Active Recall!

Podcasts, videos, and iPad art

Analog conversations and digital detoxes (Cal Newport on “Hurry Slowly”)

Topic: Cal Newport (Hurry Slowly)

Link: https://hurryslowly.co/cal-newport/

Episode Title: Cal Newport: Using Technology with Intention

Jocelyn K. Glei (@jkglei) and Cal Newport discussed his latest book, Digital Minimalism.

  • Digital detox — It’s worth taking a look at your digital life and then taking a break from parts (or most) of it. First suggestion: uninstall anything with pull-to-refresh or any sort of feed. (Yes, this might mean limiting your email use.) Whether the complete detox is possible for you and your work situation, there’s some version of your life that you can come up with where you’re not looking at a screen quite as much.
  • Analog communication — Have a conversation with a friend. You know, with your voice. This is where I dislike hard stances on video games being addictive and bad for you. Yes, I think they can be those things. But I also think games and voice chat can be a great way to keep in touch with friends in other states. Frequency matters in friendships. “But when we get together, even after years, it’s just like before!” Sure, but consider if you spoke to each other weekly during those years. (A reminder that I need to call my mom. It’d be a lot easier if she played CS:GO.)
  • The anxiety machine — Yes, phones are super useful. Yes, they can also be positivity machines. But a lot of times they can lead to anxiety and worry (re-reading the same bad news in some different form) or they just let you waste huge chunks of time that could have gone toward something that lessens your anxiety and worry (like meeting up with friends or doing the work you’ve been putting off).

I like how Justin Kan put it:

You have voluntarily decided to carry around a toxic, time-wasting Skinner-box in your pocket at all times, from the second you wake up in the morning to right before you fall asleep at night. This is incredibly stupid, and yet every smart person does it.

Need some entertainment? Just be more like Cal Newport and listen to baseball on the radio. Which sounds like a past time older than scribbling on a papyrus scroll. (It also sounds very soothing.)

Podcast Notes: Thomas Frank on building up College Info Geek

Thomas Frank walks through his career and the history of College Info Geek in the latest episode of their podcast.

From The College Info Geek Podcast episode “The CIG Story: From Dorm Room Project to Full-Time Business” (iTunes, YouTube): 

I think at the time I wanted to call it College Beat, because it was going to be college tips. That name was taken—and I actually started following that blog when I found it. But I was like, I need a new name. I don’t want to spend too much time thinking of a name. I’m a management information systems major… so I’m just gonna call it College Info Geek.

That was it. I registered the domain, I set up WordPress, I found a free theme that looked terrible but it was okay, and I put up my first article.

I always enjoy hearing these kinds of histories and “how we got to now” beat-by-beat descriptions of periods in the company’s history.

One thing I appreciated in the story is that he didn’t picture what College Info Geek has grown into when he started. It really was a thing of just getting started. And it doesn’t sound like that idea of “try and fail fast to learn”. Eventually there was the mindset of learning from failure and building systems and self awareness to stretch and grow in different areas and all those personal development things.

But it really was just a blog at first. By “just a blog” I mean that in the sense of one person making a website to share a journey. Not setting out to create a business with an audience of hundreds of thousands. He started out just documenting his journey through college.

They mention the book The Motivation Hacker by Nick Winter. I remember reading it years ago (I just checked and I bought it in 2013). One idea that stuck with me is aiming to create success spirals. It’s similar to concepts like foundational habits, the slight edge, and habits compounding.

From The Motivation Hacker:

The converse is true, too: success begets confidence and motivation, which begets more success, and pretty soon you’re fearless on wheels or look forward to crushing spelling tests. To start as an adult, after your identity is set and your “limits” clearer, this is a fragile staircase and requires climbing, but it can take you just as high as the pits are deep, and quicker than you’d think.

One thing leads to another which leads to another. But you have to stick with each thing long enough.

Make your bed, take a morning walk, and read 15 pages every day. Then increase gradually so you’re reading 25 pages every day and running a mile. (Soon enough you’ll be making 15 beds every day!)

Or start a blog and write one post after another and try out audio and video. Then, like Thomas Frank, with persistence, focus, and some luck in there, you’ll have a million subscribers. (And if not, you’ll still learn a whole lot.)

F06: “Anything You Can Imagine”

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Book of the week:

“Anything You Can Imagine: Peter Jackson and the Making of Middle-earth” by Ian Nathan

( 03:51 ) Room 1: Kitchen with an orc

( 10:41 ) Room 2: Virtua Fighter 2 Pool Fight

( 21:00 ) Room 3: Matrix and Peter Jackson

The 5 Ms, explained with quotes from ‘Rounders’

In this episode, I use Rounders quotes to talk about creativity. Specifically, I talk about Brian Koppelman’s answer to a listener in one of his Q&A episodes.

His listener’s question (at 23:10) “How do you keep nourishing yourself to keep the spark alive?”

Brian Koppelman: That’s related and it’s also back to those things I said earlier: the meditation, morning pages, long walks, cardio, listening to music, reading, watching movies. I want to keep stoking the flame by taking in great work. I want to engage with that great work and ask myself questions about it and let myself get stirred up. As you get older it gets harder to allow yourself to get stirred up emotionally by art. But it remains really worth it.

In honor of Wrestlemania, I’ve gimmick-ized the steps to the best of my ability by…

  • Combining music/reading/movies so that it’s 5 items, good to count off on one hand
  • Shoehorning each thing into something that’s starts with the letter M

1. “Uh, you know what? I got my five grand here. That’s just fine by me. I’m going home.” (Morning Pages)

A drawing of David Chang
I type more than I write longhand. When I write longhand it’s usually on an iPad. This is one of the times I can remember writing longhand. I was writing out quotes from podcast episodes and trying to sketch people in it. (I should try this again.)

Okay so this was an actual M in his description. I’ll summarize the version described by Julia Cameron in The Artist’s Way:

  • Write three pages of free form writing by hand
  • Burn the pages

Keep your hand moving across the page. Tim Ferriss describes it as clearing the cobwebs out.

Writing longhand is the prescribed method. But typing seems fine here especially if the actual alternative is that you won’t do it at all. (Really, I’m just defending the fact that I type these and don’t do it longhand.)

After you get through the initial friction, it can be very enjoyable to just free write. I used the quote about walking away when you’re up to capture Julia’s thoughts about whether or not you should continue beyond three pages.

Julia Cameron: “No! To write more than three pages is to invite self-involvement and narcissism. The pages are therapeutic, and three pages is the ideal dose.”

(Of course, Mike McDermott doesn’t end up walking away. But you’re just trying to get your day started.)

2. “Vegas huh? (Yep.) Good luck man.” (Meditation)

The Vessel but with eyes
I’m still working on making meditation practice. Until then I’ll share this picture from one of my morning walks on the High Line. This is The Vessel, looking skeptical when I talk about the benefits of meditation.

I used this quote because I’d guess meditation is the one that you’re least likely to already have in your routine.

This Rounders quote represents the skeptics. In Rounders, people are skeptical when Mike says that poker is a game of skill. Plenty of people are skeptical about meditation. Research, testimonials, and all of that can sway some people into believing it’s effective. But still, it’s “not for them”.

That said, I’m still trying to make it a regular part of my day. My first step will be adding a sauna session to the days when I make it to the gym. Which is at least sitting in silence.

(Also, check out this early episode Dan Harris’s 10% Happier: Brian Koppelman.)

3. “Hanging around, hanging around. Kid’s got alligator blood. Can’t get rid of him.” (Move slow)

Here’s a self portrait from one of my walks. (And also the portable podcast recording studio.)

This is where I start jamming these things into words that start with M. “Move slow” represents the long walks.

I’ve mentioned it here before, but go check out Koppelman’s thread from New Years Eve. I associate it so much now with walking in Central Park, where I’ll try to do a long walk a couple times a week. Here’s a tweet from one of those earlier this year…

For the day to day walking, I aim for 5 miles (but am not maniacal about it or anything so I won’t pace around my living room before bed if I’m at 4.5 miles).

Lately I’ve been adding a stroll first thing in the morning. I’ll set a timer for 15 minutes, start walking and then walk back when the timer goes off. It goes by quick. My guess is that it’s because it’s out and back.

Bonus: I can get a few minutes on the High Line and at that time of the morning it’s pretty empty except for, you guessed it, runners.

Or if you need to describe what they’re doing with a letter M for whatever reason you might instead say that they’re moving fast…

4. Move fast — “15 grand in five days? I can do that. I’ve gone on rushes like that before”

Living room with kettlebells
On good mornings, I move the coffee table and pull the rug away, revealing a gym. Or a rubber mat. Then I move a few kettlebells over from the corner and do swings (move fast) and get-ups (move slow). I fill out the day’s entry in the 5-Minute Journal app on the iPad and then start an interval timer to go through the workout. As I’m typing each item out, I’m realizing it sounds more and more like self-development parody.

Koppelman mentions cardio. Down jackets are disappearing and lawns are opening around the city. This signals that it’s time for my spring tradition. Which is trying to get into running and only doing enough sessions to finish listening to Haruki Murakami’s “What I Talk about When I Talk about Running”.

I’m not a runner or cyclist, so the version of “move fast” that’s been working for me is doing kettlebell workouts. Right now that means two movements: the swing and the get-up.

The swing is fast. The get-up is actually pretty slow but I think the important part of “move fast” is that it’s a workout and more strenuous than what you do in the “move slow” section.

5. “In my club I will splash the pot whenever the fuck I please” (Movies, music, and books)

Peter Jackson & The Making of Middle Earth
I didn’t know “production bios” was a genre but I picked up “Anything You Can Imagine: Peter Jackson & The Making of Middle-Earth” and have really really enjoyed it. It reminded me of how much the Lord of the Rings trilogy stirred me up in high school and college. I’ve started watching movies again.

Stories make humans human. Take other stories in.

This M is about consuming art that moves you.

While it doesn’t necessarily have to be movies, I have started watching more movies since listening to the episode of The Moment. (Rounders being one of them, along with The Big Short, Tropic Thunder, The Fellowship of the Ring, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. Which I’ll be happy to pull quotes from to ham-handedly explain future topics.)

This will help in your craft, as well. As Stephen King says in On Writing, “If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot.”

I have the Teddy KGB quote to close this as a reminder of ownership. He owned that club. You own this process. You can define what a successful day looks like.

Empty your mind, strengthen your body, fill your mind.

Do the work and nobody can take that away from you.

6. The bonus M: Make time for people you love

One metric to rule them all: Meals shared with people you love.

This last M is a reminder of why it’s worth doing these other things in the first place. You might not be present if you’re always worried that your creative spark will disappear.

Do your morning pages, meditate, move slow, move fast, watch some movies and get stirred up by stories.

Then go experience your story with other people.