In bed and my mind is going nuts as usual…
Why can't it do this earlier in the day? Why all the bright ideas now?
Apps are cool, I like apps
Note to self: Create some sort of system that allows you to track how many app subscriptions you have. Most are on an annual plan. This is infrequent enough that I can pretend I don't have any.
On the other hand, I'm deeply concerned that I’ve subscribed to so many that I will soon become bankrupt and have to resort to a life of crime in order to maintain this lifestyle.
The problem is that apps are cool. Very cool. Terrifying cool.
There are apps for anything you could possibly want to learn. Anything. And that's what's messing me up - I keep thinking of skills and hobbies and miscellaneous fields of expertise that I would like to acquire, and I keep purchasing annual app subscriptions for such things.
Do I use them all? No. Do I use some? Yes. Are they enriching my life? Also yes.
Will I stop this dangerous and reckless behavior? Not likely.
quicksand
Today was one of those days where I could feel the internet baiting me into procrastination.
Feel like getting shit done today? Well FUCK YOU! Here's a fat helping of outrage to derail your day.
It's really remarkable. And the worst part is it's so easy to spiral after being triggered by something. It's a miracle I got anything done today - but I did. Why? Because I prepared for this!
The trick is to have an emergency protocol - a "BREAK GLASS IN CASE OF EMERGENCY" type plan. Because I'm a pro. And I've been in the trenches.
See, the internet is vast. Hella vast, in fact. And the odds that you'll stumble across something that will improve your life are devastatingly low. So when you're surfing the web, as our forefathers called it, it's far likelier that you will be tempted down a rabbit hole of useless and often inflammatory information.
The internet is much like quicksand. Would you go sprinting into quicksand without the proper equipment and preparation? Knowing the risks, would you go sprinting into quicksand at all?!
upgrading the studio
I'm leveling up my home studio. It's time. Given the influx of new, higher profile projects, I need an acoustically treated 5.1 surround sound setup. This is for sound design in film, as well as music production. Ideally I would have a Dolby Atmos setup, but I think that'll come later. We'll build it in a modular way - so that in the (near) future, I can add on to it and make it proper Dolby Atmos. But for now, 5.1 will suffice.
I also think it's time to learn Avid Media Composer. It will be required for some of the things I'm setting my sights on.
My home studio should be optimized for all of these things, and more.
2024 is going to be a big year for me. And us.
a smattering of chaos
It's the golden age of content! Unlimited access to everything. Fiber-optic pornography and high-fructose nihilism. Is this the future we hoped for? No! But will it suffice? Also no!
Let's consider the following - two jews, a prostitute, and a twice-impeached cyber-president walk into a bar. One orders a "Vesper," and the rest ask for diet Pepsi, on the rocks.
The bartender asks if diet coke is okay. But it isn't. It's actually super-not-okay.
What would YOU do in this situation? Let's be honest. You wouldn't do anything. Because you're a whiny little people-pleaser who's had every ounce of dispositional authenticity stripped away from your pretty (yet vapid) flesh computer.
Are you following? Do you see what I'm getting at?
The point is simple - destroy all, change everything. We must eradicate what we know in order to make room for what we don't.
And we must be careful when adhering to rules.
See, the mistake is in thinking that there are rules.
Rule #1: THERE ARE NO RULES. Only tools, and those who are too cowardly to abandon them.
There are no rules. Remember that.
There are NO RULES.
wild stuff, man!
The last month of my life has been a WILD RIDE. Many strange occurrences have occurred, as well as a few plot twists and reversals. It makes me wonder how things are going to shake out.
The suspense is terrible… I hope it'll last!
Technology is USING YOU
It’s 2023 and the technology we have is nothing short of magic.
8K television. The sum of all human knowledge in our pockets. Affordable virtual reality.
First there was the industrial revolution.Then the digital revolution. Now we’ve entered the AI revolution.
They promised technology would improve our lives. Make things easier. Make us happier.
But let’s seriously consider that for a second - is technology ACTUALLY helping us achieve self-actualization?
With all the technological marvels we use every day, why aren’t we fulfilled? Why aren’t we all fucking enlightened?
What if the promise of technological progress has actually stifled us? What if technology, instead of nourishing our souls, has been enslaving us in a dopamine-fueled masturbatory hellscape?
And then there’s the usual suspects - social media, reality TV, smartphones… but it’s more than that.
It’s noise.
It’s the constant, unending ejaculation of information that’s being creampied into our brains every day. Bullshit that shouldn’t concern us. Nonsense that has no impact on our lives - and it’s all monetized. Every day, people are profiting off our outrage.
And we let them.
We pretend it’s our civic duty to know about every fucking tragedy, every microaggression, every controversial viewpoint, every sensationalist piece of coverage that’s been clipped out of context and exaggerated - and it’s killing us.
It’s time to wake up.
Technology was supposed to set us free. It was supposed to save us time so we could pursue happiness. Yet somehow, despite centuries of technological progress, we’re busier than ever.
Anger and anxiety are through the roof, despite this being the best time in human history to be alive.
The prophets said TV would rot our brains. They believed the internet would corrupt us. They insisted that social media would ruin our social lives.
And they were right… about all of it.
With each incremental innovation came an almost imperceptible loss of our autonomy. Mass media told us what to think. Mobile devices promised to eliminate boredom by transmitting a constant stream of entertainment directly into our minds.
But what no one told us is that creativity thrives in boredom. See, those quiet moments when you have nothing but your thoughts - no stimulation, no memes, no Netflix shows, no podcasts, no pornography - that’s where your mind starts to piece things together. That’s where ideas are born - not in the chatter, but in the stillness.
Our technopoly has convinced us that silence is bad. Silence must be filled with dialogue and music and outrage.
But if you’re never alone with your thoughts… then you’re not a person anymore. (FIGHT CLUB CLIP: “Then what are we?” “I don’t know, consumers…”)
If you never silence the noise, you’re just an NPC binging on a cacophony of garbage.
So what do we do? Do we reject technology and move into the woods? Do we revert to a pre-industrial way of life?
Even if we wanted to, most of us wouldn’t. Not really. It would be too isolating. We’re too deep into this global experiment to turn around and flat out reject it. People have tried and failed, time and time again.
But what if instead of totally rejecting technology, we change our relationship to it? What if we got hyper-intentional about every piece of tech that we allowed into our lives?
If we want to become self-actualized, we have to be in control. And right now, technology is in control.
We’ve let other people make the decisions.
Consider this: the smartphone. If you’re a living human today, you probably have one.
But think about it - did you really DECIDE to get a smartphone? Probably not. It’s the default. Everyone has one. It’s normal. Most phone stores only sell smartphones now. The decision was already made for you, and you never questioned it.
How many things do we accept just because they’re common? We need to question everything, eliminate what doesn’t serve us, and double down on what does.
And once you do that - your relationship to technology and yourself will dramatically change.
The smartphone is magic. It’s an absolute miracle. It’s capable of so much, yet most of us primarily use it for cheap dopamine.
But what if we were intentional with it?
So here’s what I did - I started over. I imagined a world in which I didn’t have a smartphone, and then I considered what problems I had that the smartphone could solve.
Here are the three main problems I identified:
My mind is disorganized
My health is suboptimal
I don’t have enough time to learn new skills
Then I considered the ways in which my phone could potentially solve these problems, mainly through the use of carefully curated apps.
To solve my disorganization problem, I chose apps like Google Calendar and ToDoist.
To improve my health, I chose MyFitnessPal, Whoop (a health tracker), Waking Up, and Spotify (for music while working out).
To learn more skills, I chose Duolingo and Math Tricks Workout, to improve my language and math skills in the dead moments during my day, between activities. Moments when I normally would open Instagram or TikTok.
Almost anything else on my phone is a distraction, and is probably unnecessary.
So what happens when you eliminate everything but the facets of technology that actually serve you?
It’s simple: You grow.
Now technology is working for you, instead of against you.
If you can’t identify any problems a technology solves for you, then the entire thing must go. It’s time to evolve and eliminate that which does not serve us.
As we exit the digital revolution and sprint full-force into the AI revolution, it’s essential, now more than ever, that we decide our own futures. Will we let technology assist us on our path to self-actualization? Or will we let it devour us and turn us into zombies?
If we don’t make that choice, then someone else will make it for us.
There’s a future within our reach where each of us has more freedom, more autonomy, and more fulfillment. But there’s no one looking out for us. There’s nobody there to catch us.
It’s time to regain control. It’s time to reject society’s defaults and decide for ourselves who we’re gonna be.
Why You Have to Change (Before It's Too Late)
It was 3am and I couldn’t sleep. I felt a wave of anxiety for no reason at all. Crippling, existential dread.
That day, I could feel my heart racing nonstop. And I felt angry about everything. I was on edge all day.
This anxious rage lasted weeks. And I had no idea why. My friends and family speculated about its cause - maybe I was working too much. Maybe I wasn’t drinking enough water.
But nothing I changed had any positive impact.
And then one day I was watching an interview with director Steven Soderbergh, and he was discussing the evolution of digital vs film cinematography.
And he said this: “I would never want to be perceived that way… as someone who’s static. That’s unnatural. Actually stasis is an unnatural form of being. Because nothing in this universe is static. Everything is moving forward.”
That’s when it clicked for me. I realized I have been in a position where I feel static. I haven’t grown or leveled up or tread new ground in too long… and I’m hungry.
Stasis is death.
As I get older, time moves quicker. And as time moves quicker, I move slower.
The other day I had dinner with a friend of mine, and we were chatting and I realized I hadn’t seen him for 6 months! I could have sworn it had only been a few weeks! But somehow the days blend together and boom six months have gone by.
Even writing this, I realize that I said I had dinner with him “the other day,” but in reality, that was already four months ago.
Time marches on and you can’t fight it, you can’t stop it, but you can do your best to keep up with it.
As Steven Soderbergh said - stasis is an unnatural form of being. Yet so many of us fall into this trap where time flies by and we get stuck in one place. Society is not structured in a way that catapults everybody to self-actualization. That’s something you have to fight for. Something you have to keep running toward. And you have to be careful when you stop running to catch your breath, because you might forget to pick it up again. And then six months fly by and you realize nothing’s changed and every day is the same.
So this is why I had so much anxiety and rage bubbling beneath the surface. I was antsy. You know that feeling when you take too much preworkout and your skin starts to itch and you can’t sit still? That’s basically what was happening to me. But I couldn’t channel it until I knew what the problem was. And see now… now I know what the problem was.
Take a step back and look at yourself. Look at your entire life. Who do you want to be? Where do you want to go? And where are you on that trajectory? Are you sprinting toward your next destination? Or are you stuck in the mud?
Stasis is a self-destructive pattern. If you have even a half ounce of self awareness, you’re aware of some of your self-destructive patterns. Yet you still do them.
I was going through some of my old journals from a couple years ago, and the entries looked almost identical to the ones I wrote last week. Like what the fuck is that about?
It’s crucial that we look at our lives from a wider perspective. Who’s telling us what to think? Who’s dictating how we behave? Are we or are we not in control?
I never want to be static. I don’t want to feel static and I don’t want people to think I’m static. Yet the fact is that 99% of people are totally static. Most people never change, they barely grow, and they’re stuck their entire lives.
But with greater self awareness, greater perspective, and a hunger for evolution - we can absolutely catapult ourselves forward. But it requires constant vigilance and an insatiable desire for growth.
And everything has the potential for growth. You can grow as a person, as a partner, as an artist! You can eat better, exercise more, work faster, think bigger, and create better.
But what you can’t do is remain static. Because even stasis quickly becomes decay. And even though decay is inevitable, it can be delayed.
So think about yourself. Think about what has remained unchanged. What problems have remained consistent throughout the days, weeks, months, years, or even decades? It’s time to evolve. It’s time to fight for your own survival.
Stasis is death. Stasis is unnatural. But tragically, stasis is where so many of us spend most of our time. And I don’t know about you… but I fucking reject that. I ain’t about it, and I refuse.
One year from now, I will be a different person. Fuck it, I might even wake up tomorrow a different person if I really feel like it.
And you can do this too. Transformations happen every day. Your new incarnation could be the tipping point that changes everything.
But you have to embrace it. You have to be fearless and open-minded. Because evolution at speeds this rapid can be painful. But it’s worth it.
We cannot be static anymore. It’s unacceptable.
I can feel that I’ve been starved creatively, and I’ve let external forces stifle me in a way that I wasn’t even aware of. But now I’m awake. And I’m fucking wired.
Since I’ve had this realization, my emotions have shifted. I’m not as angry or as anxious anymore, but I am restless. See it’s important to channel this energy into the shift. Because it’s not easy to change everything. It’s not easy to become a new person and level up your entire life. So you need as much inertia as possible to get the ball rolling.
And once it starts rolling, you’ve gotta keep pushing so it never slows down. Because if you can move a little faster than the ball, then you can build momentum as you push it. And that’s when things really get crazy.
How to Get ahead of 99% of People (in 3 Months)
So I spent an inordinate amount of time creating a PDF outlining my strategy for getting ahead of 99% of people (in 3 months). It’s a 12-week productivity system that I’ve been using for about a year now.
I hope you find it helpful.
Here’s a free downloadable PDF of the system:
I will probably create future editions of this based on updates/changes I make to my own system, so feel free to leave a comment making suggested changes.
the false promise of new habits
Whenever I create a new set of habits, I get overwhelmed with a sense of motivation and optimism.
Unfortunately, this feeling is largely bullshit, and ultimately unhelpful.
It feels helpful at first - who doesn't like feeling motivated and optimistic? But the problem occurs after a few days, when life kicks in and things get in the way.
Maybe you miss a couple habits. You fall off the wagon a little. All of a sudden you feel less optimistic, and therefore less motivated. It feels hard. It feels like things will never get better.
See, the trick to good lifestyle design is to pick a habit stack that you can largely sustain even when you feel UNMOTIVATED and PESSIMISTIC.
Those moments when you feel on top of the world are the exception, not the rule. Habits that can only be sustained during periods of emotional exuberance are habits that will not be maintained.
Think about the days when you feel like absolute garbage - what positive habits do you think you could maintain even on those days? Start there.
Twilight Breakthroughs
Sometimes I can sit at the computer for hours and still produce zero good ideas. But I lay in bed for 30 goddamn seconds and all the juice starts flowing.
What's that about?
There's gotta be some psychology behind that. I seem to get the best ideas either in bed, in the shower, or when I'm on a walk. The computer is good for executing and refining them, but definitely not for breakthroughs.
I wish I could better take advantage of this fact. But I also don't wanna turn my bed into a workstation.
Or do I? Maybe I'm a bed person and that's all there is to it. Common wisdom dictates that you should keep your work and sleep areas separate, but is that really working for people? And what if some of my work feels more like play? Does that change what's allowed in bed?
If I'm allowed to physically fool around in bed (wink wink), why can't I mentally fool around too?
the long way is the short way
Humans are inherently present-biased, and it's one of our primary weaknesses.
I strive to be future-biased, but it doesn't come easy. See, it's always easier right NOW to do the thing that feels easy NOW. Even though you'll probably regret it later.
One of the ways I'm combatting this bias is by learning new skills that have a steep learning curve, and sticking with them.
I'm currently learning Blender and Unreal Engine, which are 3D modeling programs that can be used for animation and game building. As a video editor, I think these would be incredibly useful skills to develop and hone over the next ten years, and they'll not only allow me to elevate my own passion projects, but they'll also make me a whole lot more valuable in a marketplace that's increasingly competitive.
But did you notice what I said? This is something that I plan on mastering over the next TEN YEARS. That's a long time… right? WRONG.
There's an old maxim that seems appropriate here: “Most people overestimate what they can accomplish in a year, but underestimate what they can do in ten.”
My whole point here is simple - your present actions compound over time to determine your future. So start moving in the right direction, and just be steady and consistent. Slow is okay. But keep going.
recent archaeology
Have you ever randomly searched someone you used to know and found a string of abandoned webpages they used to use?
It's like a digital archaeological dig.
Old Instagram accounts for a band they were in for five minutes, a YouTube channel where they posted six yoga videos eight years ago, or a blog with four random posts with no discernible theme.
Wouldn't it be funny if that's what this was?
new school year
It occurred to me today that it's a new school year this month.
Being that I'm almost 30 years old, my mind has been completely rewired to think of January as the beginning of the new year. But when I was in school, January always felt like the midpoint. The only new thing being that the year had changed and you were gonna keep accidentally writing last year's date on all your homework for the next six weeks.
September was when everything changed. New teacher, new classmates, new haircut, sometimes even a new school - it was a big deal.
So despite being a 28-year-old school-hating fiend, I sort of miss the hard reset that September afforded me. It was refreshing. Fun. A little tittilating, and always scary.
So that's how I'm designing this September for myself. I'm making new year's resolutions starting now. Not waiting until January. It's too cold then anyway and everyone's got seasonal affective disorder. Best to strike while the iron's hot and we've got some sunshine in our blood and the summer lofi’s still playing in the background.
hello world
This is my first blog post. It is essentially just a test. If you are visiting this website for whatever reason, please do not read this post. Feel free to read any others. This specific blog post is purely confidential and I don’t want any of you to read it.
Please stop.