There's a weird phenomenon which I've noticed in many aspects of life. It has to do with task lists.

No matter how many items you remove from your task list, more always seems to pop up and multiply. It's like Smith from the Matrix: the tasks never stop coming. I'm sure this is a reflection of a few things: prioritization, list management, delegation, team management, yada yada yada, yeah okay. The point is, no matter what the cause is, the task still needs to happen no?

When developing a system, why is there always "room for improvement"? What is the perfect system, one where things never have to happen and when things go wrong they are automatically and instantaneously handled. Yes, I'm sure there is a system with AI that you can implement, sure, but the problem with that is a. it still needs refinement because you can't replicate it, and b. the whole point of AI the way it is today is to interface with people like a human, so humans are gonna human. You still have the task that needs to be added to the list.

The question, I suppose, is why are tasks needing to be added to the list at all?

Why do the problems exist? Because someone did something wrong or something went wrong through no fault of anyone. Human error or systematic error. Fine.

Published as is.

I'm currently listening to Tim Ferriss on the Shawn Ryan Show. I forget how much Tim has influenced my life and my thinking.

I think one of the reasons why a) remote work culture, b) fitness, c) diet, and d) self-help as a culture for men has exploded so much over the past few years is because of him and his books. I remember feeling trapped during the pandemic, extremely overweight, feeling lost and overwhelmed, and newly broken up. I remember the sense of helplessness I felt thinking that the world as I knew it was the way my life was going to be forever. I remember the sense of loneliness that I felt come to life as a real monster and hanging onto my back, choking my breath like a monkey hanging onto my neck.

And then I found The Four Hour Workweek.

That book changed my entire life. Coming from a family of business owners who, for 30-some odd years, never deviated from the way they conducted their affairs, who regressed from the world into their business, who viewed their stores as a third child when their two sons never got another sibling, I found it extremely liberating. Especially since during the pandemic I was thinking THE EXACT SAME THING as what Tim Ferriss was talking about. I was asking myself, "Why can't it be the way that I'm thinking? Why are some people able to live a liberated life and others are doomed to be stuck? Why is the world this way?"

In my dispair, I was asking myself the "why". Tim Ferriss showed me the "how". Looking back, I seem to have stumbled upon existentialism without even knowing it. Ironically, reading Dostoyevsky was hell because I found it so boring and the characters so irritating. Perhaps I should read Kierkegaard. But I digress.

This isn't a love letter to Tim. My wife would be furious. Rather, it's an exploration (or, at least, an admiration) of what happens when you receive the right information at the right moment in the right way. I consumed the book as an audiobook, and I would listen to it in the car, on walks, and on runs (I got into running during the pandemic after listening to Jordan Peterson and Jocko Willinck's incredible series of podcasts: another piece of info that came to me at just the right time). What he said just made sense, and it was was exactly what I needed to know in order to approach the problems I didn't know I had. Whenever I had some free time, I started thinking about the problem in my head and architecting them on a notepad using the solutions in The Four Hour Workweek based on my life. I would literally fantasize about how I could escape the corporate hell I was in and feel... free. And now, years out from that time, I'm running a business on my own. It's challenging, but the challenge is rewarding. It's stressful, but a better stress than the corporate life I had. And it's hard, but I can feel happy BECAUSE it's hard.

I'm very grateful to Tim Ferriss for putting this book out, along with all the other books he's written. I think my main takeaway was this: rather than having this solution implemented once and moving on, I think that people need to ruminate on the things that they want and figure out the right way to get them. Once you find something, anything, that makes sense, implement it. Use it as a framework. Others have gone through what you're going through now. At least you have their wisdom.

I'm not sure if he will ever read this, but if he does, I just want to say thanks Tim. You showed us how to deal with the monkeys. You're the man.

Let's get after it today and revisit our thoughts tomorrow.

Vivek.

I've been having some bipolar days. Not in a mood swing kind of way, more so in a emotional-mental swing kind of way.

It's odd because things have been the most relatively stable and uncomplicated (or so it feels) in a while, but it feels wild and unpredictable. I'm not sure what it is, but there is a wild roller coaster going on inside the skull and mundane life happening outside it. I can start to understand why a lot of people go crazy when it comes to working from home, especially when they have a family: there's a few things that allow people some solitude, and weirdly a separation of work and life is a good way to ensure that you can have some time to yourself. This allows you to be able to have some semblance of calming down that internal storm.

I've once again crossed days while writing this, but I'm going to finish this today and publish it as much as I can.

Exercise, I am more and more convinced, is the key to being able to calm this storm. It's making me realize that Dan Martell (look him up) is very wise in his approach to business: exhaust the body, tame the mind. It's a very stoic and simple approach to being able to solve multiple problems.

I'm wondering if the opposite is also true. I feel it is: exhaust the mind, tame the body. Is that the secret to meditation? Meditation is the act of being able to still oneself, control the mind, and silence it. But what if the opposite is true? A person who smokes weed is generally making themselves so paranoid, so elevated in their thoughts, that they end up going through an entire journey, tiring themselves. How can you get to that form of elevated mindset whereby your body gets tired? Is that a good thing?

These are interesting thoughts, but ultimately I'm looking for a real life solution to calm down this crazy mind and heart that I carry with me (or live in, depending on your understanding of human consciousness). Exhausting the mind to tame the body definitely works, 100 out of 100 times. The opposite: I'd give it a 75% success rate, but it also comes with things that you don't want. Like the munchies.

Anyways, I've had a hard day at work, a hard workout, and now I'm sitting in the sauna. I'm hungry, and I'll go get a snack.

Let's get after it today and revisit our thoughts tomorrow.

Vivek.