Active Recall!

Podcasts, videos, and iPad art

Book Note from “Creativity, Inc.”

Steve aspired to create utilitarian things that also brought joy; it was his way of making the world a better place. That was part of why Pixar made him so proud—because he felt the world was better for the films we made. He used to say regularly that as brilliant as Apple products were, eventually they all ended up in landfills. Pixar movies, on the other hand, would live forever.

This is one of my all time favorite things to bring up starting with, “Oh have you ever heard what Steve Jobs said about iPhones and like Toy Story…?” Then I proceed to further botch the story.

Anyway, lately I’ve been entering another “I’m going to try reading more fiction” phase. Or I guess not just reading, but also getting a little bit back into TV (catching up on Black Mirror) and watching a movie here and there. I’ve even been playing the Switch more frequently. (Overcooked with my girlfriend, Hollow Knight alone.)

Sometimes I’ll double up with Hollow Knight (on mute) and an audiobook or podcast. Which is something I used to do earlier this year when I was grinding through Dark Souls III. And I really mean the grinding-through parts. I didn’t want to miss the ambience and all that when the game is progressing. But when I was just set on fighting the same Lothric Knights over and over for a couple hours, it was time to throw an audiobook on.

Oh yeah, the point of this is that fiction is good for you. Stories are a big part of being human and all that.

I get wary of how often I see advice along the lines of “stop watching TV”, “stop playing video games”, “stop reading fiction”. Wary that (1) it’s becoming more and more common but really that kind of sentiment has always been around so it’s really that I’m wary that (2) I’m reading too much of the same kinds of non-fiction.

My plan to get out of this echo chamber is to get absorbed into other stories. I think it’s working. Don’t skip out on experiencing some of the best storytelling going on today so that you can write your 5th blog post this week. Keep it at 4 posts. Close the laptop and get lost in a story.

Trying out a bullet point routine

 

Here’s a summary of the exercise.

  1. In this case, I fumbled around a bit initially to figure out how the grid on the left might work. I’ll it a few times this way to see if there are any other tweaks that will help, then I’ll try to make a custom sheet.
  2. Write sources down in the bottom for reference. Continue writing them down throughout if more come to mind during the exercise.
  3. If there’s a book I know I’ll have multiple points on, I’ll write it as its own line. (In this case. “Return of the King” and “My Morning Routine” got their own lines.)
  4. Write a one-line description of a point that comes to mind (And note the source in text). Then mark the type of point it gets: story bank, toolbox, personal story, or connection.

The four things in the grid:

  • The story bank: I’ve thrown excerpts into Evernote and used other apps and systems in the past. The particular name “story bank” comes from Ramit Sethi. I like that phrase to think of making deposits into it. Anyway, these are just quick summaries from some piece of content. Sometimes a book will use a story (Bannister’s 4-minute mile) to stress a point. The 4-minute mile goes into the story bank. Sometimes a book author will tell a personal story about themselves, so that will go into the story bank. These are helpful for when I’m copying excerpts to notecards. (I have a tag called “Excerpt hunting” in Evernote which I was pleased by but then forgot to ever use. I’ll probably change it to “Story bank” soon.)
  • Toolbox: Heavily inspired by Tim Grahl’s “Running Down a Dream”. I’ve seen similar things like Derek Sivers’s directives or in “18 Seconds” where there’s quick actions at the end (and basically any book that has a chapter summary at the end). But Tim just straight up labels it “Tool:” and writes it out directly when a chapter explains a useful tool. (Examples: “Get a therapist”, “Build a board of directors”) It’s a good way to sum up something I’ve consumed (in particular: non-fiction books).
  • Personal story: If one of the sources reminded me of a personal story, I’ll write it down here. I don’t have an example here, but in the future I think it’ll be worth just writing down anything that happened or conversations that I had. There might be a tool in it. In any case, maybe someone out there actually cares that I’m writing this in Whole Foods.
  • Connection: My routine used to be (1) wake up, (2) press a button in my phone to start a workflow to write 3 sources and 3 connections each. If one source reminds me of something from another source, that’s a connection. In the future I can go down the rabbit hole of finding or transcribing actual excerpts that connect. In the meantime, I’ll be satisfied having written down a book title and a “hey this reminded me of that one podcast where…”

I consume a decent amount of content and it creates a few problems (at least in my head, but that’s not the best place to have them):

  • I worry I’m not applying any of it: Tracking things this way means I’m at the very least reviewing the things I’m reading. That’s one step closer to actually using things I learn or literally using stories I come across in writing. Going too far in the direction of thinking I need to apply everything I read to make it worth reading in the first place isn’t good either. (I wrote a post about the utility of fiction—in hindsight the title makes my eyes roll so I’m worried they’ll just keep rolling if I open it up and read it.)
  • I worry it’s just going in and everything else spills out: I’ve been doing a shorter form of this over the past year. I’d write three sources (books/posts/podcasts/videos) and then think of three connections for each. Writing sources down was supposed to be the easy part but sometimes I’d struggle thinking of what I even came across the day before. If I couldn’t remember that, then I probably wasn’t remembering any of the content.

Okay, so I’m trying to make this a daily or at least most-days routine to fill out. Here’s how I think it’ll help:

  • I’ll track the content I’m consuming: Just doing that is good to get a higher level view of what I’m taking in. I think I stepped out of the startup/tech echo chamber and walked into a marketing/copywriting one. There are great things to learn from very smart people. (Here comes the…) But both of them make it really easy to compare yourself to the entire rest of the world. I’ve begun trying to shift things. If the answer is “Yes” to the question, “Does this pretty much boil down to how to make money?” I’ll stop. Hopefully doing this page each day regularly will give me something I can glance at to see that I should read more fiction or more about some other genre.
  • I’ll give my creative muscle some reps: To keep your body moving, keep your body moving1. The same goes for creativity. I won’t get into the neuroscience behind it, because I don’t know it. Anyway, this exercise makes me stretch a little by remembering the things I’ve consumed lately. Then I stretch a little more trying to sum some of it up.
  • It gives me something visual to share: I don’t know if I’ll time-lapse it every time. But it does give me something I can share on other platforms.
Here’s a screenshot of using Ulysses and opening up the sheet side by side.

I’ll try to do five of these and will see how it goes. The idea was that I’d then be able to take some of these points and expand on them. Today, writing about the system itself took up that time. But I’ll write three example expansions here.

(Look, I was going to not use emoji and then started looking into custom CSS for different bullet point icons and blah blah blah and anyway I’m just going to use an emoji in this post.)

???? Fit in or fit out
“Return of the King” is about the season where LeBron returned to the Cavs and the following season where they won a championship. This was a reminder of just how much everything was under a microscope that first year back. Any interaction or non-interaction was analyzed and discussed and frame-by-framed by the media.

????  Use tools
Again, this is from “Running Down a Dream”. I really like the idea of summarizing things as tools. So much that I tried to create this sheet as a tool for summarizing things that I’m reading.

???? Too many books
I buy too many books. So much that I tried to create this sheet as a tool for seeing just how many books I’m trying to read at once. I’m past the point where it’s a good thing to where I’m just bouncing from one book to another and always thinking that there might be something better to read.

Until next time!

58: Imitation

(We’ve been recording but those might stay in the vault for a little bit longer. One of them was an in-person episode with Wally which needs a little more signposting and massaging.)

This week’s episode has some things about “The Creative Curve” by Allen Gannett.

Prioritize information with these 3 questions (Book note for “Visual Intelligence”)

Check out the full notes for “Visual Intelligence” by Amy E. Herman

Tool: Prioritization questions

You’re looking at a murder scene. What do you focus on?

Okay it’s a still image from a murder scene in a movie you’re watching for your intro cinematography class. Now what do you focus on?

Okay you’re actually in the room of a murder scene. Except it’s an escape room. Now you’re trying to find some wacky puzzle elements.

In “Visual Intelligence”, Amy E. Herman writes about a three-question prioritization system:

Different prioritization systems will work better for different people. The one I’ve found to be the most helpful to the widest range of people I teach is the three-prong approach outlined in the CIA training manual The Psychology of Intelligence Analysis by Richard J. Heuer. To help organize data and find the most important elements of any situation, you ask three questions: What do I know? What don’t I know? If I could get more information, what do I need to know?

Let’s run those scenarios through these questions.

An actual murder scene

  • What do I know? There’s blood splatter. There’s a chalk outline. We know the person died from, I don’t know, a gunshot. Since I’m not actually an investigator, there’s every other generic thing I can think of from TV and movies.
  • What don’t I know? I don’t know who shot the gun. I can see bullet holes. I don’t know what kind of gun it was. I don’t know how many people were involved.
  • What do I need to know? I need to know who did it. I can ask some ballistic experts, the blood splatter expert, the friends and family, and a few suspects some questions.

A murder scene in a movie

  • What do I know? In Visual Intelligence, Amy E. Herman stresses the importance of separating subjective and objective observations. If you’re looking at a movie still, you can describe the colors. You can describe the composition of that frame. You can describe different objects in the scene and what they might represent.
  • What don’t I know? On my own, I don’t know exactly what the director and cinematographer’s intent actually was. I enjoy 3D artist Beeple’s daily 3D creations and have listened to a few interviews with him. He’s talked about how people often ask him if there’s deeper meaning to different pieces but there rarely is. Sometimes the picture is the picture.
  • What do I need to know? If you could speak directly to the people involved in making the movie, then you could verify if your reasoning behind different decisions make sense. Was the way the blood was splattered supposed to represent some underlying theme in the movie? Or was it just random. Can you read this three page theory I posted on Reddit?

A murder scene in an escape room

  • What do I know? You know there’s a puzzle hiding here somewhere. You’ve done a few of these so you know that they’re usually hidden in words or numbers that look like they’re just a normal part of the scene. Hey what’s this, this jacket has a receipt in it…
  • What don’t I know? You don’t know exactly where the clue is. You don’t know why someone would leave this point and shoot camera in this clear plastic padlocked box, but you’re willing to find out.
  • What do I need to know? You need to know what the padlock’s code is. You need to know what the next clue is. You’ve believed it all your life but now you need to know that you’re the best clue finder in your group of friends.

I’ll try using these questions to improve in prioritization and decision making. If you like those “spot the difference” puzzles in magazines and you also like preventing international tragedies (or just want to come up with better ideas at work), you’ll love “Visual Intelligence”.

Notes from “The Real Doctor Will See You Shortly”

Check out the full notes for “The Real Doctor Will See You Shortly” by Matt McCarthy

What’s the last hard decision you made?

Could someone have died?

Reading through Matt McCarthy’s “The Real Doctor Will See You Shortly” reminded me just how unimportant a lot of the things I do day to day are.

Choosing a video thumbnail and writing a description doesn’t seem that important.

On one hand, it can be discouraging thinking you aren’t impacting people much compared to a doctor saving lives. On the other hand, it can be freeing knowing that you don’t need to make literal life and death decisions night in and night out.

This book made me think of how there are a lot of similarities between jobs in seemingly completely unrelated fields. McCarthy describes presentations about patients that you have to give.

“Your presentations are weak,” he said. “Pick it up.” A wave of relief. “I’ve sensed that.” “Here’s the key,” he said, glancing at his pager. “You’ve only got a few minutes before we lose interest. Every word has to count.”

That’s something to keep in mind whether you’re presenting about a patient to other doctors, you’re a designer pitching a solution to the rest of your team, or giving a talk at a conference. You have a limited amount of time. Your audience has an even more limited amount of interest. Make it count.

“Your presentation has to be problem-based,” he went on. “Why is the person in the unit and what are the barriers to leaving?”

I’m browsing my highlights from this book in a spreadsheet right now. Without context of knowing what book these came from, some of these could just be from books about copywriting that I read too many of. (And don’t apply enough of.)

It’s classic storytelling. If you’re writing a sales letter, you present the problem someone reading might have. You explain the details of that problem and then explain the benefits.

If you’re presenting a patient’s story, you explain who the person (beginning), you explain the problem that’s landed them in the hospital (middle hook), and hopefully you work toward a solution (ending payoff).

But, of course, not everything in a job connects to other jobs. What’s your fluid? During a medical internship, you eventually find out.

A day earlier, I’d spent hours lancing every one of his abscesses with a small scalpel and even more time scooping up the pus with gauze. In college, even in medical school, the sight and smell of those abscesses would’ve made me nauseated, but not anymore. I had been told that every doctor eventually discovers which bodily fluid he or she finds most disturbing, and this realization helps guide the choice of a subspecialty. I didn’t mind blood, spit, piss, or pus. I did mind diarrhea, which meant I wasn’t destined to become a gastroenterologist.

There were moments while reading when I thought, “Wow it’d be great to have this kind of direct impact on people.” Then there were moments where I thought, “Wow it’s great I get to stay at this desk.”

Throughout the book, McCarthy talks about his humanity. In particular, hoping that he doesn’t lose it. He never wants to be someone that’s able to just move on to the next thing after seeing something insane happen in the hospital.

The page-turning moments in the book often involve descriptions of medical procedures, but captured from his perspective. You get a sense of his confusion and apprehension and then see it turn as he gains his composure and the studying and drilling kicks in.

I’ve worked in software and seen how the most effective people are the best communicators. You need rep after rep to build the soft skills. This book often reminded me that communication is probably the biggest career multiplier in other fields as well.

In product design, the goal is often to take something technically complicated and explain it to a lay audience. You choose just how simple to make it. The same happens in medicine.

Medicine is complicated and it is a skill to simplify things in a way that doesn’t oversimplify, to accurately convey in plainspoken language what is actually happening inside another person’s body. I made a conscious effort to do it, so it was irritating to see others doctors use medical jargon with families. Just talk like a normal person, I wanted to say. Pretend you’re not a doctor. But for some, that simply wasn’t possible.

I bought “The Real Doctor Will See You Shortly” after seeing it in a BookBub email. Last year I decided I’d be deliberate about choosing to read outside of my usual interests. I did that for a few months but strayed back to the usual self-development and business books.

It was a great reminder of why I wanted to read outside of my comfort zone in the first place. It’s made me more appreciative of what doctors do day to day. There’s too much to know, too many difficult decisions to get them right every time, and many different ways to simplify things:

The truth is that complex decisions are often made using simple mnemonics. Linguistic shorthand wasn’t encouraged at Harvard—information needed to be mastered before it could be abbreviated—but Ashley had just simplified a series of baffling medical school lectures on dialysis into a mouthful of vowels.

Go check it out if you’ve ever wanted some sense of what it might be like going through a medical internship. Or if you just enjoy stories where the student slowly becomes the teacher. You’ll probably find a lot of interesting connections between something you do and something a doctor does.

For a few moments you get a glimpse at how it really is just another job. Then a few pages later you’ll read a description of cracked ribs and a heart exposed to open air and realize that it really isn’t just another job at all.

Look at your summer after high school (and work those things back in)

You look up at the graduation caps raining down on you.

You’re done with high school. Remember that feeling? What are you going to do with the summer before you start college?

I started reading John McPhee’s Draft No. 4: On the Writing Process. I bought it a few months ago but didn’t read it. Tim Ferriss mentioned it in his episode with Jason Fried so I started reading it.

I have a list of ideas for different things I want to make. Lots of people do.

McPhee has a list of things he’s actually made.

So how do you pick an idea to work on? McPhee suggests it might be a good idea to consider your younger self.

For nonfiction projects, ideas are everywhere. They just go by in a ceaseless stream. Since you may take a month, or ten months, or several years to turn one idea into a piece of writing, what governs the choice? I once made a list of all the pieces I had written in maybe twenty or thirty years, and then put a check mark beside each one whose subject related to things I had been interested in before I went to college. I checked off more than ninety per cent.

The excerpt is about writing, but that look at your younger self is good to do to compare to your current day to day activities. What did you like doing your senior year in high school? What did you do the summer after graduating? That span provides good hints for (1) what you’re good at (2) what you really enjoy for leisure.

You go through a very serious college application process. Then you get in somewhere. A year later you’re wearing a gown at a very regal graduation ceremony. It’s enough to fool you into thinking that leaving high school means you’re entering the real world as an adult.

Anyway, it’s a good enough illusion that the summer before college takes on a different shape than previous summers. How’d you spend your time?

Before going to college, a shocking amount of my free time probably went toward Counter-Strike. I was blogging regularly and tweaking my site here and there. I had enough of an interest in photography that my older brother bought the first Canon Rebel Digital SLR for me for graduation.

I still make things online (lets call it blogging), I have a job tweaking other sites here and there. I still take photos.

I should probably play more video games.

Anyway, take some time to think about what you did with free time when you had fewer responsibilities. If those interests just sort of drifted away, think about why. You might decide to work those back into your life.

And speaking of process, check out this video where Jason talks through his process as he writes an article. (And check out the rest of Basecamp’s YouTube channel Getting Real if you want to check out the nuts and bolts of web development and how a product team actually works.)