A Learning a Day

There’s a principle in UX design I find helpful: the fidelity of a design should match the fidelity of thought.

When you’re still exploring ideas, a low-resolution wireframe is the right tool. A polished mockup, with illustrations and finished copy comes only once the thinking is that far along. The point is to give feedback at the right level, and to set expectations for what people are actually looking at.

One problem I keep seeing with AI in writing workflows is that it breaks this principle by default. It produces polished artifacts that look far more finished than the thinking behind them actually is.

It is worth remembering this principle when we use these tools. Reach for the flashy output when your thinking has genuinely earned that fidelity.

If it hasn’t, start with a few bullets in a doc or a spreadsheet instead. That way everyone in the room knows exactly what level of discussion they’re actually having.

“Why can humans not use their millions of words to simply tell one another what they desire?” | Marcellus the Octopus, Remarkably Bright Creatures

Marcellus has a collection of beautiful observations about humans in this well-told story. This was one of my favorites.

If you picked up your phone to get one specific thing done, and you’ve done it, put it down. And just let your mind wander.

It’s hard at first. The pull to open it back up is strong, to keep scrolling for one more hit, that small comforting feeling of having checked everything there is to check.

Let your mind wander instead.

There’s nothing more you will learn from picking up that phone or that next scroll.

There’s no need to give a long answer if a short one will do.

In the event that you wake up
and find your soul separated from source
and manifest into material form, don’t panic.
Your condition is only temporary.

You have been selected for the opportunity
of human incarnation.

This 3D simulation is designed
to break up the monotony of eternity
by giving you a fully immersive experience
as a distinct ego identity.

Your body will serve
as your physical avatar
as you navigate a dense and dramatic reality.
There will be many distractions
causing you to forget your true nature and origin.
You will experience a range of emotions
from joy to loneliness to despair.

But remember – no matter
what trials and traumas you encounter,
your soul remains perfectly safe.

At times you may feel lost or afraid.
This is totally normal.
If you ever need guidance,
simply slow down your busy mind
and bring your awareness
to the quiet place
inside yourself.

On this planet, nothing is permanent.
People and things will come and go.
You will fall in love and form sentimental attachments
only to lose everything you hold dear.

So cling to nothing too tightly, even yourself,
and when it’s time to let go, let go with grace,
for nothing is owned, only borrowed.

As you walk among
the people on the planet,
try to be a good guest.
Tread lightly. Remember
that you are only visiting.
Don’t make a mess.
Listen more than you speak.
Give more than you take.

Don’t keep your soft heart
locked inside a glass cage,
protected from wear and tear.

You’ll never make it out alive
and time passes quickly.
So come back with some battle scars
and good stories to tell.

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I belatedly discovered James Mccrae’s beautiful poem. It resonated.

“Finally, it is worth cultivating moments in life in which we feel immense satisfaction and happiness divorced from our own success or achievements.

This happens commonly when we find ourselves in a beautiful landscape—the mountains, the sea, a forest. We do not feel the prying, comparing eyes of others, the need to have more attention or to assert ourselves. We are simply in awe of what we see, and it is intensely therapeutic.

This can also occur when we contemplate the immensity of the universe, the uncanny set of circumstances that had to come together for us to be born, the vast reaches of time before us and after us. These are sublime moments, and as far removed from the pettiness and poisons of envy as possible.” | Robert Greene

This resonated.

Bill Perkins, in Die with Zero, makes an observation I keep coming back to: past a basic threshold, optimizing health matters far more to your quality of life than optimizing money.

When health is bad, money is hard to enjoy in any form. Can’t travel. Can’t move without pain. Can’t push yourself physically. When health stops, everything else stops with it.

If life is really about collecting memories, health is the first input.

I’ve heard people say they’ll sleep and rest once they get to some level of success or wealth. That might work.

That might also be a quiet tragedy in the making if all that wealth accumulated was never enjoyed because health got overlooked along the way.

One of the more important lessons you learn over time: whether a choice is good or bad depends entirely on what you’re solving for.

A colleague told me a lovely story recently. His toddler goes through fits of complaining, one thing after another. So they started a ritual: when it happens, they ask him to pause and name one good thing, one thing he’s grateful for.

What they’ve found is that once he starts, it’s easy for him to find a second thing, then a third. The complaining just stops.

It’s a good reminder that we’re all capable of spiraling down a negative path once we get moving on it. And sometimes all it takes to reverse that is interrupting the momentum.

You see the same pattern in professional sports. One team is dominating, then the other team gets a single good moment, and the entire momentum of the game swings.

Applies to our days, and to our lives.

A simple way to make the most of unpleasant experiences: train yourself to respond with “Maybe life is trying to teach me something.”

That idea alone opens the door to what the experience might actually be teaching you.

Almost every unpleasant experience has a lot to offer, if you’re willing to ask.