I can't stop thinking about how we're all just pretending.

Look at my browser tabs right now: 16 half-read articles about bubbles and progress, 3 Twitter threads about AI risk, and somehow a Wikipedia page about medieval farming practices (don't ask). We're all so busy consuming content about doing things that we've forgotten how to actually do things.

The tech guys heading to DC keep talking about bubbles like they've discovered some cosmic cheat code. Build enough hype, pour enough money in, and somehow we'll manifest the future through sheer force of PowerPoint presentations. I get it. I really do. I've sat through enough pitch meetings to see the intoxicating appeal of treating progress like a startup metric.

But here's what's eating at me: When was the last time any of us did something that actually scared us? Not the sanitized fear of a bad quarterly review, but the gut-churning terror of stepping into genuine unknown territory.

I spent three hours yesterday optimizing my productivity system instead of writing this piece. The irony isn't lost on me. We've gotten so good at building systems to manage risk that we've turned risk management itself into a form of procrastination.

The Silicon Valley crew isn't wrong about stagnation. Walk through any major city and you'll see us furiously iterating on food delivery apps while the same infrastructure crumbles a bit more each year. But their solution feels like treating a caffeine addiction with better coffee. Sure, maybe some good comes from their "productive bubbles," but I can't shake the feeling we're just building more elaborate ways to avoid facing our collective fear of actually changing anything real.

I keep coming back to this image: We're all sitting in a perfectly climate-controlled room, wearing VR headsets showing us an exciting world of progress and innovation, while the actual room slowly fills with water. The simulation gets more impressive every quarter. The water keeps rising.

Look, I'm not immune. I've got my own comfortable bubbles. — my Notion workspace is a masterclass in organized procrastination. But at least I can admit I'm scared. Scared of being wrong, scared of looking stupid, scared of trying something real and watching it fail.

Maybe that's what these bubble evangelists are missing. It's not that we need better frameworks for progress. We need to admit that real progress is terrifying, and no amount of VC funding or government appointments will make it less so.

I don't have a solution. But I'm tired of pretending that reshuffling tech executives into government positions or redefining bubbles as spiritual experiences will fix anything. Maybe the first step is just admitting we're all caught in an elaborate game of make-believe.

I should probably close some of these tabs now.

I can't stop thinking about how we're all just pretending.

Look at my browser tabs right now: 16 half-read articles about bubbles and progress, 3 Twitter threads about AI risk, and somehow a Wikipedia page about medieval farming practices (don't ask). We're all so busy consuming content about doing things that we've forgotten how to actually do things.

The tech guys heading to DC keep talking about bubbles like they've discovered some cosmic cheat code. Build enough hype, pour enough money in, and somehow we'll manifest the future through sheer force of PowerPoint presentations. I get it. I really do. I've sat through enough pitch meetings to see the intoxicating appeal of treating progress like a startup metric.

But here's what's eating at me: When was the last time any of us did something that actually scared us? Not the sanitized fear of a bad quarterly review, but the gut-churning terror of stepping into genuine unknown territory.

I spent three hours yesterday optimizing my productivity system instead of writing this piece. The irony isn't lost on me. We've gotten so good at building systems to manage risk that we've turned risk management itself into a form of procrastination.

The Silicon Valley crew isn't wrong about stagnation. Walk through any major city and you'll see us furiously iterating on food delivery apps while the same infrastructure crumbles a bit more each year. But their solution feels like treating a caffeine addiction with better coffee. Sure, maybe some good comes from their "productive bubbles," but I can't shake the feeling we're just building more elaborate ways to avoid facing our collective fear of actually changing anything real.

I keep coming back to this image: We're all sitting in a perfectly climate-controlled room, wearing VR headsets showing us an exciting world of progress and innovation, while the actual room slowly fills with water. The simulation gets more impressive every quarter. The water keeps rising.

Look, I'm not immune. I've got my own comfortable bubbles. — my Notion workspace is a masterclass in organized procrastination. But at least I can admit I'm scared. Scared of being wrong, scared of looking stupid, scared of trying something real and watching it fail.

Maybe that's what these bubble evangelists are missing. It's not that we need better frameworks for progress. We need to admit that real progress is terrifying, and no amount of VC funding or government appointments will make it less so.

I don't have a solution. But I'm tired of pretending that reshuffling tech executives into government positions or redefining bubbles as spiritual experiences will fix anything. Maybe the first step is just admitting we're all caught in an elaborate game of make-believe.

I should probably close some of these tabs now.