Projects are encapsulated sequences of tasks, educational undertakings, and practices that I use when making stuff, refining things, and/or shifting from one set of norms to another. I make a project called Brain Lenses for which I write and produce…
For a long time, I sucked at sleep. But a handful of years ago I started to wonder if I might be capable of learning to sleep better: I started thinking it might be a skill I could work on…
I spend a meaningful amount of time curating what I think of as my “inputs”: data from informational sources (news and nonfiction), but also experiential sorts of things like music and fiction and other aesthetic experiences. My ideal outcome is to maintain…
A paradigm is a state of being; a status quo for a given moment in time. A paradigm shift is what happens when variables change in such a way that the status quo changes measurably or perceptually. Post-WWII Europe was…
As humans, we’re nudged by our biologies to wonder what’s on the other side of every mountain and driven to push ever-outward in a million directions at once. We’re not built to tolerate uncertainty. It’s stressful! It might portend danger.…
I tend to believe the truism, “There’s no bad weather, only unsuitable clothing.” Many times I’ve found myself in the middle of storms, walking through ice-glazed landscapes, slogging along humid paths and beaches, and my enjoyment or misery will be…
Adopted belief systems can be pernicious, because while we may justifiably assume the value-defining elements in our lives are our own—constructed from homemade blueprints and self-mortared bricks—many of them are inherited (from family or culture), transmitted (from marketing messages or…
Most mornings, I make and drink two small mugfuls of black coffee. After trying dozens of different coffee-prep approaches, I landed on hand-grinding beans and steeping them in an inverted Aeropress as my preferred method. This routine of placing the…
Over the past handful of years I’ve thought a lot about not just my work, but the totality of the work I’ve ever done, am doing, and will do. This is a different exercise than mulling over a single essay…
One of the more reliable ways to ensure you have a good time when traveling is to commit to flexibility and improvisation, rather than becoming rigid about your peripatetic plans. This doesn’t mean giving up on your plans or folding…