Time Management
Our Time is LimitedI find it important to reflect on death, on a regular basis. Just the simple fact that we will die someday … and we don’t know when. This helps us to remember that life is short and precious, and to resolve to make the most of this gift. As a high performer, you can make a big impact on the world, doing good and serving people in a meaningful way, with the limited time you have in this life. But it’s important to do so by not frittering away time with busywork. We tend to g...
Time Management
Our Time is LimitedI find it important to reflect on death, on a regular basis. Just the simple fact that we will die someday … and we don’t know when. This helps us to remember that life is short and precious, and to resolve to make the most of this gift. As a high performer, you can make a big impact on the world, doing good and serving people in a meaningful way, with the limited time you have in this life. But it’s important to do so by not frittering away time with busywork. We tend to g...
How to Improve Any Moment
The title of this article is a bit misleading, because every moment is already perfect and doesn’t need to be improved. But our experience of the moment can be fraught with difficulty, and we have the power to create a new experience in each moment. The problems we face stem from our narrative about the moment: we are constantly interpreting things in a certain way, so that we don’t even notice that we have this interpretation or narrative. For example:If someone hasn’t returned my text messa...
How to Improve Any Moment
The title of this article is a bit misleading, because every moment is already perfect and doesn’t need to be improved. But our experience of the moment can be fraught with difficulty, and we have the power to create a new experience in each moment. The problems we face stem from our narrative about the moment: we are constantly interpreting things in a certain way, so that we don’t even notice that we have this interpretation or narrative. For example:If someone hasn’t returned my text messa...
Stateless
Every day, we are dealing with a thousand things, overrun by emails and messages and tasks and chores … and it can become overwhelming and shut us down. I’d like to talk about an idea I’ve been working with, called the Stateless Protocol. It’s meant to reduce the overwhelm and help us to focus and be more present. Let me explain the idea, then we’ll talk about how to apply it.Stateless Computing for HumansIn computing, as I understand it, a program will normally try and remember everything. I...
Stateless
Every day, we are dealing with a thousand things, overrun by emails and messages and tasks and chores … and it can become overwhelming and shut us down. I’d like to talk about an idea I’ve been working with, called the Stateless Protocol. It’s meant to reduce the overwhelm and help us to focus and be more present. Let me explain the idea, then we’ll talk about how to apply it.Stateless Computing for HumansIn computing, as I understand it, a program will normally try and remember everything. I...
The Practice of Trust
In this chaotic world, we worry, we avoid, we try so hard to “do it right.” At the heart of it, all of that worry and anxiety is because we cannot trust. We don’t trust others: we judge them and try to tell them how to live their lives, we get frustrated with them when they don’t do things the way we think they should. We don’t trust ourselves: we avoid saying things because we don’t think we can handle it if they get upset, we try to get things just right because we don’t think we can handle...
The Practice of Trust
In this chaotic world, we worry, we avoid, we try so hard to “do it right.” At the heart of it, all of that worry and anxiety is because we cannot trust. We don’t trust others: we judge them and try to tell them how to live their lives, we get frustrated with them when they don’t do things the way we think they should. We don’t trust ourselves: we avoid saying things because we don’t think we can handle it if they get upset, we try to get things just right because we don’t think we can handle...
Positive Feedback Loops
Let’s say you want to be more disciplined about your day … you might tell yourself, “I’m going to wake every morning, meditate for 15 minutes, plan my Most Important Tasks, and then get started and follow the plan. No doubts about it.” And then your plan gets hit by distraction or interruption, and you feel bad about it. You try again the next day, start out well, but then at some point, you get off track and feel discouraged. Three days into this attempt, and you feel like you are completely...
Positive Feedback Loops
Let’s say you want to be more disciplined about your day … you might tell yourself, “I’m going to wake every morning, meditate for 15 minutes, plan my Most Important Tasks, and then get started and follow the plan. No doubts about it.” And then your plan gets hit by distraction or interruption, and you feel bad about it. You try again the next day, start out well, but then at some point, you get off track and feel discouraged. Three days into this attempt, and you feel like you are completely...
