August Progress Report

“How you spend your time is how you spend your life.”

OBJECT LEVEL (what did I do?)

Self-feedback:

August felt like a month of healing and rejuvenation, especially being back at home with family.

You may have noticed that this progress report is a bit late; it feels good to write it right now, a feeling of “I want to” rather than “I should”. I’m treating writing these as a mix of inspiration and discipline.

Here’s where I’m at for goals:

Previous goals:

• Writing: transferring posts to blog
• Video: 4 videos
• Dance: stretch + workout 4x a week

How I did:

• Writing: semi-check. I have a main theme for the future blog with posts planned out from a marketing perspective. However, from an internal compass perspective, I’m exploring a lot of topics right now, so waiting a bit longer to narrow down the focus. This will likely be put on the side for the next few months
• Video: 1/4th check. So I overestimated the amount of time I would spend on videos versus hanging out with my little brother. At this point moving forward, I think it can be a given that I’ll make 2 videos per month: a recap one and a creative one
• Dance: 1/8th check. Again, severely underestimated my workout motivation, defaulting to weekly tennis games and leisure evening strolls at home

I think it’s a great outline in terms of planning for my week. For example, my routine consists of morning writing, work, evening videos or additional projects, stretching + core/arms/floorwork, sleep.

Thinking of each day as a menu of options with certain criteria to hit (1 hour of writing every day; 5 hours of videos + 3 hours of workouts every week). This way, it gives me structure as well as flexibility.

Yet holistically, I haven’t figured out what I want to focus on.

I don’t have specific writing goals other than to document my learnings. Nor videos goals other than to document life (and get better at Premiere Pro as a byproduct). And for dance, I enjoy being good at something, but don’t have higher aspirations than that. These are the things I care about and want in my life, more of grounding stones I think, rather than something that’s shooting for the sky.

But perhaps, I need that foundation first as a ground and fuel, before I can shoot off a rocket.

And another question to ask:

What is the 80 that would make the 20 right now?

Right now, the main focus is instructional design. So I’m thinking about what things should stay constant and what things can evolve to fit that need.

For example, some of the morning writings can be spent on scripts and storyboards (I’ll experiment with work writing vs. creative writing to see what amounts feel good). Some of the weekly 5 hour video time can be spent on learning and making Captivate videos. And working out is good for health in general:)

August’s Typing project

• I made halfway progress. I noticed that if I didn’t practice for one or two days, I would revert back to my old habits of typing haphazardly. This was great practice and definitely the type (haha) of project that I would want to pick up again

Insightful posts:

A game on trust:

“Game theory has show us the three things we need for the evolution of trust”

1. Repeat interactions (trust keeps a relationship going but you need the knowledge of possible future repeat interactions before trust can evolve)
2. Possible win-wins (you must be playing a non-zero sum game, a game where it’s at least possible that both players can be better off — a win win
3. Low miscommunication (if the level of miscommunication is too high, trust breaks down. But when there’s a little bit of miscommunication, it pays to be more forgiving)

If there’s one big takeaway from all of game theory, it’s this: What the game is, defines what the players do. We are each others’ environment. In the short run, the game defines the players. But in the long run, it’s us players who define the game. So, do what you can do, to create the conditions necessary to evolve trust.

p.s. how to make a similar explorable game: http://explorabl.es/

Growing blog to 100k+ visitors:

• only publish if it’s going to be the best piece of content on that topic on the internet (when others read it, they know its of a certain standard and strategy). If it’s not the best in your field, how can you get there?

→ Find the best blogs in whatever market you’re trying to dominate, assess what they’re doing well, and then see where you can emulate them or do better.

• create rabbit holes: If it’s related to your niche, that’s an article that you should write for your own site, and do a better job with than guest posting
• Write one, massive, cornerstone article on the benefit you want to provide your audience, and then use that article to inspire the other articles you need.
• spend 80% of your time on creating the best articles online (principle #1), and the last 20% on getting them in people’s hands.
• Since you’re going to be SEO driven, articles you publish should start to rank over time: give it 2–3 months
• Pick ONE acquisition focus, ONE retention channel, and ONE engagement channel.

How to tell the truth:

• there is a difference between honesty and the truth: How is it possible that everybody believes that they are honest yet has a difficult time identifying anyone else with the same characteristics? Are we all so dishonest that we are lying to ourselves?
• “If I trust you completely, then I require no explanation or communication of your actions whatsoever, because I know that whatever you are doing is in my best interests. On the other hand, if I don’t trust you at all, then no amount of talking, explaining or reasoning will have any effect on me, because I do not trust that you are telling me the truth.”

Learning on steroids:

• The Feynman Technique: choose your concept, pretend you’re teaching the concept to a new student, whenever you get stuck go back to the book, simplify and create analogies

What a personal masters could look like:

• Learning toolkit: books, courses, forms of idea exposure (TED, podcast, in person), apps (evernote, duolingo)
• Best way to leverage all the learning resources: having the will to learn, structuring a learning plan, building in learning times to our day, determining which technologies / formats of learning works best for you, documenting learning
• A personal masters example: communication skills, MBA lite, innovations in edtech, city-building, future of retail
• Parting questions: focus, tracking progress, documenting learning

Gamification: Octalysis framework

• Gamification is a design process that places the most emphasis on human motivation vs. most systems are “function-focused,” designed to get the job done quickly.
• However, Human-Focused Design remembers that people in a system have feelings, insecurities, and reasons why they want or do not want to do certain things, and therefore optimizes for their feelings, motivations, and engagement.
• Games have no other purpose than to please the individual playing them. Yes, there are often “objectives” in games, such as killing a dragon or saving the princess, and sometimes saving a dragon, but those are all excuses to simply keep the player happily entertained.
• Games are fun because it appeals to certain Core Drives that motivate us, some in empowering ways, some in manipulative ways.

8 core drives of gamification:

• epic meaning + calling
• development + accomplishment (challenges + badges / leaderboards)
• empowerment of creativity + feedback (legos)
• ownership + possession (virtual goods)
• social influences + relatedness (mentorship / companionship + competition)
• scarcity + impatience (appt. dynamics — come back in 2 hours)
• unpredictability + curiosity (sweepstakes)
• loss + avoidance (losing previous work if quit)

Books read:

• The Defining Decade
• Education of Millionaires
• The Little Book of Letting Go

PROCESS LEVEL (how did I do it?)

Belief updates:

• Work flexibility: I realized what a big deal it was to be able to structure my day. Especially according to energy levels, and who I was with. For example, being at home gave me the spaciousness to get so much done, both professional and personally because it provided me with more control over my time

META LEVEL (why did I do it?)

• Taking actions half out of choice and half out of obligation (“this has always been the way it’s been done”)

Goals for next month:

• I know it will take me a while to get back in the groove of things, so holding off specific goals for now
• Broader picture-wise, how can I recreate the type of spaciousness and productivity that I felt at home?

Monthly project:

• Start reaching out to people again, this time specifically in instructional design

Thanks for reading! This is #7 of my monthly progress reports. You can check out the previous one here:

July Progress Report