Yesterday I was forwarded a bunch of messages that Prof. Ben Zhao (a computer science professor A full professor with tenure, so I feel entirely within my rights to call him out here. at the University of Chicago) wrote about me on a public Discord server with 15,000 members, including this gem: Now…

You want to order from a local restaurant, but you need to download a third-party delivery app, even though you plan to pick it up yourself. The prices and menu on the app are different to what you saw in the window. When you download a second app the prices are different again. You ring the…

Paul Graham wrote a 12,000-word mega essay on how to do great work but the essence of it is a small paragraph near the end: Curiosity is the best guide. Your curiosity never lies, and it knows more than you do about what’s worth paying attention to. This is an incredibly underrated observation. To…

Here’s Dave Rupert (from my notes): the goal of a book isn’t to get to the last page, it’s to expand your thinking. I have to constantly remind myself of this. Especially in an environment that prioritizes optimizing and maximizing personal productivity, where it seems if you can’t measure (let…

It has been about a year and a half of working three days a week in response to burnout. It took me six months to regain the ability to do anything beyond resting the moment I was done working, and in the past year I have recovered much of my ability to function, though not necessarily in the sense…

About the Episode Do you worry that you might be wasting your life? That you’re doing things that don’t feel important? Are you constantly anxious about your to-do list? Is your mind blown that it’s 2024 already?!? This week, I’ve enlisted the help of my friend Oliver Burkeman, author of the…