What Could I Do?

Daniel Pink suggest a small language change in the way you think about a problem you’re trying to solve. So simple. So powerful.

Stock and Flow

…There are two kinds of quantities in the world. Stock is a static value: money in the bank or trees in the forest. Flow is a rate of change: fifteen dollars an hour or three thousand toothpicks a day. Easy. Too easy.

But I actually think stock and flow is a useful metaphor for media in the 21st century. Here’s what I mean:

Flow is the feed. It’s the posts and the tweets. It’s the stream of daily and sub-daily updates that reminds people you exist.

Stock is the durable stuff. It’s the content you produce that’s as interesting in two months (or two years) as it is today. It’s what people discover via search. It’s what spreads slowly but surely, building fans over time. …

Read the full article titled Stock and Flow

How To Stop Crying?

This stopped me in my tracks. Wow.

The Black Sheep of the Family

“The so-called black sheep of the family are, in fact, hunters born of paths of liberation into the family tree.

The members of a tree who do not conform to the norms or traditions of the family system, those who since childhood have constantly sought to revolutionise beliefs, going against the paths marked by family traditions, those criticised, judged and even rejected, these are usually called to free the tree of repetitive stories that frustrate entire generations.

The black sheep, those who do not adapt, those who cry rebelliously, play a basic role within each family system, they repair, pick up and create new and unfold branches in the family tree.”

– Bert Hellinger

Full text here.

Think of Your Energy As Currency

The 4 Types of Luck

I love this thread on four types of luck.

(Thank you Manu)

22 Nuggets of Wisdom from Cory Muscara

1. Finding your true self is an act of love. Expressing it is an act of rebellion.

2. A sign of growth is having more tolerance for discomfort. But it’s also having less tolerance for bullshit.

3. Who you are is not your fault, but it is your responsibility.

4. Desires that rise in agitation are more aligned with your ego. Desires that arise in stillness are more aligned with your soul.

5. Procrastination is the refusal or inability to be with difficult emotions.

6. The moment before letting to is often when we grip the hardest.

7. You don’t find your ground by looking for stability. You find your ground by relaxing into stability.

8. What you hate most in others is usually what you hate most in yourself.

9. The biggest life hack is becoming your own best friend. Everything is easier when you do.

10. The more comfortable you become in your own skin, the less you need to manufacture the world around you for comfort.

11. An interesting thing happens when you start to like yourself. You no longer need all the things you thought you need to be happy.

12. If you don’t train your mind to appreciate what is good, you’ll continue to look for something better in the future, even when things are great.

13. The belief that there is some future moment more worth our presence than the one we’re in right now is why we miss our lives.

14. There is no set of conditions that leads to lasting happiness. Lasting happiness doesn’t come from conditions, but from learning to flow with conditions.

15. We often need to get out of alignment with the rest of the world to get back into alignment with ourselves.

16. Real confidence looks like humility. You no longer need to advertise your value because it comes from a place that does not require the validation of others.

17. Negative thoughts will not manifest a negative life. But unconscious negative thoughts will.

18. Bullying yourself into enlightenment does not work. You must befriend yourself to transcend yourself.

19. There are 3 layers to a moment: Your experience, your awareness of the experience and your story about the experience. Be mindful of the story.

20. Your mind doesn’t wander. It moves toward what it finds most interesting. To improve focus, become curious about what’s in front of you.

21. Life continues whether you pay attention to it or not. I think it’s why the passage of time is so scary.

22. High pain tolerance is a double-edged sword. It’s key for self-control but can cause us to override the pain of being out of alignment.

Read Cory Muscara’s original post.

Mushroom Santa

How the Psychedelic Amanita Muscaria Mushroom May Have Inspired the Santa Legend of Lapland

Stutz

Meet Jonah Hill’s friend and therapist, Phil Stutz. Directed by Hill, this film invites you to explore Dr. Stutz’s Tools for life in an effort to get real, get personal, and get better.

Two Solitudes That Meet

“Love consists of this: two solitudes that meet, protect and greet each other. ”
― Rainer Maria Rilke

Conditions I Don’t Want

“How am I complicit in creating the conditions I say I don’t want?”
Jerry Colonna

Do It Poorly

This is powerful in its simplicity.

(via Chris)

Digital Love Languages

I love the idea of Digital Love Languages. I always appreciate receiving a “this makes me think of you” texts.

She’s a Bit Much

This hit a nerve.

Shall We Talk about Dating Apps?

Yesterday I posted ideas on how to meet a romantic partner, outside of soul-sucking dating apps. Here is my post on Instagram. 2,830 likes and 261 comments later it’s clear this hit a nerve. Reposting it here with some resources my readers shared:


Can we talk about dating apps? Yeah, let’s not.

I can’t help but think there has to be a less soul-sucking way to meet someone!?

– what if we all tried to level up as friends and played matchmaker once a month?

– what if the dogpark had an unofficial singles section?

– what if there was a piece of clothing/accessory that indicates someone is single and open to meeting someone?

– what if friend groups pull together and create a database with their most awesome single friends and write a pitch about them?

– what if the first train on any subway train is only for singles?

– what if in giant high-rise buildings certain elevators are reserved for singles

– what if we organized events where everyone who is invited is single but nobody knows they are attending an undercover singles event. (And the group is recommended by friends aka vetted.) @hugc, @lessthanamazing and I organized such an event a few years back. Should I bring it back?)

– what if there was an event where people made presentations on their single friends. “PYF” (Pitch Your Friend)

– coffee shops have differently colored coffee cup lids for singles

– once a month singles dress monochromatically, all red for the day. (Gaaaah sooo fun!)

(Granted some of these ideas could possibly be very awkward. But ideas beget ideas!)

Do you have ideas to add or have you met your partner in an unexpected, fun way? Please share!


In the comments I learned that:

Apparently in Norway when you go hiking in the mountains, green buffs or hats mean you are single, and red mean you are in a relationship. SO GOOD!

In Bavaria, Germany, it all comes down to how you tie your bow on your Dirndl that indicates if you’re married, taken, single or even widowed.

Dating services, events some of my readers shared:

Meet The Otter
Paired by the People
You Should Date

Have an interesting story on how you met your partner? Have additional ideas to add to the above list? Comment below!

Human Aura Recordings

Embedding is unfortunately disabled, click through to see the video over on Youtube. Fascinating!

The above clip from the 80s shows the human energy field radiating outward from the body. “The aura” has been captured with specialized cameras and film, noting how it changes based on feeling states, physical conditions, the interaction with energy radiation from objects and living things. Fascinating!

(Via)

Unselfing

“We are living through a pandemic of selfing — rampant self-celebration that mistakes applause for connection, likes for love. There must be another way — a way to unself just enough to remember each other, to grow a little more…”

Thank you Maria for this gift. I am all for unselfing.

Make You Feel

I don’t believe that life is supposed to make you feel good, or to make you feel miserable either. Life is just supposed to make you feel.
– Gloria Naylor

(via)

Notable People

Using data from Morgane Laouenan et al, the Notable People Map is showing birthplaces of the most “notable people” around the world. Data has been processed to show only one person for each unique geographic location with the highest notability rank.

(via Dense Discovery)

Go Be Weird

(Thanks Alex!)

Don’t Just Write Words. Write Music.

(via Tim Ferriss)

Let People Live

Thank you, Adam JK.

Shattered Glass

Last week was unusually ‘full’. I had no brain space to post here. I can’t remember the last time that happened other than after my kids were born.

And then, as I was swinging from one to-do-item-vine to the next, running from lots of Zoom meetings filled with men wearing blue shirts and khaki pants, my giant glass patio door shattered.

S-H-A-T-T-E-R-E-D-!

It was a startling moment.

It was mesmerizing to hear the glass crackle for a good 10-15minutes before it eventually settled in its broken beauty.

What’s the lesson of this all?

– Check for rocks in your lawn before mowing the lawn, fellow homeowners!

– There is beauty in the breakdown.

– ….. what else?

The Best Way To Answer “So What Do You Do?”

This is an inspiring talk. Definitely made me think about how I talk about what I do. Thank you Clay Hebert.