Author: alearningaday

We caught up with a few friends over the weekend. One of them is based in Germany and was sharing his excited about 100% normalcy starting next week.

After reopening restaurants and bars a few weeks ago, offices started with work on alternate weeks. As new COVID-19 cases have slowed to a bare minimum, they’re now ready for offices to reopen completely starting next week.

It blew my mind.

I found myself wondering if we’d experience that 12 months from now in the US (optimistic case).

Then, I saw an excellent thread by Andy Slavitt – a former Federal government Healthcare head.

COVID Update July 26: We can virtually eliminate the virus any time we decide to. 1/

— Andy Slavitt @ 🏡 (@ASlavitt) July 26, 2020

He makes the case I’ve been attempting to make over the past weeks in my COVID-19 updates (he just does it 1000x more articulately).

(1) We are 6-8 weeks away from getting to where many countries who experienced bad outbreaks are.

(2) For these 6-8 weeks, we’d need to commit to a) universal mask wearing, b) all hot spots closed (bars, restaurants, etc.), c) prohibit interstate travel or travel into the country, d) enable families with symptoms to isolate in hotels, e) 90% lockdown

(3) We’d need unemployment insurance, will have a rough few weeks (albeit with the ability to enjoy the outdoors). BUT, we’d experience exponential decay and will see new cases become a trickle within 6-8 weeks.

(4) The blessed economy could then restart. We could test aggressively and experience the sort of normal so many countries are already beginning to experience. The risk wouldn’t completely go away without a vaccine but we’d reduce the stress on our healthcare professionals, ensure employers can begin hiring again, and can deal with the occasional outbreak as it pops up.

In his thread, he says “lets not pretend this isn’t an option.”

Another way to say the same thing would be to say – “There’s a fucking playbook out there. Let’s just follow it and prevent thousands more from dying.”

We were in conversation about a few moments today.

Being present with thousands of people singing as one.

Memories from a wonderful two week trip with people we loved.

Cheering for a team along with tens of thousands of people.

All these moments are special because of a feeling of one-ness among large groups of people. We’ve felt it – in concerts, in prayer, in events, on holidays, and in a sports game.

I miss those moments. And, I’m going to appreciate them a lot once we’re able to experience them again.

The turning point in the Kung Fu Panda movie is when Po (the panda) and Master Shifu realize that there is no point expecting him to be like all of the other fighters.

Po was fat and perennially thinking about food.

And, it turned out that all they needed to do is create a training regime that involved using food as motivation.

I’ve seen parents, teachers, and managers attempt to use comparisons to motivate others. While it works sometimes (in the short run at any rate), these comparisons are blunt tools. They encourage folks to attempt to “be like others.”

The magic happens when we learn to work with our own unique cocktail of strengths, weaknesses, and motivations instead.

Much like Po.

The less permanence we attach to positive or negative events, the more peace we find.

Dan Heath shared an interesting case study about city of Chicago’s quest to reduce the use of single use plastic bags.

The city council started with a ban on single use plastics. But, they soon realized that this was not having the intended effect. To ensure carbon neutrality, citizens would need to use a paper bag at least thrice or a cotton bag 130 times to ensure the trade-off made sense.

They didn’t.

The city council then replaced it with a 7% tax on all paper and plastic checkout bags that started in early 2017. A research team lead by economist Tatiana Homonoff found that the use of single use plastic bags went down from 80% to 50%.

As shoppers had to make a more conscious choice, many either skipped using a bag altogether or made a conscious effort to use their own.

I thought this story was fascinating for three reasons. First, it reiterates the idea that there are no solutions – only trade-offs.

Second, I love the approach the Chicago City Council took. I wish there was a central repository for city councils all over the world to learn from these experiments.

And, finally, it goes to show how hard it is to get upstream interventions right.

In the first version of my phone’s home screen (~2010), I did my best to fit all my most used apps. I was optimizing for ease and convenience.

In the second version (~2015), I reorganized the home screen based on apps I wanted to use.

In the third version (~2019), I focused on only using half the home screen’s real estate as I embraced more simplicity in every aspect of my life.

As I reflected on the positive effects of increased simplicity in my life during my half yearly reflection two weeks back, I realized it was time for v4.

It is a keeper.

We had a 3 hour power outage in the middle of the night yesterday. It spurred a few reflections. Here are my top 5 –

1) Our first instinct when the power went out was to figure out if it was an issue only in our home. A quick check confirmed our whole neighborhood was affected. The next instinct was to get on Google/check our power authority’s website which, in turn, pointed us to their Twitter feed. Within minutes, the Twitter feed came alive with official updates and reports from folks who saw sparks outside their home (caused by falling branches). It was a wonderful example of what Twitter the product does a great job facilitating.

2) Our sleep was very disturbed for the next 3 hours. And, its effects showed through the day. I’ve written plenty about the effect sleep has on optimism and positivity. And, today was definitely one of those days I held on longer to any negative inputs.

3) As I tossed and turned, I recollected fond memories of frequent middle-of-the-night power outages during a summer two decades back. During these outages, many of our neighbors used to get out onto the road and onto their terraces/rooftops. As sleeping in the sweltering Chennai heat was impossible, this transformed an uncomfortable situation into a fun, communal, gathering.

4) That in turn reminded me of a crazy fact – I can’t remember the last time I experienced a 3 hour power outage. It has definitely been more than a decade. A sign of accumulated privilege I take for granted.

5) In the midst of the outage, we wondered if it’d last long enough to mess with our workday and/or spoil the food in the fridge. It reminded me again of the invisible nature of accumulated privilege (this note made me ponder that some more) – I take so much for granted on a daily basis.

There is so much to be grateful for.

A sure-fire way to ruin happiness in close relationships is to assign permanence to one-time mistakes when sharing feedback (“you always do this”/”you’ve been doing this a lot of late”).

Focus on the situation at hand.

Ignore the baggage.

Don’t transforms dots to lines unless necessary.

“Now I’m going to discuss how we would look for a new law. In general, we look for a new law by the following process. First, we guess it.

Then, we compute– well, don’t laugh, that’s really true. Then we compute the consequences of the guess, to see what, if this is right, if this law that we guessed is right, we see what it would imply. And then we compare those computation results to nature. Or we say, compare to experiment or experience. Compare it directly with observation, to see if it works.

If it disagrees with experiment, it’s wrong. And that simple statement is the key to science. It doesn’t make any difference how beautiful your guess is, it doesn’t make any difference how smart you are, who made the guess, or what his name is. If it disagrees with experiment, it’s wrong. That’s all there is to it.” | Richard Feynman

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Such a simple and beautiful articulation of the scientific method.

It has lots of powerful parallels to building and designing technology products.

Character is the set of mental and moral characters that are unique to a person. And, it shows up as a composite of our daily habits and behaviors.

Every once a while, we have the pleasure of meeting folks with a strong character – the sort that seems to revel in adversity and never lose sight of the importance of doing the right thing.

And, one of the things I’ve learnt about folks with strong characters – nine times out of ten, they experienced a painful failure or loss that made them who they are.

This painful failure or loss isn’t unique to these folks – most people on the planet experience them.

Instead, these folks are unique in their determination to grow from these experience. They use the heat and fire to forge themselves and get made.

So, the next time you encounter someone with unusually strong character and mental strength, just ask them to tell you their story. Look out for a story about a defining failure or loss.

It’ll be a good one.