
A shorter brain dump awaits you this week, dear reader. It’s been sort of a hectic week in terms of project backlog, so I haven’t had a chance to really reflect on things as much as I would have liked. But alas, understanding to myself that a butt load of content each week is unsustainable. That being said, I still found time to read a bit and reflect on those readings so do enjoy! 😬
Everyone’s Busy, Now What?
So you meet someone, either in person or through reaching out on social media. Great! A connection as been established, a budding friendship’s on the horizon! Also real quick, when did I start writing like this…anyway, I can’t tell you the number of times the phrase “let’s hang or grab coffee” has been followed up by radio silence. Am I upset about it? I mean, not entirely. I think a lot of the time, I end up feeling way more guilty than I should. I must not have been proactive enough, I tell myself. But it’s easy to forget that sometimes it’s not in your control. People are going to miss each other in an attempt to hang out. People get busy. It happens.


The best thing you can do in that situation is just…move on. If it’s going to happen, it’ll happen in the future. And also, if you reach out to someone and they don’t eventually get back to you who cares? You did your part! Sure the nudge here and there might be useful — especially if the other person just forgot. It’s all good though, there are plenty of other people to chat with and get to know.
This Week’s Selection
Re: The Rate of Change #100
Dennis Cortés recently wrote his 100th article on his weekly newsletter (🎉) and had some helpful tips to share when it comes to writing, much less getting started writing. As someone who’s fallen off the wagon multiple times when it comes to setting a habit out of writing, I found this to be honestly really motivating. I can’t tell you the amount of times I’ve had to “pep talk” myself into writing; understanding and seeing that other people potentially struggle from this too is really comforting.
If you don’t already follow his work, I highly recommend it! In his words, we have pretty similar thoughts when it comes to design and…just thoughts in general 😉 He also words things a lot better than I so there’s that.
Some reading insights:
Write about what interests you, not what gets you the clicks. Being able to pour your passion and interests into your writing helps it be a positive and enjoyable experience, rather than a race to popularity.
Put your preference at the top of your priorities, but topics that satisfy what you want to write about and benefit others are a great sweet spot to find.
It’s a marathon, not a sprint. Start writing small and release articles when it makes sense for you, even just once a month to start with.
Re: Deep Work
So I will own up to the fact that I didn’t actually end up reading the book, just the 4-minute summary of it (link in the title). But hey, if the idea here is prioritizing and giving time to actually do work…I’d say I was in the right. Anyway, a friend suggested this to me and although I’m still working to apply these principles in my everyday workflow, it’s been really helpful to slowly inch towards a “no disturbances” mindset.
I’ve since turned off notifications for my Macbook when I’m dedicating on getting a project done. WhatsApp messages from my girlfriend will still grab my attention when I see that red dot, but the couple seconds of attention that get stolen for Slack messages are no longer in the equation. You realize that it really does add up, even if you’re good at multitasking (spoiler: I’m not).
Some reading nuggets:
The bimodal approach: this prioritizes deep work above everything else. You could set a 4–6 hour block each day for deep work…once that block is over, you’re free to do everything else that might be on your plate.
Productive meditation: using your “unproductive” time to do deep thinking. The next time you have some “down time”, in which you do menial tasks, latch on to a big problem, try to see sub-problems of it, break it down and solve it.
Weekly Listens (Spotify Playlist Edition)
Okay so I usually refrain from posting any Spotify embeds in my articles just because of the obscene amount of extra space it has on the page (for no reason)…but I was falling short on my Soundcloud finds. Here we are.
You ever go through new music and think to yourself, “this song’s pretty good but I’m not entirely sure I would continually listen to it?” That’s how I feel with a good number of songs I find in my Discover Weekly. Naturally, I created a playlist folder for ‘em! Based on my listens for this week, the songs here follow more of an electronic vibe but they’re definitely enjoyable!
