Weekly Review of 2020-12-20

The Voice Memo Experiment

On [[2020-12-14]], I started the [[Voice Memo Experiment]]. Every day for the next month (until [[2021-01-14]]) I am going to send a voice memo to a new person.

Why?

  • Short version: Voice memos remove constraints of texting and phone calls, while leaving room for the inefficiencies that make conversations energizing and creative.
  • Long version: [[Voice Memo Experiment]]

My Writings of the Week

  1. After a great car ride last week with [[Justin Mehler]], I wrote down some of our thoughts about [[The New American Dream]] on [[2020-12-15]]. I compare some of his new ideas to those I write about in my notes on [[American Individualism]]. All in all, it was a great conversation, and I think we'll be talking about those topics more in the future.

  2. On [[2020-12-14]], I wrote some notes on [[Why We Don't Talk More]], which is also part of the inspiration for the [[Voice Memo Experiment]]

Podcasts of the Week

  1. [[Daniel Ek]], CEO of [[Spotify]] on The [[Tim Ferris]] Show
  • link to spotify
  • At the beginning of this episode, Daniel talks about two great Swedish words without direct english translation. Words like this are always fun
    1. Eldsjal, also his twitter handle, means "A fiery soul"
      • There is a short Swedish Wikipedia page here
      • someone who is intensely passionate about something
      • He grew up being called this because of his general enthusiasm and made it his twitter handle as a reminder for himself. It is a term he identifies with, and likes to live his life by
    2. Lagom: Just about Right
      • ~9:40: "Encapsulates the Swedish spirit more than anything else. Very much a culture of you shouldn't stand out. You are part of greater being. The best thing you can be is lagom... that feels crazy if you are an American"
      • This quote from wikipedia helps paint the translation even better

      • Whereas words like sufficient and average suggest some degree of abstinence, scarcity, or failure, lagom carries the connotation of appropriateness, although not necessarily perfection

      • Spotify's culture is a mix between these two cultures, and the clash causes an internal conflict for Daniel himself
      • Daniel quickly points out how this attitude is starkly different from the focus on [[American Individualism]] I've written about recently. Americans are all about extremes. We want everything bigger and better. We respect those who work extreme hours. We heavily identify with our country leading the gold medal count at the Olympics. We eat a lot. In every facet of life, we are extreme.
      • This contrast in culture is very interesting. Daniel talks about how it has led to interesting company dynamics at [[Spotify]] while also leaving him with sometimes hard internal conflicts to rectify between the two
  1. I have listened to a lot of episodes on the [[singletracks]] podcast, and it's how I ended up learning about bikejames.com. Great podcasts to get more inspiration on biking and get more familiar with the culture and current landscape.

Articles of the Week

  1. Social Media V2 [[Ben Thompson]] [[Stratechery]]

    • link to article
    • This describes a problem I experienced on social media for years. You can't be everything to everyone, and that's limited me from having a fully immersive online experience. Instead of being creative and building out different accounts for different niches, I got off almost all of them (Instagram, twitter, and FB) for a few years.
    • Ben talks about a really interesting idea here: V1 of social media copies social dynamics we have in real life online. V2 isn't going to copy real life. It is going to take advantage of the new dynamics available on the wonderful world of the internet. [[TikTok]] is the first step toward this.

  2. [[Simon Sarris]] https://simonsarris.com/

    • At the bottom of his website:

      "We lived in a state of dialogue for millennia, almost all knowledge was two-way communication. Even with books, every person talked to more people, sometimes in a single day, than they had ever read. Then between the printing press and radio we switched to one-way communication as the norm, and now it's the opposite. The consequences of this are not fully appreciated."

    • This is related to the [[Voice Memo Experiment]]. We have access to the amazing knowledge of the best in the world, but we are ignoring the people around us. What are the consequences we aren't appreciating?

Books

I've been reading The Power Paradox and writing some notes here and there. A great read so far. You can find some of my notes by looking at the linked references on [[The Power Paradox]] page

Fitness

Since I got a new moutain bike two weeks ago, I've gone a bit overboard riding. I've also gone overboard watching videos and listening to biking podcasts

My favorite bike fitness site yet is bikejames.com. He has some against the grains opinions, specifically regarding flat pedals (and even has a long and researched manifesto about it), and some great content about what is important to move well on the bike and how to improve functional fitness

  • Focusing on hip mobility is one thing he stresses, which is part of the reason I've been so focused on yoga and flexibility recently, as opposed to strength.
  • One of my biggest training mistakes in high school while training for baseball was spending too much time on fitness, and not enough time on actual playing skills. Fitness cannot replace great skills, but great skills often beat great fitness.

Found [[breathe and flow]], and have followed 1 video a day to improve flexibility and mobility. There is a great series on Yoga for Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, which targets many of the same body parts important for [[MTB]]

I particularly appreciated this video. I had been curious if they lift weights, and the answer is no. They build muscle through powerful movements like the ones in this class. And after following a couple of their strength classes, I can vouch for how difficult they are.

Tweets

Inspiration to start putting together a Weekly Review from [[David Perrell]] [[Burnt Ends]]

  • link
  • Everyone has burnt ends. We are all sifting through tons of information each week. Starting a weekly review will give me a more active role in my information consumption

I wrote some advice for myself I wish I'd follow

Final Thoughts

This is the first year I'm going to write out a [[Year-end Review]], which I am intimidated by and excited for. Thanks to this being the first year I've used [[RoamResarch]], I have plenty of notes to review. My goal is to make it a short summary of all that I've learned from this year.

[[Bailey Allen]] gave some great feedback on the structure of this website. It is very likely you will see some changes soon.

Lastly, the idea of the Weekly Review is something I am going to refine as I go. This one ended up a bit longer than I planned, which is great, but may not be sustainable on a consistent week to week basis. We'll have to see how it goes



My Linked Notes

One last thing

If you liked these notes, hit me on Twitter!