Summary of week
- Paradox of choice. I often feel that if I have free time I’m at somewhat of a loss as to what to do. I’m conscious of the volumetric approach but I don’t seem to be making any great progress anywhere so it’s not immediately obvious or gratifying to work on any one thing.
- This is kind of where the attempt to understand comes into play, just to be mindful and willing to engage in whatever I’m doing.
- I really found that I couldn’t engage with anything, it all just seemed bland.
- Struggled on Friday and Saturday really with this. Then on Thursday I was stressed and pissed off.
- Starting to get back into liking jiu jitsu, just to work on my own progress.
- Along these lines, I found that when i started to engage with David Kipping’s videos and how he’s applying probability it became fascinating. To use it in such a way to quantify unknowns about such big questions.
- Also, one thing he says in the Lex podcast is he wanted to contribute some meaningful intellectual contribution to society, not necessarily to be special, or the first or anything. Just resonated with me.
- I found that this week I just wasn’t excited about much in the evening, I was reading James Joyce and Farewell to Arms which were frankly uninteresting.
- I started reading ckirsch book on the basics of Computer Science, I’m going to try and get back to these fundamentals, partially because it interacts with things like language.
- I think I slipped on just executing this week, like if I felt I was paying enough attention to something I didn’t just put aside time for it.
- At the same time, it’s important not to catastrophise and spiral, just accept and move on.
Goals
- Compile first draft of Electronics/Power Systems document.
- Clean Bike.
- Look into galaxy formation, astrophotography etc.
- Stanford Encyclopedia for computation.
- Writing out BJJ notes. Having plans for each session.
Excerpts from week
Friday
- I listened to Philosophize this! podcast on Simone Weil. An example is used of making a habit of reading and how you can ‘will’ yourself to do it. Weil might argue that you should try and understand what it is you find difficult, to interact with and work with that. She says this is the class of the will and understanding of things, when more sensitivity is needed.
- It’s interesting as an add on to the kind of Jocko mentality, where just doing stuff can take you far but may not offer a whole lot.
- I’m skeptical of how novel I suppose weils approach is. After reading @tom-holland ‘Dominion’ it’s hard to know what ideas are really philosophical and just derived from religion.
- This doesn’t mean it’s not interesting advice, but I just wonder how applicable it is. One of the main things with Simone Weil is how she really led by example and tried to practice what she preached. Definitely worth paying attention to her I think.
Having one of those evenings where I can do anything I want but nothing at all! Paradox of choice I suppose. I put a large amount of emphasis on how I use my time, so when I feel im wasting it, it’s draining. But in the end, I suppose, doesn’t really matter what I do.