecessary Apologies
The first thing that leapt out at me was how often I apologized for writing the way I wrote. I apologized for meandering, for being vague and imprecise. I kept saying “I’m sure this will make sense later,” and while I think I was right about that, the constant self-consciousness annoys me now. All writing is an act of faith. All writing is necessarily vague, imprecise and incomplete to some degree. It may occasionally make sense to draw attention to that fact, if it serves the point you’re making. (Analogy: think of a comedian being awkward and mumbling, in a way that’s funny rather than cringeworthy.) But doing it over and over again isn’t a stylistic choice, it’s a tic that distracts from what matters. So I’m going to make an effort not to talk about it anymore. My work will always be incomplete, and there will always be room for improvement. I will welcome criticism without overly-preempting it. Done.
2: Connecting the dots backwards
I anticipated that this would be the case, but it’s cool to actually do it. At vomit 100 (actually 101…) I decided to start doing summaries of earlier vomits so that I wouldn’t have to face all 1000 at the end, all at once. This was an interesting and enriching experience, possibly more important than doing the vomits themselves. Rework is how you develop mastery, no?
I’m proud to report that it’s real. When I look back on the last 130 vomits, I see rivers of thought, meandering, diverging, starting and stopping. While each piece of writing stands alone by itself, as a collection I can see connections. I get a clearer sense of the boundaries of what I care about. What seems almost random on a day-to-day basis reveals itself to be part of a larger tapestry. This gives me a lot of confidence that the journey is worth continuing, indefinitely.
What will I write about next?
So far I’ve written a lot about productivity, procrastination, gamification, identity creation, cigarettes, social media, akrasia, education. I’ve inadvertently captured a bit of the changes I’ve been going through- how my priorities have been changing, how I’m developing and growing.
I’ve gotten a sense of how the practice of daily, reflective writing can inform one’s behavior. It can function as a commitment device of sorts. You write at your best, for yourself at your worst. If I remember correctly, David Ogilvy wrote in Confessions of an Advertising Man about how one of the great things about good advertising is that it sets up a strong promise to consumers that the client will then be obliged to keep. Similarly, there’s something about writing that props me up. I’m trying to write myself a backbone. Time will tell if it works out. It’s worth a shot, at least.
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Lately I’ve found myself pressed for time. Now, it’s not like I’m a super busy, important person with lots of commitments. I have relatively simple obligations. My problem is that I don’t manage myself effectively. I don’t monotask. I don’t chunk up my time. I should be working in short intense bursts, but instead I lounge around until it’s really late. I do ultimately get stuff done, which is a huge step forward from how I was as a student- irresponsible, evasive. But that alone isn’t something I can run my life on. Nobody gives a shit about your personal progress, they only care about what you can do for them.
I need/want more time to spend with my wife, and on my personal projects- I want to read books, do book reviews, write more word vomits, meet interesting people, and all that fun stuff.
I’m so tired, and it’s all my fault. I think that’s what adult life is about, mostly. Managing your own energies.
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#welcometothecircus
I always thought that I had reasonably made my peace with death. Our physical bodies die and decay, but we live on in the thoughts of others. We live on in what we leave behind- our art, our contributions, our legacy. That’s the best shot at immortality we got. So a person ought to focus on legacy, I thought.
Then I learned about the heat death of the universe. Eventually all the stars will burn out, and everything will run out of energy- everything there is will be diffused into vast, lukewarm nothingness. I used to take comfort in the fact that things will go on after I’m gone, but now I realize that even that is temporary. There is no known way to undo entropy, and it seems highly improbable. So even a legacy isn’t with as much as I had thought, from a cosmic perspective. We really are the briefest of accidents.
This troubled me for some time. Life is truly an absurd accident. We are all clowns amusing ourselves in the face of the abyss.
So I have found it necessary to shift my “center” away from thinking about legacy. The present moment is far more precious than I had previously acknowledged. A boring, unpleasant life in pursuit of some sort of lasting legacy now strikes me as wishful thinking. It’s not very different from seeking solace in the hope of an afterlife. The slate will well and truly be wiped clean in the end, and none of us or our descendants will survive it.
What then? We have to extract as much as we can from the present moment. We have to well and truly suck the marrow out of life. We have to find ways to maximise pleasure, awe, joy and gratitude within the context of our finite lifespans.
This isn’t an argument for short-term hedonism, for a life of reckless debauchery, parties and drugs. Those constitute what I’d call a local maxima- they’re like fast food. They might feel good in the short run, but they don’t fulfill. We’re too smart for that, fortunately or unfortunately. To be human is to seek, to inquire, to learn and to transcend. To serve others in a way that both helps others and fulfills our own internal needs.
So a positive legacy is still a good thing, I think, but it really shouldn’t be at the expense of joy. It’s all ultimately a form of self-deception- we’re still clowns in the cosmic circus even if we’re being productive, generous, kind. Even if we’re fighting for justice, fighting oppression, doing all of the things that need to be done to give our species the greatest collective shot at a brief, joyful existence.
Meditating on this makes me realize that we have no time for petty anger or frustration. We have no time to tolerate anything that isn’t en route to joy. Sure, not everybody has that privilege. If you’re faced with literal existential threats- you can’t put food on the table, can’t get a job, etc, then those are problems you will have to solve, or perhaps try to solve. I don’t know. I cannot speak on behalf of people who are suffering, and it would be hubris to try. All I know is that you have to put your own mask on before you can help others.
That caveat aside… if you have access to books, to clean water, to a roof over your head- if you’re a domesticated human, you owe it to yourself to exercise your agency over yourself- whatever tiny amount you have. You owe it to yourseld to number your days, because they truly are numbered. We should go to bed each night feeling like we had made good use of our time.
- No time for toxic relationships.
- No time for petty Internet arguments.
- No time to be offended by the clowning of others- life is hard and absurd, and we should have zero expectations for any of it to make any sense at all.
It’s amazing that things function as smoothly as they do. Make time for friends and family while they’re still around, but not so much that you forget to serve your own interests and curiosity.
Something I’m trying to convince myself about: it makes zero sense to mock others for their decisions or choices. I do it because of lizard-brain impulses. It’s animalistic, and the animalistic pleasures tend to be short-lived (and often broken or untenable in modern digital life. They were optimized for a simpler, duller time.) People can clown around, and they will. Making a big righteous deal about it is just another form of clowning. Which is fine if you enjoy it, but it’s not all that interesting as a pursuit.
It’s like sports. I often feel like most professional sports are a waste of time, a sideshow. Yes, it could be your passion to kick a ball into a net or drive in circles really fast. I can respect passion, drive, focus, discipline, teamwork and all that good stuff, even if the pursuit feels a little trivial (in comparison to solving water, disease, advancing technology, space travel, etc.)
But I’m a hypocrite who doesn’t live up to my own standards, because I participate in silly, pointless sports of my own. Arguing with people on the interner is my equivalent of driving in circles. Yes, it’s possible to get really good at it, but you’re just going nowhere really fast.