Month: March 2022

The curse of productivity when

We suffer when we apply the principles of work & productivity to our leisure!

Theoretically, hobbies should be among the most intrinsically motivated things we could do—they are the work we choose to do when we could be doing anything. But the validation we get from others online, and the validation we get from our culture writ large for spending our free time in a productive, virtuous way, muddies that motivation…
The message that a hobby is the best way to spend one’s free time is also a message about what you should value most in life: hard work, achievement, productivity. Those aren’t bad things, but are they really more important than relationships, contemplation, and rest? Hanging out with your friends, caring for your family, enjoying creature comforts, replenishing your energy—these may not make for a unique fun fact to whip out at parties, but they are good for the soul.

QotD: Sahil Bloom

It’s hard to get lucky watching Netflix at home on the couch.

It’s (relatively) easy to get lucky when you’re engaging with people, interacting, and learning—in physical or digital worlds.

Spend more time engaging and you’ll find yourself in more positions to get lucky.

Agyeya

आज अज्ञेय जी के 111वें जन्मदिवस पर उनको श्रद्धा सुमन अर्पित करता हूं।
अज्ञेय कहते हैं “परिचय प्राप्त करने के लिए अधिक बोलने की ज़रूरत नहीं है, वह तो मुस्करा भर देने से हो जाता है।”
ऐसा निष्छल व्यक्तव्य कोई और दे ही नहीं सकता था।

यद्यपि गद्य और पद्य दोनों में उन्हें महारत हासिल थी, और दोनों विधाओं में उन्होंने नए आयाम कायम किए, लेकिन मेरा परिचय उनसे उनकी कविताओं में हुआ। मुझे हिंदी कविताओं की ओर मोड़ने वालों में वह अग्रणी थे।
बचपन में अधिकांश कविताएं या तो साधारण तुकबंदी होती थीं, अथवा बहुत ही बोरिंग। ऐसे में साँप जैसी कविता का आगमन हुआ और कविता के प्रति मेरा दृष्टिकोण बदल गया।

साँप !
तुम सभ्य तो हुए नहीं
नगर में बसना
भी तुम्हें नहीं आया।
एक बात पूछूँ–(उत्तर दोगे?)
तब कैसे सीखा डँसना–
विष कहाँ पाया?

Interview with Debbie Millman

Everyone will find a different takeaway from this short interview

  1. The only thing I try to do every single day is get at least 7 hours of sleep! Sleep is SO important; it is when you regenerate your brain cells and your body. If I don’t get enough sleep, I definitely can not be creative.
  2. I wish I knew that anything worthwhile takes a long time. I wish I knew that things would turn out okay by the time I was in my forties. I wish I knew enough not to be so afraid to go after what I really wanted.
  3. I don’t believe in “too busy.” I think that busy is a decision. We do the things we want to do, period. If we say we are too busy, it is shorthand for “not important enough.” It means you would rather be doing something else that you consider more important…Simply put: you don’t find the time to do something; you make the time to do things.

5 Laws of Stupidity

  1. Everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals among us.
  2. The probability that a certain person is stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person.
  3. A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person while deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses themselves.
  4. Non-stupid people always underestimate the damaging power of stupid individuals.
  5. A stupid person is the most dangerous type of person.