The Notepod: Recent Episodes
Walter & Francis
We're trying to learn more about videography, podcasting, and learning. We'll try to share the good stuff.
Microwaving another bag of broccoli
That was the 1 habit I wanted to work on.
The rest of the 1-1-1-1-1 pact
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1 habit
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10 pages
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100 reps
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1000 words
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10000 steps Which adds up to 11,111 and maps to
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Habit building
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Reading
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Weightlifting
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Writing
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and Walking Initially I'm aiming for 500 days but I want to do these daily for the rest of my life. Which means the intensity is lower than other challenges you might come across. Which are great, which I've definitely tried and strayed off of.
The PACT idea is from Tiny Experiments. You decide "I will ACTION for DURATION"
It stands for
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Purposeful: it's about the daily behaviors
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Actionable: I know these are doable
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Continuous: I'm going for daily for... hopefully decades
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Trackable
I already do most of these on various days but now I'm trying to be deliberate about getting all of those in every day.
So what's with the broccoli?
- One habit every 21 days?
This is probably Video-idea Driven Development.
I've long wanted to do some kind 10k, 1000, 100, 10 thing but could never figure out how to round out the "1"
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1 minute meditating?
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1 gratitude?
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1 video posted? But last week I realized 1 could be a flexible thing I could use to represent an experiment to try. The 1 also reminds me of the BJ Fogg thing of "Floss 1 tooth":
"Think of it this way: You can keep many tiny plants alive by giving them a few drops of water a day. It’s the same with habits. There are still days when my motivation is unusually low for flossing. On those days, I floss only one tooth."
I want to document this whole thing through vlogs so, yes, I did think this might be a way to make the videos a littttle less repetitive.
I'll be able to align the "1" to some shorter-term goal I have. Right now? Lose some weight. It starts in the kitchen, etc. so I want to eat a bag of broccoli every day.
Why this goal? First, it's not an all-day goal. All-day goals become hard.
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Tracking food every day takes a lot of effort initially and I always fall off.
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Avoiding snacking is another all-day thing
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Avoiding anything as a whole is an all-day thing So with these habits I'll aim to make them things I add to the day and can very clearly say "I'm done"
With the broccoli I can cook it, eat it, say "I'm done", then feel slight discomfort for 2 hours because I should probably split it into 2 meals.
- We don't have walrus meat so we need to add hard things (10 pages)
Earlier this year I read The Wide Wide Sea by Hampton Sides. It's about Captain James Cook. It was an extremely hard life with not so great food on the ships:
Midshipman George Gilbert had stronger words for walrus flesh. He described the elaborate procedure the men improvised to make the “disgustful” meat palatable. “We let it hang up for one day that the blood might drain from it,” Gilbert wrote. “After that, we towed it overboard for twelve hours, then boiled it for four hours, and the next day cut it into steaks and fried it. And even then it was too rank both in smell and taste to make use of except with plenty of pepper.”
But Captain Cook loved it because of the goal: make maps of the world
He was finally doing what he loved and knew best: serious cartographic fieldwork, on a big scale, in an unfamiliar place. There wasn’t time for laying down much precision—the minute details would have to be filled in by later explorers—but the general idea of Alaska, its outline, was coming into focus.
Anyway, it was a reminder that life can be kind of easy compared to centuries ago. We seek out these hard things because we don't have to hunt for food anymore. Shaan Puri had a great phrase for this sort of content: "toughness influencers"
So anyway. Speaking of books, that's what the 10 represents: 10 pages of reading every day.
I want a daily practice for building back my ability to focus and concentrate. I know I've read consistently in the past. I can do it again. So I'm aiming to read 10 pages a day. A 300 page book every month.
- "Wake up at 5am and work out": James Altucher & Sahil Bloom (100 reps)
It is why the first thing I say, whenever a young person comes to me looking for life advice, they're feeling lost is wake up at 5am and go work out for 30 straight days.
That's Sahil Bloom, author of The 5 Types of Wealth, on the James Altucher podcast.
I've worked out regularly for more than a decade. But you wouldn't be able to tell!
I've spun my tires for too long. As mentioned I want to lose some weight and I've bought into weightlifting being an important part of that.
I did sort of shoehorn it into the "100" here because I wanted weights to be a part of this. It sort of works:
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100 kettlebell swings is 100 reps
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5x5 w/ warmup sets is around 100 reps
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100 burpees in a hotel room 100 reps is flexible.
I am not. So maybe I need a 100-rep mobility routine.
- Amplify patterns (1000 words)
The 1000 is for 1000 words and it's a writing habit. Good things seem to happen creatively during periods where I'm writing regularly.
From, Tiny Habits, Anne-Laure Le Cunff talks about amplifying existing activities:
Finally, for activities that are already part of your life but which you wish to engage in more regularly, a three-month pact helps reinforce and amplify patterns so you can collect better quality data to guide your journey. Incidentally, three months is roughly the length of the #100DaysofCode challenge and my own challenge of writing 100 articles in 100 workdays at Ness Labs.
She amplified things with 100 articles in 100 work days.
I already write daily in private. These are just journal entries or notes on my info diet. I don't know if journal is the right word either. Anyway I write in Obsidian or Google Docs or Evernote or whatever app I'm using at the time is. Many days are already 1000+ words.
I want to amplify it by measuring it and steering the writing more to writing I'll publish. Scripts for these videos or for Shorts or for blog posts.
Daily writing is great in so many ways so I want to keep it up.
- Distract the distraction with another distraction (10,000 steps)
10,000 is for steps. You've probably heard of walking 10,000 steps as a goal already. You might have paced around the room trying to get 100 more steps before trying to do this sort of thing.
Walking is good for mind and body so I want to have that as a habit. I also can't do 10,000 reps weightlifting or read 10,000 pages in a day. I might be able to blab into a microphone all day to write 10,000 useless words.
One thing I really want to use walking for is to relieve stress.
In The Comfort Crisis, Michael Easter writes about Dr. Trevor Kashey suggesting he replace food as a reward with light exercise.
He recommended that I distract the discomfort of reward hunger with another form of discomfort: light exercise. “Find some ‘calorie negative’ ways of dealing with stress,” he said. “Walking is my number one. It relieves more stress and is health promoting. It leads you to burn calories rather than onboard them. And it removes you from the situation and adds time for reflection, where you can realize that you weren’t really hungry.”
Walking is the greatest thing to pair other things with.
I have a treadmill desk set up. If I use it and just brain rot with the laptop, I still don't feel as bad as I would have if I was melted on the couch doing the same.
But usually I do find myself actually reading and writing when I'm on the treadmill. I can type totally fine.
10,000 steps is also a nudge to get outdoors.
All 5 of the things in this 1-10-100-1000-10000 plan are daily nudges toward something broader in the long term. I'll do another video on that later. Like, subscribe, but most important: get your reading/writing/walking/lifting in!
Thanks for checking this out.
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit activerecall.substack.com
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit activerecall.substack.com
A content diet review to start the new year. Aiming for weekly but we’ll see! Trying to get back into podcasting by focusing on audio-only. Also check out my latest Shorts.
(1) Journey to Michelin chef
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YouTube: h woo “i think i want to be a michelin star cook”
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Book: “Show Your Work” by Austin Kleon
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YouTube: Sam Sulek
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YouTube: Matt Choi
(2) Fourth Wing → The one thing... do they need to kill so many people?
“There is nothing more sacred than the Archives. Even temples can be rebuilt, but books cannot be rewritten.”
- Amazon: “Fourth Wing” by Rebecca Yarros
(3) Shogun → If you like Last Samurai and 1000-page books...
"The Emperor and the entire Imperial Court were kept completely isolated in walled palaces and gardens in the small enclave at Kyoto, most times in penury, and their activities perpetually confined to observing the rituals of Shinto, the ancient animistic religion of Japan, and to intellectual pursuits such as calligraphy, painting, philosophy, and poetry."
- Amazon: “Shogun” by James Clavell
(4) Feel Good Productivity → What if this were fun?
"What would this look like if it were fun? I stuck the note to my computer monitor and went to sleep."
- Amazon: “Feel Good Productivity” by Ali Abdaal
(5) Predator → “Last Action Heroes”
Mac: [to Blain's corpse] Here we are again, bro... Just you and me. Same kind of moon, same kind of jungle. Real number 10, remember? Whole platoon, 32 men chopped into meat... We walk out, just you and me, nobody else. Right on top, huh? Not a scratch... Not a f**n' scratch. You know, who ever got you, they'll come back again. And when he does, I'm gonna cut your name right into him... I'm gonna cut your name into him!
- Amazon: “Last Action Heroes” by Nick de Semlyen
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit activerecall.substack.com
Sharing some takeaways from “Same as Ever” by Morgan Housel and how they connect to the NBA from a casual watcher.
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Best Story Wins: MVP narratives
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Wild Numbers: Why watch games when you can watch highlights for an hour
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Calm Plants the Seeds for Crazy: Load balancing plants the seeds for the In-Season Tournament
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Does Not Compute: You miss 27 straight 3-pointers on hardwood, not on a spreadsheet
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Too Much, Too Soon, Too Fast: Cars, clothes, and the 2008 crash
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit activerecall.substack.com
I moved all the episodes and the feed to Substack! We’ll see how this goes.
On this week’s episode, I recorded in the car and tried to come up with some creativity takeaways from “Demon 79”
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No one likes the horns look, what do you want me to look like? (Share those guilty pleasures!)
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Use a list! (When you have to eat a frog, procrastinate with murder)
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Demon vision to find bad people (You don’t always see the hard work)
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“You’re a basher” (Find your format)
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Resistance shows up (right after you’ve run the politician off the road)
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit activerecall.substack.com
Notes on the podcasts I listened to recently
Not Investment Advice: "George Mack: Ignored Ideas, Creativity Hacks, Game Psychology, US vs. UK & Finding The Right Metrics"
David Perell: "Kevin Kelly: On Fame, Structuring Ideas, Writing Books, and Founding Wired Magazine"
Deep Questions with Cal Newport: "Ep. 263: Overhaul Your Life"
The Ryen Russillo Podcast: "Russillo on the Road: Spain Travelogue"
The Game w/ Alex Hormozi: "Hormozi Life Hacks You Need To Hear | Ep 605"
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit activerecall.substack.com
I talk about my coffee/gym/dinner routines when living in 3 different apartments in New York.
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Consistency: Indie Hackers #267: The Path to $3M in 3 Years as a Solopreneur with Justin Welsh
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Classics: Ray Dalio: Principles
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Crane Kicks: "Fat Loss Happens on Monday" by Josh Hillis and Dan John
Applying principles from Morgan Housel's "The Psychology of Money" to my own fitness journey.
Applying principles from Morgan Housel's "The Psychology of Money" to my own fitness journey.
Applying principles from Morgan Housel's "The Psychology of Money" to my own fitness journey
Applying principles from Morgan Housel's "The Psychology of Money" to my own fitness journey.
Applying principles from Morgan Housel's "The Psychology of Money" to my own fitness journey.
Applying principles from Morgan Housel's "The Psychology of Money" to my own fitness journey.
Taking some of the finance principles from "The Psychology of Money" and applying them to fitness as I try to finally lose that 10 pounds
Still a solo episode. Sharing some book notes from the last few books that I read.
- "The Nineties" by Chuck Losterman
- "Fat, Crazy, and Tired" by Van Lathan
- "Plays Well With Others" by Eric Barker
- "Building a Second Brain" by Tiago Forte
Books mentioned:
- "Psychology of Money" by Morgan Housel
- "Jony Ive" by Leander Kahney
- "Stolen Focus" by Johann Hari
Talking about
- "NITRO: The Incredible Rise and Inevitable Collapse of Ted Turner's WCW" by Guy Evans
- "The Nineties" by Chuck Klosterman
- "The Daily Laws: 366 Meditations on Power, Seduction, Mastery, Strategy, and Human Nature" by Robert Greene
Super Bowl
- nWo-esque Paul Mitchell ad
- 1995 Super Bowl halftime with Indiana Jones
Books mentioned: "Now You See It and Other Essays on Design" by Michael Bierut "Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals" by Oliver Burkeman
"How the Internet Happened: From Netscape to the iPhone" by Brian McCullough
"How to Read a Book" by Mortimer J. Adler
Book notes for
- Breathe by Rickson Gracie
- The Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson and Lord William Rees-Mogg
- The Extended Mind by Annie Murphy Paul
- Winning by Tim S. Grover
- The Gap and the Gain by Benjamin Hardy and Dan Sullivan
- Dune by Frank Herbert
Back with some lessons from NYC Food Spots. Based on these three posts from the blog that I wrote in August.
Creator lessons from NYC food: Very Fresh Noodles
Creator lessons from NYC food: Katz’s
Creator lessons from NYC food: Xi’an Famous Foods
Breaking down the principles of generalism from Pat Flynn's "How to be Better at Almost Everything"
Just finished reading "Arnold: The Education of a Bodybuilder"
3 mental tools:
- Loops: Open for curiosity, Close for focus
- Friction: Add for bad habits, Remove for good habits
- Level Changes: Up/Down for learning and teaching, Left/Right for creativity
Talking about:
"Year Book" by Seth Rogen
"A Very Punchable Face" by Colin Jost
Trying something new: book stacks.
Quotes from 3-5 books centered around a single topic. For this one: creativity.
I also talk about the 3x3 practice I've been doing
Books in this episode
- Creativity by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
- Creativity, Inc. by Ed Catmull and Amy Wallace
- Creative Confidence by Tom Kelley & David Kelley
- Principles by Ray Dalio
Other links
- 3x3: https://twitter.com/activerecall/status/1397693640382640129/photo/1
Talking about a few books I read in May
- Effortless by Greg Mckeown
- The Art and Business of Online Writing: How to Beat the Game of Capturing and Keeping Attention by Nicolas Cole
- Soundtracks by Jon Acuff
- The Infinite Machine by Camila Russo
- Musashi by Eiji Yoshikawa
- 21 Lessons: What I've Learned from Falling
- Down the Bitcoin Rabbit Hole by Gigi
- How to Change: The Science of Getting from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be by Katy Milkman
Talking about some new additions to the desk setup as I try to make more videos about drawing and stuff.
Related it to some book notes from
- "Atomic Habits" by James Clear
- "Show Your Work" by Austin Kleon
- "Work Clean" by Dan Charnas
And at the end I mentioned Captain Sinbad's channel
Going through some recently finished and in-progress books.
Just writing out a list of different books I’ve been reading with some thoughts.
Recently finished
- Bitcoin Billionaires by Ben Mezrich — I got more interested in crypto/blockchain through NBA Top Shot and the NFT boom. I had some Bitcoin already, but NFT popularity made me realize how little I know about how it all works. This ended up only having high level explanations of Bitcoin. But the whole story of the Winklevoss twins’ second act was fascinating.
- Almanack of Naval Ravikant by Eric Jorgenson — Great read the week leading up to getting married. There’s plenty about getting wealthy, but the happiness chapters were more timely. The audiobook was my companion on a couple long walks in the city. If you want to mainline some of Naval’s thinking, then this is the way to go.
In-progress
- Musashi by Eiji Yoshikawa — Still working on this. I started it in December and just crossed the halfway mark. About 450 pages to go. Somewhat slow going but getting very interesting now. Good reminder to lean into things I might not enjoy but that I’ll learn a lot from.
- The Infinite Machine by Camila Russo — Continuing to learn mode about crypto/blockchain technology. This book is about the history of Ethereum, which is the main coin involved in the recent NFT a boom. The only history I know of Ethereum is that I wish I had bought some earlier. Just started this but one takeaway is that Vitalik Buterin started by writing for Bitcoin Magazine before building Ethereum.
- Working Backwards by Colin Bryar and Bill Carr — Mostly here to learn about Amazon’s use of narrative writing instead of PowerPoints. (After seeing @TrungTPhan mention it in this thread.)
- The Energy Paradox by Steven R. Gundry — I want to get my energy back. Basically: I can rarely stay awake through a full movie after a workday. And when I’m up I just don’t have any, as the book puts it, get-up-and-go (GUAG). I’ve felt better in the past and would love to get back to that.
- Fast Forward: Hollywood, the Japanese, and the Onslaught of the VCR by James Lardner — Combining some learnings from last year’s books (1) I enjoy reading older books about some recent technology (like Michael Lewis’s Next) because it’s fun to re-live that time without it being filtered through a modern lens and (2) I enjoy reading about Hollywood/filmmaking (one of my favorites from last year was Robert Rodiguez’s Rebel Without a Crew).
Next up (maybe… there’s a ton I want to read)
- Daemon by Daniel Suarez — Continuing the pattern of learning about crypto, I saw this book recommended somewhere. I really should’ve written down where I saw the recommendation because I’ve completely forgot now. Anyway, this is pretty much combining three thoughts: (1) I want to learn more about crypto/blockchain technology and (2) Musashi reminds me that I should read more fiction and (3) I admire Tiago Forte’s thinking and he wrote about the value of reading science fiction.
Tiago: “I started reading sci-fi to pass the time. I had good memories of reading Jurassic Park as a kid. I continued because I noticed that it gave me something: a stronger imagination, a disrespect for the merely possible.” * Two Meals a Day by Mark Sisson — Trying to get my health back in order (I wrote a long post here). I have more information than I need for my goals but reading books does help keep motivation up. And I can try to share good bits and pieces to better frame my own learning and writing. * Soundtracks by Jon Acuff — I enjoyed all his previous books. I’m guessing I’ll like this one as well. I tend to overthink so this seemed like something that might help me either (1) stop overthinking or (2) start overthinking in a more useful way.
Talking through some ideas for future threads aka pulling loose connections between MMA and making things online.
Okay we hit RECORD again finally. Kicking off 2021. We talk about some of our goals
- Fitness goals
- Creation goals
- Personal goal
We'll be making videos in 2021 and sharing our progress as we go.
Just turning the mic on and recording to start to kick the rust off this whole podcasting set up. Let's goooo — talking about moving to SF, the MacBook Air M1, and the Oculus Quest.
We've played a good amount of Magic: The Gathering in our lives so we talked about some life lessons from playing it.
Books mentioned:
- High Output Management by Andy Grove
- A Fighter's Heart by Sam Sheridan
- The Power of Moments by the Heath Bros.
Podcasts mentioned
- Tim Ferriss & Derek Sivers (2015)
[02:09] "We Don't Need Roads" note
[06:51] "Apprenticeship Patterns" note
[10:46] "Every Tool's a Hammer" note
Books we talked about (some Active Recall CLASSICZ)
- "The Obstacle is the Way" by Ryan Holiday
- "Stillness is the Key" by Ryan Holiday
- "Grit" by Angela Duckworth
This week I'm talking about "Hackers and Painters" by Paul Graham.
- "Do Things that Don't Scale" - Paul Graham's essay.
"When you only have a small number of users, you can sometimes get away with doing by hand things that you plan to automate later." * "Revenge of the Nerds" - Paul Graham essay. * That Tim Ferriss & Derek Sivers thing about The Magic of Thinking Big:"And, it’s also one of those books, sorry, but I’m getting defensive. But, it’s one of those books that I read in around 2000, maybe a year or two after college, and I was in a shitty 100-plus hour a week job, where I was sleeping at my desk, and sitting the the fire exit, because that’s the only place they can fit me. But, yeah, it has to catch you at the right time."
Corrections: Messed up Ethan Suplee's name (I said 'Sharplee'). Sorry about that. Check out his episode with Kevin Smith.
This week I'm talking about BJ Fogg's "Tiny Habits".
If you've ever heard the advice of "if you want to build a habit of flossing your teeth, make the habit flossing one tooth", then you've been influenced by some of BJ Fogg's work.
I go over some of the concepts covered in the book and take a look at my habit of checking my phone first thing in the morning (instead of my aspirational goal of working out first thing in the morning).
Some topics
- Aim to do what you already want to do: Read things you enjoy if you're trying to build a reading habit. If you want to read more difficult, dense things, it'll be hard if you aren't already reading regularly in the first place.
- Practice doing the habit: I mentioned a post by Steve Pavlina about practicing waking up. "Tiny Habits" encourages practicing the habit itself a few times in a row. This way, if it's a daily habit, you aren't limited to one rep every day. Practice the entire habit (including the celebration) then do it again.
- Speaking of celebrating, most people aren't good at it: Sometimes we're driven by incentives to stick to a diet. One common example is the cheat meal. You stick to your diet day in and day out and then have the cheat meal (or day) on the weekend. This can be effective but it's more of an incentive rather than a celebration. You can add tiny celebrations immediately after your tiny habit. Fist pump after flossing one tooth. It sounds silly but it'll pour a little bit of concrete on the habit.
[ 0:49 ] An internet recommendation rabbit hole ending with Michael Jackson and Prince and starting from JJ Redick and Bill Simmons (Learn about the Staples Center replica court that a very rich person has in Bel Air)
[ 6:47 ] How do you deal with overplanning?
[ 9:04 ] How many episodes will it take to hit your stride? ("Traffic Secrets" by Russel Brunson)
[ 11:34 ] How do you figure out what your ideal environment is? ("Making of a Manager" by Julie Zhuo)
[ 15:04 ] What's the magic of 120 hours and hard days? ("How to be a Straight A Student" by Cal Newport)
This week, I'm talking about Ben Bergeron's book "Chasing Excellence"
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If you have Netflix and also don't like reading: check out The Redeemed and the Dominant. I watched this midway through and you get some of the behind the scenes.
How do you write an entertaining nonfiction book?
I definitely wanted to keep reading. The narrative is following two of his athletes as they compete in the 2016 CrossFit games. (They both also win.) Each chapter focuses on a characteristic (Commitment, Grit, Positivity…) that's needed to win the games. Then the chapter usually jumps from the present day event back to the months of training in a session where they focused on that movement.
Would you start with someone with above-average talent or someone who’s mentally tough? — The book focus on the mental side of competing at that level. Everyone that makes it to the games is physically world class. Nobody there is perfect.
"Given the choice between coaching an athlete with above-average talent or one who is mentally tough, it might surprise you to hear I’d pick the former. Not because I believe talent is more important, but because I know I can teach someone to be mentally tough."
**As much as I like the idea that you can practice and work hard to become great at something, there are limits in different disciplines.
I always like the simplicity of the NBA comparison. If you want to make it to the NBA, it's better to start with a 6'5" who is mentally weak than someone who is 5' and 10x tougher mentally.
It reminded me of this piece from The Fighter's Mind**
“Mental toughness is learned. It’s not a skill that everyone has, or is born with. There are people that are born tougher than others mentally, or figure things out earlier in their life. But if you have motivation you can acquire mental toughness, it’s just about what your body gets used to putting up with."
Why is it a good thing to get some experience at the top level?
Because you might realize you're already there. The book mentions Mat Fraser not qualifying for the Games earlier in his career:
"At the North East Regional that year, Mat, a former Junior National Weightlifting Champion, did well in events involving moving a barbell, but had obvious holes in his game. He finished fifth overall, two spots out of contention for the Games. Instead of being demoralized, he was heartened—it was his first time interacting with Games-caliber athletes up close, and he walked away thinking, If I work hard and practice, I could beat them."
This reminded me of Mark Hunt's book Born to Fight (which I need to do a Notepod episode on), where he talks about his fight with someone at the top level:
"The bell rang and as I walked back to the corner it occurred to me this prick didn’t even hit that hard – I’d been hit harder than this my whole life. I even managed to drop the dude in the second round with a running leg kick, but as the last seconds of the third and final round ticked away I knew I’d lost on points. In those moments one thought spun around my head over and over again. That was it? The guy couldn’t throw fireballs from his hands or Dragon-Punch twelve feet into the sky or do anything I couldn’t do. If that’s all those guys had, I could get my hands on them. If I could get my hands on them, I could certainly put them to sleep. They weren’t the characters from Dragon Ball Z, and Jérôme wasn’t Super Saiyan"
Have I personally experienced this? Look, no. Not athletically.
But there are definitely those moments in life where you realize someone is human. Or that some group of people is made up of… humans.
Here’s the second episode of The Notepod. This is another book notes episode. Each episode might be about a book. I’m still figuring it out but wanted to get started with consistency.
Which sort of relates to the book this episode is about, “Rebel Without a Crew” by Robert Rodriguez.
We're back (and probably need to stop starting every episode with "we're back for real this time!") talking about Work Clean, one of our favorite books from last year and maybe a top-10 all timer.
Some concepts we talk about from the book
- Daily plan
- Clean as you go
- First actions
Sections
- Start, stop, continue (with the podcast)
- 3 book quotes from some of my favorite books in 2019
- Ranking the books I read in 2019 and a sort of top 10
Active Recall 2019 Reading List
The 10 books I mentioned from 2019
- Awareness: The Perils and Opportunities of Reality
- Alchemy: The Surprising Power of Ideas That Don’t Make Sense
- Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World
- Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?
- Work Clean: The life-changing power of mise-en-place to organize your life, work, and mind
- Liar’s Poker
- Creative Calling
- Recursion
- Stillness is the Key
- The Algebra of Happiness: Notes on the Pursuit of Success, Love, and Meaning
We're talking about "Atomic Habits" by James Clear
Previous episode:
63: "Atomic Habits"
https://activerecall.co/atomic-habits/
We talk about "Finish" by Jon Acuff
https://www.amazon.com/Finish-Give-Yourself-Gift-Done/dp/1591847621
- Great book with tips about finishing work
- I'm good at starting, bad at finishing. I don't usually have writer's block, but I certainly have finisher's block. By that, I mean that I'm able to outline and outline and outline a bunch of ideas. And even get to drafts of things. But then actually finishing the thing and releasing it becomes a challenge.
- We discuss hiding places and noble obstacles. Wally talks about how he can get caught up editing a certain point of a video. But we also discuss that video editing work for a client deserves perfectionism more than something like a blog post does.
- Picking between good and bad is easy, between good and good is hard. This is where it's a noble obstacle. If I want to finish editing and scheduling this podcast, I need to edit and finish these notes. That'd be good. But I'm tempted to just leave and head to the gym, because that's also good. And it also gets me away from the resistance I feel toward finishing these notes.
- One tip to finish: set a timer. We don't talk about this tip specifically, but it's what I'm using to cut the goal down to something that can be finished.
- I create a memory palace room to remember some of the tips: Mr. Perfect cutting food in a kitchen with an invisible cloak on
Our arms still hurt from patting ourselves on the back for returning to the podcast.
- The book of the week is Jon Acuff's "Quitter"
https://www.amazon.com/Quitter-Closing-Between-Your-Dream/dp/0982986270 - It's about passion. We talk about both sides of the 'follow your passion' argument. We are both in a place doing work that we're passionate about. It doesn't mean there aren't parts that don't feel like work. There are also things we're passionate about that we weren't able to turn into careers.
- Here's the best book against the idea of following your passion: Cal Newport's "So Good They Can't Ignore You"
https://www.amazon.com/Good-They-Cant-Ignore-You/dp/1455509124 - We batched a couple episodes. We were going to try to get to 4 episodes. (One for each of Jon Acuff's books: Quitter, Finish, Start, Do Over. We didn't finish all 4 episodes, but we did finish two. So an episode is scheduled next week for Jon Acuff's "Finish".
Okay I set a timer to write these notes and the timer is up. I think this is better than not having notes at all. But I'll set a longer timer next time.
This week I'm sharing some podcast episode recommendations.
00:58 — Petting zoo x Jason Fried (Knowledge Project)
06:26 — Fitness center x Mark Manson (Model Health Show)
15:02 — Moleskine wallpapered room x Alan Sepinwall and Matt Zoller Seitz (The Moment)
21:51 — White room with all your unfinished projects x Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Cranor (Start With This)
28:19 — Driving range with pie x Scott Page (Knowledge Project)
Book(s) of the Week
The Slight Edge
https://www.amazon.com/Slight-Edge-Turning-Disciplines-Happiness/dp/1626340463
The Compound Effecthttps://www.amazon.com/Compound-Effect-Darren-Hardy/dp/159315724X
Book of the week:
"Anything You Can Imagine: Peter Jackson and the Making of Middle-earth" by Ian Nathan
( 03:51 ) Room 1: Kitchen with an orc
( 10:41 ) Room 2: Virtua Fighter 2 Pool Fight
( 21:00 ) Room 3: Matrix and Peter Jackson
Connecting Rounders quotes to the 5Ms
- Morning Pages
- Meditation
- Move slow
- Move fast
- Movies
And a bonus 6th M!
Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World
Memory palace room
- Room 1: Kitchen with a Las Vegas buffet set up
- Room 2: Living room filled with smoke, cigarettes, and your friends
- Room 3: Swimming pool filled with bells, chimes, and broken glass
Ces takes a walk and talks about the book “Making Ideas Happen“
- Making Ideas Happen by Scott Belsky
Talking about This is Marketing by Seth Godin
- Wally's favorite logos
- How do brands go beyond a logo?
- Lightning round with Ces talking about Active Recall's brand
- FEAR and self-help
- Branding for James Harden, Tom Brady, and great white sharks
Links
- Great white shark:
https://www.instagram.com/oceanramsey/p/Bsq-MfTFYpG/ - Seth Godin's blog
- You on Netflix
- Imaginary Worlds: Gathering the Magic
14:02 — Topical three
18:48 — Book of the week intro
21:45 — 4 step to building good habits and breaking bad habits
29:40 — Stop eating bad food, start working out and vlogging
Links
-
Atomic Habits (James Clear, Amazon)
-
Better Than Before (Gretchen Rubin, Amazon)
-
The Power of Habit (Charles Duhigg, Amazon)
(We've been recording but those might stay in the vault for a little bit longer. One of them was an in-person episode with Wally which needs a little more signposting and massaging.)
This week's episode has some things about "The Creative Curve" by Allen Gannett.
We discuss some of the myths in this great post:
- Nat Eliason's "16 Popular Psychology Myths You Probably Still Believe"
I'd still like to believe that forcing myself to smile will make me happy.
We've talked about practice before:
- 32: How to practice (according to games)
- 15: Talkin' about practice (with Jason!)
- 01: Autotelic Exotelic
It's one of our favorite topics but we should probably stop talking about it and start being about it.
We congratulate DC on upgrading from 12 pounds to 24 pounds of UFC championship belt.
Then we express a bit of gratitude that the things we discuss about sacrifice are peanuts compared to what our parents had to give up leaving their homes for different worlds.
Books mentioned
- "Four-Pack Revolution"
- "What Should I Do with My Life"
- "Barking Up the Wrong Tree"
Theme of the week: Questions
Questions are powerful and we discuss questions we use that have been helpful in life.
Spoiler: "What would this look like if it were easy?" makes the cut.
Things we mention:
- "Wait, What?" by James E. Ryan (shorter version in a video)
- Moe Shalizi on Short Story Long
- "Tribe of Mentors" by Tim Ferriss (book)
Going back to one of our favorite books. We're talking about Grit. Some topics: ( • ) The treadmill, Will Smith, and why you should get back on the next day ( • ) Passion + Perseverance ( • ) Flow vs. Deliberate Practice (spoiler: it depends)
Bullets
How's your week?
- Find your flow
- Sketchbook revival
- Draw a Box
- Omega red drawing
- Drawing every day in technical drawing
- Morning trying to run — barbell — kettlebell
- Headspace Nike
- Omega Red
- Jim Lee Twitch Streams
- Wally
- Producer
- Wally's six pack
Minimalism
- Bruce Lee
- Digital files: Used to be good, but pretty terrible now — started working to improve this
- Creative Quest: MP3 library
- Wally: Kind of organized as a kid
- Video folders - 2016, 2017, 2018
- Organized to find videos
- Essentialism
- Minimalism
- The Power of Saying No
- Sushi with coworker
- Matt D'Avella: The Minimalist Filmmaker
- Throwing clothes away
- Minimalist podcast
Essentialism
- Not design aesthetic
- 3 core truths: I choose to, Only a few things matter, I can do anything but not everything
- I can do anything but not everything
- Warren Buffett description
- One kick 10,000 times
- Hardest part: letting go
- Not good with the drone
- Three essentials
- New perspective to say no
- Protecting the essentials
- Protecting the assets: YOU
- Sleep discussion
- Aim for 8 hours
- You know 8 is good for you, but you still end up doing 6
- Trying to have the play time
- If you have 3 kids and working two jobs
- 5-6 hours on good days
- Play is not really there
- Stress is more prominent than with creativity
- 5 minute journal
- I have a notebook
- Story about film photographer and digital photographer
- Mind travel Jeff Bezos
- Draw from your elbow
Chapters
00:11:50 - Learning from Eric Thomas on "The Ed Mylett Show"
00:18:10 - Learning from Ep. 100 of "Short Story Long"
00:37:40 - If you could give 2 seconds of advice...
Links
ED MYLETT SHOW: Eric Thomas - The Hip-Hop Preacher:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjI2P5Bgd-A
Short Story Long #100:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_4oKBnjuRM
Recapping our first 8 episodes in a speed round format (80 seconds each). Podcast recommendations: Short Story Long (w/ Tamara Dhia), Knowledge Project (w/ Barbara Oakley), and Industrial Strength (Joe DeFranco)
( 00:05:38 ) Speed rounds: First 8 episodes
( 00:20:24 ) Q: You can't break necks easy?
( 00:24:38 ) Cool thing #1 : Tamara Dhia (Short Story Long)
( 00:31:46 ) Cool thing #2: Barbara Oakley (Knowledge Project)
( 00:33:42 ) Cool thing #3: Triple H (Industrial Strength)
Links
- The Rock in The Rolling Stone
- Bill Simmons podcast: The Making of the Andre the Giant documentary
- Josh Waitzkin on the Tim Ferriss Show
- The Prodigy Returns
- The Four Burners Theory: The Downside of Work-Life Balance
This week we’re talking about Daniel Pink’s latest book When: The Secrets of Perfect Timing.
If you’ve ever watched one of those whiteboard timelapse videos, there’s a good chance it was inspired in some way by the whiteboard video of Pink’s talk about “Drive”.
- Are you a lark or an owl? (You’re probably a third bird.)
- Are you looking for ways to improve how you schedule things in your day?
- Are you looking for a good time to start something? (If not, you might be looking for a good time to end something.)
When has the answers to these questions.
Thinkers 50 named him one of the top 15 thinkers in the world. He had one of the top 10 most watched TED talks ever. And now upwards of twenty people will read about his book as Active Recall’s BOOK OF THE WEEK.
Get to know yourself (What’s your chronotype?) I took this chronotype questionnaire. Go check it out. It took less than five minutes and asks what times you do certain things and how you feel about certain times. I was a 61 which falls in the moderate-morning category.
An example question: If you had a workout partner that wanted to work out at 10pm, how would your workout go? This was particularly relevant when I took the survey because I did my workout the night before. I don’t usually do night workouts and it was a struggle. And the usual energy boost that leads to a good day instead led to trouble sleeping. That said, I can see getting used to it if I made it a regular thing.
Turn your midpoints into endpoints (And ways to deal with the afternoon trough) You know what an afternoon slump feels like. Whether it’s from that enormous burrito you had for lunch or if it’s just the rhythm of the day, afternoon’s can be a slog. It’s the midpoint of our day and midpoints can have drops in quality. You don’t have the full tank of energy when starting something and you don’t have the motivation of seeing the finish line.
What do you say to a demigod? What if you're stuck answering phones? Does money bring happiness? What (else) brings happiness?
( 00:01:43 ) Xerxes gets insulted and spits back at Leonidas
( 00:07:50 ) Jacoby - What if you're talented but they've got you answering phones?
( 00:18:30 ) Drama - Moe, money, and happiness
( 00:30:00 ) Book of the week: A Guide to the Good Life
(This is Ces.) I forgot I couldn't record with Wally this week so I recorded a solo episode. I tried to talk through some ideas for future gaming life lessons videos.
Wally and Ces try to break into the gaming niche by rambling about games and shoe-horning them into lessons for LIFE.
The ever-changing, ever-evolving format
The theme this week is practice.
We’re tweaking things again. We’re going to try to have one theme going through the entire podcast. I think we had a good thing going a couple episodes ago where we did (1) recommendations, (2) a book of the week, and (3) The Magic Window.
Last week we tried to do that again and it came off a little too random. The book of the week used to tie things together pretty well but we just couldn’t read that many books. Now we’ll try having a theme to tie things together.
We’re going to do recommendations but this time we’ll open it up beyond podcasts to videos or blog posts or whatever. We’re still going to do a book of the week. We’re still going to do The Magic Window. And we’re going to try to tie it to one theme.
Yes, AI, we’re talking about practice
Practice (Recommendations)
I made a bunch of videos last week. A lot of them are about practice. I started to Niche down into gaming life lessons. I’m kind of motivated by this because it’s fun to make. I also think that there’s an audience for it. This is that idea that I would be interested in it so there’s probably other people in the world that would be interested in it.
I’m going to try to make a bunch of these. I made this outline a long long time ago to try and write something very long. I might just try to make a bunch of videos as a rough draft. We keep coming across this connection in different episodes. I made videos about a couple of the ideas that we talked about multiple times. I made a video about the whistle in Mario 3 and how you shouldn’t just skip through the entire middle part to jump to the end or else you’ll miss out on a lot of good things.
These will be my recommendations for the week. I made 3 videos about the models of practice so we can talk about that it. We actually talked about this awhile ago in one of the earlier episodes.
Going to group some of these videos together.
- Street Fighter II: Life Lessons (Models of practice pt. 1 of 3)
- Starcraft: Life Lessons (Models of practice pt. 2 of 3)
- Counter-Strike: Life Lessons (Models of practice pt. 3 of 3)
- Who are you practicing with? (Gaming life lessons)
Book club: The First 20 Hours
Again, the theme is practice. The book this week is actually a book we did an episode on the floor it is called the first 20 hours. We talked about different aspects of that book and that episode. Just talked about the 10 steps of Rapid skill acquisition. Mostly because I made a video about that also.
- Rapid Skill Acquisition (Gaming Life Lessons)
Magic window: Do you remember the first time you practiced something? Were you applying the models of practice?
[ 00:08:20 ] Podcast Recommendations
[ 00:15:35 ] Wally tells a Musashi story (still podcast recommendations)
[ 00:27:30 ] Book of the week: How to Stop Worrying and Start Living
===
Podcast recommendations
- Tim Ferriss podcast: Terry Crews
- Jocko Willink podcast: Tim Ferriss (Musashi)
- MFCEO: One Year From Today: Where Will You Be?
- Joe Rogan #962: Jocko Willink
Book recommendation
- How to Stop Worrying and Start Living
(00:03:20) Resolutions (Podcast recommendations)
(00:19:10) Subtle Art of Not Giving a F- (Book Recommendations)
(00:33:50) Arcade Games (The Magic Window)
(00:47:38) Closing gratitude (Borrowed Segment)
===
We're back! New year, new you! Trying out this format, building on some of the things from late last year (podcast recommendations and the magic window) and the bulk of our first 20 episodes (book of the week).
I'm really enjoying this format. Here are some things we talked about.
Podcast recommendations
- Pat Flynn Show: Dan John on Measuring what Matters
- Jocko Willink #100 with Tim Ferriss
- Art of Manliness: Motivation myth Jeff Haden
Book of the Week: Subtle Art of Not Giving a F-
- Stop caring about unimportant things so that you can focus on the important things
- Maybe being a digital nomad isn't the answer
- Creating things because it's fun for you
The Magic Window: Arcade games
Talking about a couple games we played growing up
- The Simpsons: Is this game overrated?
- Time Crisis 2: How it ties into the 4-minute mile
Thanks for checking it out!
We're talking about Tim Ferriss's latest book, "Tribe of Mentors". We ask each other a few of the questions from the book. If you want better answers from more astounding people, you'll want to check out the book itself.
Check out the "Tribe of Mentors" sample chapter: https://tim.blog/2017/10/03/tribe-of-mentors/
Entirely based on this Rotten Tomatoes interview with Steven Yeun. He talks about The Sandlot being one of his five favorite films because he watched it in that window where you're aged 10-12. Everything is awesome. You don't even know what criticism is. We talk about our favorite things from that age.
There's no book of the week but we do discuss a couple of our favorite books from that time.
No book this week - Instead, we recommend different episodes of podcasts. Each of us recommends 3 podcasts and asks a question or explains a segment that typically comes up in that podcast.
- What is Dungeons & Dragons like?
- What have you learned in the gym that you've been able to apply in life?
- What would you tell your 12-year-old self?
- If this episode were a Saturday morning cartoon character, who would it be?
And many more! (Or two more.)
It's a little different. We should have another book next week. As always, thanks for checking us out!
We opened by talking about UFC 217. We will not niche down to MMA, but we just might start getting down to making videos and vlogging. Wally and I both make videos on our own. They're very different, but the media is roughly the same.
In light of that turn, this week's book is Edit Better by Jeff Bartsch.
We had this idea that we'd take some of the lessons in this video editing book and see how we could turn it into general life advice. Actually, here's the convo where I ran through some ideas with Wally (by "convo" I mean it's me writing paragraph texts):
That text followed the format we had in mind more than this podcast did.
People then respond with righteous indignation, "I will make my own choices because it's a personal thing and I am going to be me and I'm going to create my own editorial reality and who R U to tell me how to make my own personal choices you stupid big obnoxious judgmental person you stop judging me stupid judger I shall now post sarcastic yet contextless updates about you on social media."
This is something I lean on too much. I want to do things my way. In every case, I'm wrong. I didn't want to do what some podcasts with higher production value do. When I did start adding some of those elements (structure with some audio signposting, adding some music), the episodes improved.
Video-wise, I've been trying to skip some necessary steps for making videos. In the making-of videos I've seen, people making whiteboard videos always start with a script. I've been trying to start with an outline and it leads to problems.
I'm okay with this, though. I've learned some things about making videos quickly that I think will pay off in the long run. (Contrasted to skipping standard podcast procedure that just led to worse podcast episodes with no benefits in the long run.)
I mentioned some YouTube channels that I really like:
- PictureFit: Short animated videos on just about every fitness and nutrition topic you can think of. He also did a great livestream Q&A where he shares how he grew his channel.
- AsapSCIENCE: Similar to PictureFit but instead of fitness and nutrition it's about a broader range of topics. 'Science' is in the title but there are videos like "What if Everyone Lived Like Americans" and "Introverts vs. Extroverts".
- Extra Credits: I started watching I think around when they just started expanding into other topics like history. I'm excited to see they started doing sci-fi videos. When I first got my iPad I looked to Extra Credits for inspiration for simple, engaging visuals. In the past year they've grown the team and now the illustrations and animations are more elaborate. It's great.
- Nerdwriter: Some of my favorite content on the internet. Evan Puschak 1.) has interesting ideas and 2.) is good at presenting them in interesting ways. I'd love to have a handle on just one of those two things. If you're all caught up in Game of Thrones, check out his side by side cut of one of the battles in the latest season against clips with similar shots from other classic movies. That reminded me of the side-by-side of the "Let Your Game Speak" commercial with the original shots.
Another section in our episode was about the editorial planning rules:
Determine your Desired Outcome
Determine your Message
Determine your Market. Who is your audience?Determine your Media
Determine your Method, the driving idea or unifying concept behind your project
If you're making videos, check out Edit Better. It's great.
If you want loose connections between video editing advice and life, hit play on our podcast episode!
We've missed a few weeks but we're back. We're talking about the The Power of Moments by Chip and Dan Heath. You should also check out our earlier episode about Made to Stick by the same authors.
In this episode we cover a few different topics from the book. We talk about:
- Good and bad customer service experiences
- First days of work that we remember
- Moments that are crystallizations of discontent
- Moments that affected our lives that have had a long-lasting effect
Stay with it until the end where we do a short scripted section that we wrote from the book.
Intro * Send your questions in on Twitter * Weekly fitness update: my weight isn't great! But I've started going Simple & Sinister. Trying to do a daily workout. The approach is that it's moderate exertion instead of some programs where failure is pretty much the goal for each workout. * Wally has some mimosas at a bridal shower
Laughing at the hardship From I Can't Make This Up:
"In life, you can choose to cry about the bullshit that happens to you or you can choose to laugh about it. I choose laughter.”
Have you ever been bullied or have you been the bully? Kevin Hart says he was bullied as a kid but knew that it was important to stand up for himself. Even once. Take the beating and then move on. They'd rather find someone who won't put up a fight at all.
We've both been bullied. I talk about when I was sort of bullied. Wally talks about when he was definitely bullied.
Bully by association. There was a time that I was sort of the bully, but not really.
| Take action! Try to laugh at it. It won't work for everything. But think back to the hardships you've been through in the past that you laugh about now. You can find strength in that. Hopefully it gives you some perspective * Stand up to that bully. If you're one of our very young listeners and you're being bullied, remember to stand up for yourself. Now that I think about it, it'd be better if I didn't give this kind of advice. Talk to your parents about this. * If you're the bully*… grab the other kid's bag and throw it over the fence. Just like Wally's bully did. It sounds like a very strong move. |
Our parents were right From I Can't Make This Up:
“It turns out that the things I hated most as a child are the same things that serve me the most as an adult.”
Keep a schedule. Kevin Hart says that his mom would maintain a very strict schedule to make sure that he was in the right places at the right time. She would rather take the bus 2 hours than ask for a ride. Hart learned how valuable this mindset was.
Find a group of people who you meet with regularly. It doesn't have to be church, like me and Wally went to growing up.
| Take action! Be like my dad: run, sit in the sauna, eat beef broth.* I'm slowly turning into my dad, as we all are. My dad was in the Navy so he established the habit and can't really go a day without working out. He loves that routine. I started using the sauna to relax after hearing Joe Rogan and Tim Ferriss mention it more than a few times. I should've just listened to my dad. |
Kevin Hart is persistent From I Can't Make This Up:
Persistence: More than anything, my willingness to be persistent is responsible for the success I've had. My mindset is: It's okay to fail, but it's not okay to quit.
We talked a lot about persistence in our Grit episode. This book is great because you get to see how many obstacles he runs into and how he overcomes them. Wildly successful people make it seem easy. It never is as easy as it seems. Hart knows he's lucky. He also knows he works very hard to keep a lot of irons in the fire.
| Take action! * Remember that the answer to 'Luck vs. Skill' doesn't matter. Kevin Hart says he got lucky. He also says he worked hard to get lucky. If you're frustrated when comparing yourself to other people's success, remind yourself that it takes luck. If your head has become humongous because of your success, remind yourself that you got lucky. In either case, go work hard again.
- Remember that this moment builds into the next moment. Hart gives a lot of insight into the television industry. He talks about his experience with TV pilots. He started learning that auditions matter even when you know you won't get the part. Because there's a chance that someone watching you will see you again. If you can make a good impression the first time it can help down the road. |
This week's book is Not Caring What Other People think is a Superpower. Ed Latimore (@EdLatimore) can actually hit hard. He's a boxer. He can hit hard with his words as well. I really enjoyed this book.
Here are some me and Wally discussed:
- Gratitudes
- Strategy & Tactics
- Planning
And MORE!
Links
Ed's site: https://edlatimore.com
A better podcast that has Ed as a guest: https://www.farnamstreetblog.com/2017/08/ed-latimore-podcast/
Third time is hopefully a charm.
- Four metrics to measure life with
- Introversion, extroversion, and friendship
- Gritting, quitting, and games
Revisiting Barking Up the Wrong Tree. I'm in the same time zone again this week because I'm visiting my family in Washington. We're doing Barking Up the Wrong Tree for a third time. The first go at it was our third episode, so we didn't know what we were doing at all. Last week was our second attempt and we didn't have an outline. We were all over the place.
Equipment: This seems to be a decent travel setup. The caveat here is knowing that Wally will record his side. His side his side his side of the pod.
- One AirPod connected to my iPhone for the Hangout call with Wally
- iPad with EarPods in the other ear and recording with Ferrite
- Zoom recorder with the clip-on lav mic
I was about to say it's a simple setup but it was like hooking into the matrix at first. I could have skipped either the iPad or the Zoom recorder but peace of mind and all that.
What went well: Outlining. 10-15 minutes of outlining made the episode go so much smoother. Here's the general format we've been using:
-
Topic
-
Overview and excerpt: Quick summary of the topic as described in the book
-
Question: The bulk of our conversation. How that topic applies to us
-
Take action! Some kind of actionable step for listeners to take
Repeat 3 or 4 times.
The last time we started with this format was the Better than Before episode. It makes it easier to edit and write show notes for after.
What can be improved next time (other than Jason being back!): Dip our toes into other genres. I continue using some of the same examples. Aka the Mario 3 flute example that would be at the center of the Bingo sheet if this show were a drinking game. We mentioned Sapiens and Homo Deus in the episode.
We tried going over Barking Up the Wrong Tree by Eric Barker, which we talked about 16 episodes ago. The idea was that we'd be better this time around. We weren't.
But the show must go on!
We'll give it a shot again in the next episode. (Which I'll post immediately after this one — it's already recorded and edited.)
Activerecall.co
Primal Branding by Patrick Hanlon
3 topics from the book:
- 7 components of successful brands
- The importance of creation stories
- Primal personalities
Misc. links:
- Video book notes by Ces on the video channel
- Shawn Michaels shows Marty Jannetty his favorite music is Sweet Chin Music
@activerecall & @walteramedia
https://activerecall.co/better-than-before
We're talking about Better Than Before, by Gretchen Rubin
Question: Which of the four tendencies do you think you align with most?
Question: Which of the foundational habits have you found most useful and which do you need to improve on?
Question: What is a bad habit you stopped or a good habit you started?
Question: What bad habit do you pair with a good one? What has worked in the past?
@activerecall & @walteramedia
https://activerecall.co/made-to-stick
We're talking about Made to Stick, by Chip and Dan Heath
@activerecall & @walteramedia
https://activerecall.co/talent-is-overrated
We're talking about Talent is Overrated, by Geoff Colvin
@activerecall & @walteramedia
https://activerecall.co/shoe-dog/
We're talking about Shoe Dog, by Josh Kaufman
@activerecall & @walteramedia
https://activerecall.co/journal
We're talking about The First Twenty Hours, by Josh Kaufman
Active Recall — The first 8 weeks
Jason was on the episode this week to talk about The ONE Thing by Gary Keller and Jay Papasan.
We also had a couple of listener questions from one listener:
- What would you look like as a Japanese cartoon character?
- What's the best donut you've had?
Some context for the Japanese cartoon character question: this is from an old Strong Bad video and Wally happens to know the person who sent the question in to Strong Bad.