tier list of life attitudes

007

hey hey!

Issue 7 of this newsletter. Shit. I have what, five weeks left of my internship? Then just two more weeks after that before the semester kicks off. Damn.

I’m not gonna lie, this past week didn’t pan out the way I thought it would, not in a bad way though. These past few weeks I’ve been writing about wanting to read and write more. But I find myself revisiting newsletter 003 that said not to cram too much ambition into summer. It’s nice that I write these for myself and I’m already getting some use out of it. As someone once said, “We need to be reminded more than we need to be taught.”

There’s a nice passage in Bird by Bird that I read last week:

I remind myself nearly every day of something that a doctor told me six months before my friend Pammy died. This was a doctor who always gave me straight answers. When I called on this one particular night, I was hoping she could put a positive slant on some distressing developments. She couldn’t, but she said something that changed my life. “Watch her carefully right now,” she said, “because she’s teaching you how to live.”

I remind myself of this when I cannot get any work done: to live as if I am dying, because the truth is we are all terminal on this bus. To live as if we are dying gives us a chance to experience some real presence. Time is so full for people who are dying in a conscious way, full in the way that life is for children. They spend big round hours. So instead of staring miserably at the computer screen trying to will my way into having a breakthrough, I say to myself, “Okay, hmmm, let’s see. Dying tomorrow. What should I do today?” then I can decide to read Wallace Stevens for the rest of the morning or got o the beach or just really participate in ordinary life.”

So I relish in the fact I was able to go on spontaneous adventures with my best friend who was in town this week. I’m grateful I got to spend time with many people that I’m lucky to have around.

Earlier this week I wrote a ‘tier list’ of kinds of activities… or just verbs that I have in my life, here’s what I came up with:

Loving > Being/Doing > Experiencing > Resting > Mindful Consumption > Passive Consumption > Complaining

After some thought, I realized this is less of an ‘activities’ tier list but rather an ‘attitude towards life’ tier list.

Loving: Loving anything… friends, family, people, activities, things, the time passing. Very much in the same vein as gratitude. If I can’t even love how the time is passing and approach as much of my life with some form of love, I feel like that’s a sign that I’m doing something wrong. It’s a shame too, because I catch myself being critical how the time passes (like earlier in this very article) when really just putting a little bit of effort to approach things with love is a small change in framing that, I think, has insane ROI on just life in general. Approach life with love and earnest.

Being/Doing: A theme in my life seems to be that I think too much before or just about doing anything. I’m starting to realize that life doesn’t really reward the sideline thinkers and calculators, but rather the person in the arena. Partly because quantity leads to quality, but also because life doesn’t reward procrastinators. Having a bias towards action is something I’ve been trying to practice.

The only real measure of intelligence is if you get what you want out of life. There’s two parts to this: a) were you able to hack reality to get what you wanted and b) were you able to figure out what you should want in the first place - Naval Ravikant

I also think doing things really puts my money where my mouth is and tests the sort of identity I build for myself against the world. Doing is the literal manifestation of ‘being’ — and I wish to live authentically. It helps to have mentors, inspirations, even people you don’t want to be like. But if I am to carve the life I want, I can’t spend my time in what coders call ‘tutorial hell’ and just keep watching people do things I don’t. I’d rather spend time embodying and finding out who I am and who I’d like to be.

The fool, with all his other faults, has this also, he is always getting ready to live. Reflect, my esteemed Lucilius, what this saying means, and you will see how revolting is the fickleness of men who lay down every day new foundations of life, and begin to build up fresh hopes even at the brink of the grave.  Look within your own mind for individual instances; you will think of old men who are preparing themselves at that very hour for a political career, or for travel, or for business. And what is baser than getting ready to live when you are already old? - Seneca, Letters from a Stoic

Experiencing: There’s a chinese adage: “读万卷书，行万里路”, which translates to “read ten thousand books and walk ten thousand miles” that’s used to express the importance of reading and travelling to experience the world. While I adore this saying, I’m of the opinion that reading books, however wise they can be, is ultimately an indirect form of living. I think that life will teach you almost any lesson you need if you’re out in the world. Have more “at-bats” and venture to see it with your own eyes — these are the things that build true wisdom and create the tales worth telling my children. Saying yes and being brave enough to experience something… anything. I feel like by default I’m a homebody, but there’s something to be said about not making the shoulder devil’s job easier and making the effort to experience something rather than nothing.

Resting: I put resting in the middle of my tier list, the highest I could. Underrated but deeply important. Sometimes I feel guilty for resting and antsy I could/should be doing something else, but I don’t think I’ve ever been in the wrong for prioritizing rest.

Mindful Consumption > Passive Consumption: This is something I’ve been stabbing at in this blog, where in a world of commoditized attention, it’s a superpower to be able to direct it and be intentional. Sadly, I think Passive Consumption (originally at the bottom of my tier list) is something me and many people around me spend the most time on, just because it requires the least energy (aside from resting). But hey, I have to read and watch media to learn about this world regardless. Might as well try to watch the youtube video/book/podcast without switching the tab as if I’m an multitasking addict with a threshold of minimum stimulation. Damn.

Complaining: something I’ve realized is that it pisses me off when people fight desperately for their limitations. It’s like watching someone build a prison around themselves. I’m guilty of it too, but when I see it in other people it really bothers me that they can’t see further than the limitations they’ve constructed and continuously complain about it. I think it’s the most awful way to navigate through life. Gonna do whatever I can to avoid this state of mind.

small notes

digital mentors of interest: I think having mentors is super important, but most of mine come from the internet. Some people I have on my radar to do some deep dives on or to revisit properly, now that I’m writing: Naval Ravikant, Anthony Bourdain, Professor Galloway.

dreams: I was recently talking with my friend’s dad at a potluck about his son’s after college plans and aspirations. Something I forgot about was that, despite not having figured out exactly what he has a passion for in college yet (he’s studying nursing for now), his dream job is to be an art director. I think I’m in the same boat in a way. My end game is also to do something creative. While I love coding for many reasons, at the end of the day I’ll be spending my life building someone else’s dream if I continue down this road. Now, if I am to take my own advice, I would just start now. Do the creative stuff now. I’m getting ready to live, like Seneca warned. So maybe I can get the ball rolling on something creative to work on with him.

a musical obligation: Something my sister once told me was that she sees listening to music as something of a human obligation, in a similar vein of reading the classics in literature. She seems to think it strange or lazy when someone doesn’t put the effort into expanding their music preferences. Now, I’m not an avid music listener in the same way she is. She’s always been the more musical one. But I’ve thought about it a little bit, and I think her take does have some ground to stand on and some deeper implications. In a world of endless media and opinions, doing the due diligence to break out of your normal music rotation and discover new things is not only enjoyable, but quintessential. That is, putting effort into knowing yourself and your own tastes against the world’s taste. So I think I’ll also put some effort into listening to albums and music outside of my norm.

Wow. This newsletter turned out way longer and more philosophical than I anticipated. I think what I’m really poking at is this ‘tier list’ prioritizes the attitudes I bring to life, and without it I sink into the path of least resistance and doom scroll, wade through the days, and sit duck. It’s fun to see my brain piece together what it thinks it needs. Again: I need to be reminded more than I need to be taught. I’ll need to revisit this tier list someday, because I think it’s connected with what I don’t want to regret in life.

Til’ next week,

Evan