One of the most intelligent case studies in design is the Chinese tea cup. They’re made without handles simply because if it’s too hot to touch, it’s too hot to drink.

Humans naturally want to add more. Add a cardboard sleeve, add a warning on the outside of the cup, add a handle. The result of all these things never cools down the actual contents.... See more

Companionship content is the most durable in its closeness to human experience, to being around people . When we search for a YouTube video to watch, we often want the best companion for the next hour and not the most entertaining content.

“The question is how we transition from what could, despite our best intentions and deepest feelings, merely be a performance, to making the work the central thread of our lives, rather than just a sideshow. The power structure of our world doesn’t care much what you’re posting online. It cares what you are spending your entire life force on, how y... See more

So what we see is that self-actualization is a flywheel: you become self-actualized by seeing reality clearly so you can design a life that fits you, and you become better at seeing reality by engaging with it head-on.

Following a curriculum, you build mental models by processing simple examples, and then those simple models filter reality so that you become blind to the subtleties of the more complex examples. This is sometimes called a knowledge shield.

To avoid knowledge shields the US military, when it does accelerated training programs, avoids sequential curr... See more

Self-actualization means, at least partly, that you have designed a life that fits you—that allows you to express your human potential. And as I talked about in the last part, to make a good design, to find a fit, you need to perceive the context you are designing for clearly.

This is an amazing algorithm: do interesting things and magically arrive at a complex understanding of the world.

Deadheading as a repeated practice of cutting that which stands in the way of growth, evolution, nourishment. Dancing that „capacity” dance, on a tightrope between usefulness and uselessness. Learning the same lesson again and again. (Because make no mistake I will be here again, sometime sooner or later.) Hoping that next season’s blossoms will be... See more

I want to do x, so why can’t I?

For many months now (as you could tell by my silence) I have had the hardest time prioritizing the thing that’s important to me. Writing. Not just here publicly but also my own personal writing that happens in the early morning when my brain’s rested but fuzzy and supple and things spill out with ease, or late at nig... See more