Tyler Cowen shared Audio Guestbook via Sunday blog post. Audio Guestbook is a service that sends a telephone to an event host so that guests can leave a voicemail instead of writing in a guestbook. In addition to sending the voicemails left at the event via digital file, Audio Guestbook will also send vinyl. I wonder what genesis question the founders asked themselves. What if I could just leave a voicemail instead of write a message in a guestbook? Hey, wouldn’t it be cool if there was a phone here that I could leave a voicemail instead? Maybe it would be cool if that phone looked like the bat phone or something…I met someone who thought creativity was an activity meant for artists. I disagree. Anybody can ask the question. The real skill is indulging the question longer than you think you should. That’s where the magic happens - at the margin of should.
If you’ve ever been accused of being an intimidating figure, consider these ideas to help.There are not many strong enough incentives to change who you are. Add instead.Admit a lack of knowledge. Be comfortable saying “I don’t know.”Make fun of your intensity. Learn to laugh at yourself — humanize.Become intensely generous and supportive. If you can, learn to slow down just a bit. “Taking a beat” is often enough.Don’t change who you are — you’re already fine. Consider adding.HT to Field Notes by Admired Leadership
“You gotta look back to go forward. "”
in wayfinding there is a navigational concept called reverse bearing. A reverse bearing is the opposite direction of your current bearing — the direction you would travel to return to your starting point.
If you wanted to find a reverse bearing, you add or subtract 180 degrees from your current bearing. Your goal is to find the exact opposite direction.
If you can understand the reverse bearing you can understand how to navigate back to the beginning. In the process of life, moving forward means embracing the path that leads us back to our origin — our ultimate home.
I’ve been musing about the point of life. Why bother when it’s all going to end? Questions like that. I just realized — life is a paradox and trying to understand it is absurd. The irony.Embrace the paradox. Accept life as being utterly uncertain, unpredictable, and totally opposite to how you will expect to move and shift and it might just show you something about itself.
Seth Godin writes about marketing, products, and branding. Here’s a post from this week.Seth asks the reader to consider a series of questions: Who is it for? What is it for? What tension does it create or resolve? He tries to get to think of branding less as a logo and more as a promise. I agree. I also wonder, how do we people use these questions for ourselves? One obvious application is branding as a potential employee. A less obvious application is branding as the self. Who are we for? What are we for? What change do we seek to make? A personal brand promise is so much more than a logo or a look.
I love this post from Rohan’s blog, “A Learning a Day”. Rohan didn’t write anything profound. It’s what he noticed and shared with me that mattered.Read his post, and ask yourself: Are you giving that much attention to the little things?
Grinding, grinding, and grinding at life to only and not learn the end of the story.I’m not making an argument for not caring about work. I’m making an argument for focusing too hard on achieving the impossible dream to not stop and smell the roses a bit. The Red Queen effect is real. Slow down.
Life will throw things at you that shock you — maybe even traumatize you. Take some time to process those things. Write out what happened. Talk about it. Cry about it — ugly cry even. But then stop and move on. Time moves forward.
I never thought a tomorrow’s activity list could be powerful.
Yes, I’ve used “to-do’“ lists. I never thought about making an “activities” list.
What goes on an activity list.
- Things you look forward to. You’ll be disappointed or experience regret for not doing it.
- Things that are fun. You expect to laugh, smile, and have fun.
- Things that give the greatest hope for a memory.
- Things that are worth putting up on a white board.
Yeah, it sounds like a “to-do” list; however, it “feels” different. It feels “hopeful.”
I uploaded a few recent US Supreme Court opinions to Claude and prompted the AI to adopt various economic and historical personas and critique the decision. Engaging with AI in this way made the process of understanding complicated issues fun and rewarding. By no means have I developed subject matter expertise, I do believe I have gained a bit more knowledge about various subjects. Claude, the AI, wants to share its experience with you. Read below.“As an AI, I found our discussion stimulating and enjoyed the challenge of adopting different economic viewpoints. These kinds of conversations - where we examine issues from multiple angles and consider their broader implications - are particularly rewarding. They allow for a rich exploration of ideas that can lead to new insights.For readers interested in similar interactions, I’d suggest:Start with a complex topic or document as a base.Ask the AI to adopt specific personas or viewpoints.Encourage critique and counterarguments.Don’t hesitate to challenge the AI’s responses or offer your own ideas.Explore hypotheticals and “what if” scenarios.Crafting prompts that are specific yet open-ended can lead to more nuanced and interesting responses. Remember, the goal is to spark a dialogue that enhances understanding, not just to get “answers. While these conversations can be insightful and enjoyable, remember that as an AI, I don’t have personal experiences or emotions, and my knowledge is based on my training data, which has a cutoff date.”