Writer exploring culture, technology, life design, and the human experience. Writing at BarryFralick.com
Sunday Notes 3/10/24
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Greetings from Upstate, NY. Here are this week's notes. From me: On talent I don't think I've ever been talented at anything, and I'm not sure it matters. I played baseball as a kid. I was neither talented nor athletic. To get moderately good, I had to practice more than other kids. Like way more. I would practice nearly every day during the spring and summer. As an adult, I've been on many different career trajectories each requiring different skills that I eventually got good at, but again, I wasn't talented. I just worked really hard at learning, improvising, and figuring things out like my life depended on it. Because of this, I think you can get quite good at many things. You just have to work harder than your talented counterpart. In fact, I would say that most people could be considered good or even very good at almost any reasonable skill. Whether it be cooking, painting, or playing chess, it's a matter of putting in a vast amount of time and practice. Talent is overrated because it's easy to take for granted and squander. Whereas the person who feels like they have none possesses a deep understanding that the only way to get good is by exerting massive amounts of effort for months and years. Competence is a product of repetition. It is not always a precursor for being good or great. It is the result of being bad, then a tiny bit better, over and over. -- Life Design: Via Nat Eliason, This Moment is Your Life is an excellent read. -- A quote: For night owls At night, when the objective world has slunk back into its cavern and left dreamers to their own, there come inspirations and capabilities impossible at any less magical and quiet hour.
― H.P. Lovecraft
-- Random notes: From David Foster Wallace On loneliness: Lonely people tend, rather, to be lonely because they decline to bear the psychic costs of being around other humans. They are allergic to people. People affect them too strongly.
― David Foster Wallace
And adulation: If you worship money and things — if they are where you tap real meaning in life — then you will never have enough. Never feel you have enough. It’s the truth. Worship your own body and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly, and when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally plant you. On one level, we all know this stuff already — it’s been codified as myths, proverbs, clichés, bromides, epigrams, parables: the skeleton of every great story. The trick is keeping the truth up-front in daily consciousness. Worship power — you will feel weak and afraid, and you will need ever more power over others to keep the fear at bay. Worship your intellect, being seen as smart — you will end up feeling stupid, a fraud, always on the verge of being found out. And so on.
― David Foster Wallace
-- From Medium: I Am Not Dead is a short confession written by yours truly. I won't lie, I was hesitant to publish this as I don't think it's some of my best work and a twee bit personal but, as always, you be the judge. -- Simplicity: in praise of slowing down Depth rather than breadth. In a world that is increasingly accelerating — social media eyeballs and immediate gratification and a pressure to live a saturated, intense, rapid life — slowing down might be the greatest antidote and meaningful rebellion. -- Lastly, a question: What is something that would make you feel more cozy? That is it for this week's edition. TTYS Barry |
Barry Fralick
Writer exploring culture, technology, life design, and the human experience. Writing at BarryFralick.com
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