STRAT_TRAPS_v159
Stray Thought
Last weekend was my birthday weekend. To celebrate, I found an uninhabited island on airbnb1
I went fishing, sat in a camping chair while doing nothing, and tried to sleep in a hammock for three days.
Honestly, I can’t remember the last time I was able to sit in a chair and realize there was nothing I was supposed to be doing other than what I felt like in the moment.
Coming back to the real world (or, I’d argue, leaving the real world and coming back to the manufactured one), my brain felt awake and more engaged. I was lighter. And I ended up writing a lot of quick notes in my “strategy thoughts to maybe include in newsletter” notebook.
So, two things:
You should spend some time alone. (more on this later)
You should expect this volume of the newsletter to be extra heady and driven by quick fire provocations initially scribbled on a tiny page.
But first, the weather:
I have no idea what I searched to generate this result, but I found it in my screenshots.
TL;DR: the weather is bad.
The importance of regular exposure. And being honest.
Coming to the end of a longer term contract and been thinking about the nature of generating business. The obvious starting point for the thought was how longer term contracts can be hard on your personal top of mind awareness among potential future clients. But I send a weekly newsletter. And yet, during the past 6 months of this project, my inbox has been far more quiet than I grew to expect last year.
Then I started mentioning that I would have availability soon.
And the emails came in.
So… you need to remind people you exist, sure.
But you also need to tell the world you are available. Plenty of people have told me the opposite (sorry mom). But if you are good at what you do, people assume you’re busy unless you say otherwise.
This isn’t just for work. Adult friendships suffer because they have less time for exposure to one another.
Wealthy people have more friends because they can afford the expense and time to see one another.
Parents end up making new parent friends because they see each other everyday at drop off or pick up.
Be intentional about your exposure and be honest with your status.
The prolific Rob Estreitinho dropped a thought on LinkedIn re; undervalued Strat skills. I commented and Avery Harrison thought it was worth words than a quick comment. I actually have a lot of thoughts on the matter…
You can’t just be “intelligent” - you’re intelligent at something.
Listening with empathy is a type of intelligence.
As is “memorization” or “good at math.”
intelligence is being adept at navigating something in the outside world. History facts, reading people, details, big picture, interpersonal/relationships etc. all things that are notable not about you, but you navigating something outside your internal experience.
Here’s the thing tho. Intelligence is the first step. Understanding how to interact with the world was programmed into us a long time ago.
The fun begins when you start to become perceptive about how the world works regardless of your presence.
Then – and this circles back to the top of this email – the next level of understanding comes when you look internally. Who are you and why? Who are you when there are no external pressures or influences. Are you comfortable spending time inside yourself rather than out?
Nothing of value to this thought, but it keeps popping into my head…
I want to make a version of the hero’s journey visual, but adapted for a painfully boring story of the average day.
The hero’s journey of monotony
The mono myth of the mundane
“modularity is inversely correlated to expressiveness”
I found this note in my collection of thoughts and have no idea what it is from. I am not even sure I 100% agree.
Kind of depends on the context of “modularity” and “expressiveness” I suppose.
Calm Lunacy
also
unhinged low stakes
Reasoning forwards vs reasoning backwards… if this is true, what will happen vs if this has happened , what must be true
memory taxidermy
When you know the names of different types of trees, you look at the trees more. Knowledge a product of knowledge.
Stomp rockets are a great way to meet your neighbors.
Not sure what the metaphor there is, but I know there is one.
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A while back I toyed with the idea of doing these newsletters in google slides. that way I could link back to prior volumes, etc. Still considering it, but havent pulled the trigger. Here is an abandoned draft of a volume from a few weeks ago.
bye.
(part of me hates that, but it was worth suspending my beliefs around land access).