Category: Life
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A different consistency
You and I, as human beings, are not consistent. Still, our brains tend to think other people are consistent (fundamental attribution error), and our brains have a need for consistency (cognitive dissonance). A very literal application of this: scheduling. To say I appreciate habits and fixed routines would be a huge understatement. (I’m a virgo!).…
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Off timing
Every hit comes with a lot of misses. The problem is you and I only see people discussing the hits—and we don’t see them discussing the misses so often. Everybody is missing every day. Sometimes, we’re just too early; we build BlackBerry apps instead of iPhone apps, we discovered YouTube before the entertainment industry recognizes…
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Where’s the opening?
“Low hanging fruit” has become an excuse to do boring things, so we need a new one. I liked this one I came across in therapy: “Where’s the opening?” Most action plans are set too far into the future; we must start closer to where we are right now. If you want to write a…
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Complaining vs. caring
NetNewsWire is at the top of Hacker News right now. It’s a familiar name; with a quick Google Search, I dug up an article I wrote over a decade ago for Guiding Tech that mentioned it. I didn’t have a Mac yet—I do now though, so I’m finally trying it again. It’s nice, and I’m…
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“But I haven’t been able to force myself to…”
Every time I hear the words, “Force myself,” I wince. I hear it in sentences like: “I want to do personal branding and more tweeting, but I haven’t been able to force myself to…” “I want to apply for more jobs, but I haven’t been able to force myself to…” “I want to eat four…
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Same word, different meanings
Writing. Writing a blog post is very different from writing an email, a deck, a memo, a book, or a comment. Compare this with St. Bonaventura’s description of making books: 1. Scribe: Write the work of others, adding/changing nothing 2. Compiler: Write the work of others, with additions not your own 3. Commentator: Write the…
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Show up early, leave late
That’s one way to make time in a packed schedule. If you can’t move things around, you’ll need to make the time. End a session 15 minutes earlier. Delay the next one by 15 minutes. Now you’ve got an extra half hour to do the thing you really should be doing.
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“If I were actually smart, then I would…”
… not be working this job. … be the person who’s my boss right now. … be making a lot more money. When framed like this, thoughts are an end point; because you’re not smart enough, you’re not going to do it. In other words, you can’t. That’s one way to appraise your work, self,…
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From 49% to 51%
I joined a podcast recently, and referenced this post I once wrote: don’t make “Bad” the enemy of “Good.” The editors at Fast Company picked it up a couple of weeks after I first published it. The gist of the post: Many times, “Good” things start out “Bad.” Thinking about it, getting feedback, looking for…