Keep going when the going is hard and slow
A notebook about how we work, and learn, and love and live.
"Patience is waiting. Not passively waiting. That is laziness. But to keep going when the going is hard and slow - that is patience. The two most powerful warriors are patience and time." - Leo Tolstoy
It's really cold in New England today. So many of the things we thought might get done will have to wait. We're not being lazy, we're being patient.
Happy Friday.
Learning
Why so many of the best things we have produced, from science to the arts, have come from collaboration
"Research shows people are incredibly good at picking apart other people’s reasons. We are just terrible at picking apart our own in the same way."
"With no one to tell you that there are other points of view to consider, no one to poke holes in your theories, reveal the weakness in your reasoning, produce counterarguments, reveal potential harm, or threaten sanction for violating a norm, you will spin in an epistemic hamster wheel. In short, when you argue with yourself, you win."
"...(Cognitive scientists Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber) call all of this 'the interactionist model,' which posits that the function of reasoning is to argue your case in a group setting. In this model, reasoning is an innate behavior that grows more complex as we mature, like crawling before walking upright. We are social animals first and individual reasoners second, a system built on top of another system, biologically via evolution, and individual reasoning is a psychological mechanism that evolved under selective pressures to facilitate communication between peers in an environment where misinformation is unavoidable. In an environment like that, confirmation bias turns out to be very useful. In fact, bias itself becomes very useful."
Book Excerpt: Why Changing Your Mind is a Feature of Evolution, Not a Bug
Learning
The mind has always been an inherently jumpy thing.
Easily distracted; from the Sloane Manuscript 2435, f. 44v. Courtesy the British Library
"...Caveat cogitator: the problem of concentration is recursive. Any strategy for sidestepping distraction calls for strategies on sidestepping distraction. When Cassian made one of his simplest recommendations – repeat a psalm over and over, to keep your brain reined in – he knew what he was going to hear next. ‘How can we stay fixated on that verse?’ the monks would ask. Distraction is an old problem, and so is the fantasy that it can be dodged once and for all. There were just as many exciting things to think about 1,600 years ago as there are now. Sometimes it boggled the mind." - Jamie Kreiner
Article: How to Reduce Digital Distractions: Advice from Medieval Monks
Learning
“It shouldn’t be called servant leadership anymore, it should just be called leadership” – Pat Lencioni
Robert K. Greenleaf
“The servant-leader is servant first… It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first. Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead. That person is sharply different from one who is leader first, perhaps because of the need to assuage an unusual power drive or to acquire material possessions…The leader-first and the servant-first are two extreme types. Between them there are shadings and blends that are part of the infinite variety of human nature.
“A servant-leader focuses primarily on the growth and well-being of people and the communities to which they belong. While traditional leadership generally involves the accumulation and exercise of power by one at the “top of the pyramid,” servant leadership is different. The servant-leader shares power, puts the needs of others first, and helps people develop and perform as highly as possible.” - Robert K. Greenleaf
Article: The Servant as Leader
Futures Thinking
There's good news, there's bad news.
For the fourth year the folks at Visual Capitalist have collated a Prediction Consensus (now part of their more comprehensive 2023 Global Forecast Series). And, recognizing that situations such as COVID-19 and the invasion of Ukraine can flair up with knock-on effects on the whole system, and acknowledging that experts are just as susceptible to hype as the rest of us, they asked ChatGPT to write the intro to this article:
"Humans have a natural curiosity about what the future holds, and the desire to predict the future may stem from this curiosity. In addition, the ability to predict the future can provide a sense of control and security, as individuals may feel that they can prepare for even influence future events. Moreover, prediction the future can also be a way for people to make sense of the present and understand the forces at play in the world around them. Finally, the desire to predict the future may be driven by practical considerations, such as the need to make decisions about investments, career choices, and other important life decisions." - ChatGPT
Book Excerpt: Prediction Consensus: What the Experts See Coming in 2023
Inspiration, Creativity
Why I have a serious fan-crush on Miranda July
I first discovered Miranda July when she created a whole website to promote her book of short stories, No One Belongs Here More Than You, using only a dry-erase board. But because she didn't have a dry-erase board she used her refrigerator and stove.
When I got the book I sipped it, letting myself read just one story a day lest the book be over too soon. It is as off-beat as her promotion of it. Her beguiling odd but thoroughly seductive tales are built of simple and sturdy lines like: “Inelegantly, and without my consent, time passed.”
She was born in Vermont and raised in Berkley. After dropping out of film school at UC Santa Cruz she moved to Portland, OR where she took up performance art and one-woman shows. According to her she has not worked a day job since she was 23 years old. Today she is an accomplished filmmaker, actor, writer, musician and spoken word artist. Her power, to me, is rooted in a calm insouciance that initially belies the huge brain and fearless gumption that drives her work.
In this video she describes her approach to filmmaking. It is not 60 seconds long, it's not really a film school, and there were no episodes 1-4. But it is a very good trailer for her film Kajillionaire, which she wrote and directed.
Video: 60 Second Film School | Miranda July | Episode 5
Website: Miranda July-Home
Social Messaging, Community
“I think everybody wants peace, particularly in these times."
Christi Bartos of All About Beads on Bank Row in Greenfield with her peace sign in her window.
Photo by Paul Franz
Pat Hynes is a retired professor of environmental health, and a board member of the Traprock Center for Peace and Justice. Every Saturday morning, in my own town of Greenfield, Massachusetts, I can see her standing on our town common holding a sign that reads: "Health, Not War". Hamdi Yildiz runs a tailor shop on Main Street and was inspired by her quiet activism. He asked her if he could put her sign in his window the other six days of the week. His act, in turn, bloomed into a movement. As of this week a total of 24 downtown stores proudly bear a sign that advocates for peace.
About the initiative, Claire Chang of Greenfield Solar, said: "I think everybody wants peace, particularly in these times".
Article: Greenfield Storefront Signs ‘A Natural Way to Start Peace Literacy’
Graphic Design
Book cover design is alive and well.
"The first crop of designs of 2023 is fresh, cheeky, and mushroom-forward, which can only portend good things (please let it portend good things)." - Emily Temple
Article: The 11 Best Book Covers of January
Oneliners
Article: Farmers May Not Have to Choose Between Crops and Solar Panels.
Article: The Brooklyn Public Library Gives Every Teenager in the U.S. Free Access to Censored Books.
Article: Oatly’s Climate-Footprint Counts Are a Sign That Carbon Labels are Going Mainstream. Do They Work?
Article: A New Study Suggests Prescribing Exercise Before Psychiatric Drugs.
Playlist
You know me, I love a good cover. Make it a good cover of a 60's psychedelic classic and things get great. Last fall, Molly Tuttle and Golden Highway, played the Levitate Flannel Jam at Maine Craft Distilling in Portland, ME. As Strum Bum commented: "I Never dreamed I would hear White Rabbit sound like a mixture of Bluegrass and Middle Eastern Folk music." This band is having a blast.
Video: Molly Tuttle Channels Grace Slick "White Rabbit" 10/9/22 Portland, ME
Mitch the editor in his a new role as Mitch the DJ.
A Spotify AI-assisted playlist
Molly and band inspired me. So I seeded a playlist with three of her songs, then mixed them with songs that share a similar spirit. This is the second mix I've posted on my new Spotify profile page, Big Sounds from a Small Planet.
Mix-Tape: Molly Tuttle and Friends
Image of the Week
Salt Ponds #4
Near Naglou Sam Sam, Senegal 2019
© Edward Burtynsky, courtesy of Flowers Gallery, London / Nicholas Metivier Gallery, Toronto.
"A new series of aerial images from photographer Edward Burtynsky reveals sites of displacement, erasure, and extraction—all, at first glance, sublime—across five African countries. From the breathtaking expanse of the Sishen Iron Ore Mine to the controlled might of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, a story of reshaped and redefined landscapes emerges. Burtynsky makes visible the scope of human impact in sub-Saharan Africa, inviting viewers to digest vistas of both beauty and destruction, and to witness the marks, physical and abstract, that we set into the Earth."
Article: Patterns of Extraction
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