Latest Dispatches

Jadite 6459 — Sherwin-Williams Duration

This is a true bummer. It was also the primary reason I chose Medium as my article platform of choice. Dang. They have to bring it back or give us something new right?

As you’re looking at my drawing above I want you to think about the theme song from Doogie Howser, just cause I think it has a good vibe, and you know, he was kind of the blog pioneer when you think about it.

This is a really great write up my friend. I am really moved by the examples you brought in.

Have you ever been in a conversation or a debate with someone and had the urge to say “Well, you just need to be right all the time!” Or maybe that’s been said to you? I’m going to posit that it isn’t that anyone needs to be right so much as they need to know they are being clear. That is they need to feel like they are being understood.

“Ikigai is a Japanese concept that means ‘a reason for being’. The word refers to having a direction or purpose in life, that which makes one’s life worthwhile, and towards which an individual takes spontaneous and willing actions giving them satisfaction and a sense of meaning to life.”

In the 10th grade, our world history teacher, Mr. Kaempfer (who was recently made famous by playing a game of wiffle ball with fellow former student Jimmy Kimmel. What?!?🤩), put the same question on every single test we ever had and the answer was a definition we had memorized that we had to get right verbatim or we got it marked wrong. The question was, “What is cultural diffusion?” I’m not 100% sure I still have the right answer. It has been 20 years, but it went something like this: The spreading of cultural traits or characteristics from one group of people or civilization to another.

Cody, that’s just it! They get both sides. That kind of relationship is really important to have.

I was watching a virtual conference today and one of the hosts told a story about a live episode of a video podcast she was recording from home and how while she was recording her dog took a dump on her bed right behind her. That’s when I thought, you know what, if my kids run into the room and say poop while I’m on a call, I’m not going to sweat it. And you know what? That happened today.

From every talk I’ve listened to that begins with the idea that in order to even start to comprehend the contents of the talk, it has to start with a radical shift in mindset and after all of the articles and books I’ve read that talk about mindset, I’ve come to realize that mindset is a punchy way to say attitude.

After a really fun but long and tiring trip to the zoo today, I took a nap. The rest of the day I spent talking about music with my best friend and sharing albums we are listening to.

My first semester of college I took an ethnography class and the first reading assignment was about a people called the Nacirema. The reading described their morning ritual in strange detail. Everything seemed obscure but after the fifth or sixth paragraph something started to sound familiar.

A great thought occurred to me in conversation today. We are pushed to choose a side even when we are not sure if we should. You even learn in college writing classes to choose an argument because writing is weakest when it toes the line. (Here comes my third Hamilton reference in a row) “If you stand for nothing, what will you fall for?”

The most powerful line in Hamilton is during Leslie Odam Jr.’s singing of Wait For It. The line goes, “I am the one thing in life I can control/I am inimitable, I am an original.” The truth and self-belief in the way he delivers that one line makes the show.

I’ve had a personal wrestle with money for most of my life. Sometimes it’s been good. Sometimes it’s been bad. I’ve learned more hard lessons with money that easy lessons.