Tag: Commitment

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Emotional Work Politics Reading

Day 1371 and Against The Tides

I don’t swim very much as an adult but I grew up in an era with mandatory swimming tests (even at university).

I was lucky enough to not only learn to swim in the Pacific Ocean but in Colorado I spent a lot of time in our many creek, rivers and lakes. Freshwater has its own appeal and I’ve seen the tides work on the Great Lakes. But little is as magical as the buoyancy of seawater.

I’ve struggled with not having swimming and the joys of warm weather and cool water with some of my autoimmune challenges. A bathing suit I’d never worn came to represent some of that loss.

But today I was able to take a swim. I put on a bathing suit and was able to casually swim with just enough force applied to steady myself in a comfortable place against the increasingly forceful tide coming in. I felt like I’d won even if it was just for thirty minutes. I enjoyed a nice healthful thing in between the chaos of a very busy moment.

I’m not much of a Fitzgerald fan and but the joy of finding the limitations in one’s life as you mature is the relatability of feeling the weight of a one’s years as you push against the tides.

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past

So many decisions cannot be undone and yet we steady ourselves against forces much bigger than we are. Pushing against some of the vastness of a sea while relaxing into its much bigger whole is quietly humbling

I feel good about pushing against the vastness but also not being so sure about my own place in much larger forces. It’s no wonder man yearns for the horizon.

I took a shower and immediately went back to work. But it was nice to be a human doing a human thing while all of this is going on around me. I held my own against the tides. And I intend to keep doing.

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Politics

Day 1358 and I Must Subsidize Demand

There is a beloved meme in communities like YIMBYism (a movement advocating for building more housing with the slogan “yes in my neighborhood”) in which the protagonist agonizes over subsidizing demand as the cyclical pattern of rising demand giving rise to rising cost carries on.

“I just need to subsidize demand”

America is a strange place where we espouse a lot of free market policies but we tend to favor subsidies as a solution. Which isn’t always a bad thing. Sometimes there are good reasons for providing support for things that aren’t as commercially viable immediately like pure science or education or other public goods.

It is however not the only policy tool available to people. A fun fact about how I have a good time, my participation in civic life was as an appointee on the New York City Community Boards. I was part of a group who approve licenses and permits for things like liquor and parades and the like. I also served on quality of life and transportation boards. I also did monthly meetings for land use.

I was easily the youngest person who volunteered time and I learned a lot about how damn many rules we have at every level from neighborhood to city and state on everything from ventilation and to environmental review. And some of those rules are pretty good things!

But it would be preposterous to say that all rules are good and that every part of the process of starting a business (large or small) is easy. Some problems you can’t through money at and fix. Or if you can it creates a whole unintended set of other problems. Like paying for lawyers and consultants.

Because Twitter is the land of any old idiot getting a say (just like a community board meeting) I’ve got every flavor of opposition and missing the point on this tweet.

We do a lot well in America. It’s relatively much easier to start an LLC and get a license to do business. Complying with everything from the liquor board to FinCEN will take a little more. Anyone who has run a business can tell you about their corner of the universe and the paperwork involved. Just ask my husband who spends most of his time as a businessman keeping up with paperwork.

I think it’s perfectly fine to be skeptical that throwing more money at a problem like how challenging it is as a business owner to contend with government bureaucracy. Demand subsidies can only fix so mich. It’s just a lot more complicated than that. Be smart and don’t let your head spin like our meme gentleman.

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Internet Culture Politics

Day 1356 and Sick Sad World

Current ways of knowing are (maybe rightly) under scrutiny. Some of us attempt to source truth by look backwards citing Chesterton’s Fence.

I’ve been skeptical of romanticizing the past as traditional ways of knowing can be bad cultures too. Sick societies are a constant companion of human nature no matter how we long for that Paradise Lost.

Maladaptive cargo cults are everywhere (Silicon Valley has dozens of flavors) and these superstitions ca. reproduce for generations if nutritional gradients are surplus.n

Noble savages are as silly a concept as high minded aristocracy. You probably know a few maladaptive emotionally sick types within your own communities.

Next on Sick Sad World

Remember the long running joke of Comedy Central’s Stephen Colbert? Truthiness. Emotive truthiness reigns supreme as “news-like” content bubbles in the Internet of AI slop battle out the truth of an issue not with verifiable facts but verifiable feelings. Which one is more maladaptive?

We were subjected to a week’s worth of BBQing content which was digested by the American psyche until we switched to the new cycle of a crazed would-be assassin and his failed attempt to kill former president Trump.

If so much of our society is maladaptive copies of civilizational failures, the best any of us can do is pray we are humble enough to see truth and we willing to adapt our ways to it.

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Community Culture

Day 1349 and Worry Not

Through Robin Hanson’s link round up today I came across a review of a book by Joyce Beresen “Warriors and Worriers” that has a novel thesis on how different sexes cooperate and compete.

Human males form cooperative groups that compete against out-groups, while human females exclude other females in their quest to find mates, female family members to invest in their children, and keep their own hearts ticking. In the process, Benenson turns upside down the familiar wisdom that women are more sociable than men and that men are more competitive than women.

The Survival of the Sexes: Warriors and Worriers

The reviewer Tove K of Wood from Eden suggests that Bereson’s work shows that worry and fear may be playing a part in our current fertility crisis for women.

If women worry more about competing for resources than men because their social competitions are zero sum (versus men who must be more cooperative for group defense) than I can see how if you get to fear being a driver of inferiority. If you are struggling with poverty or resource constraint you might be living in fear. It’s hard to imagine that there are infinite games. Maybe too many of us can’t see beyond limited zero sum “us versus them” resources competitions.

In that theme, Bryan Caplan wonders if only fear (and shame) can sway the highly impulsive as they are not as able to see cause and effect.

When I grew up young women experienced rather pervasive fear and shame on becoming pregnant. Now we see more women convinced to pull back from the risk of children entirely.

What I can’t quite square in these theories is how much actual resource constraints play into this versus the subjective differences in resources we see in our social groups. Is it all a comparison game?

You may be doing objectively better than any of your ancestors but still feel inadequate next to a lavish Instagram feed of an influencer. If you don’t think you can live up to the high standards of parenting required in American life maybe you’d worry yourself into a smaller family.

Or as many are choosing you’d worry yourself into no children at all. Last week the Surgeon General said Americans were in a crisis of parental stress. Who wants that? I’d say that women should worry less but if our biology says “only the paranoid survive” the future of humanity will take more than just our evolutionary instincts. We need to want to live.

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Startups

Day 1343 and LFG?

The aftermath of a long weekend is one of my favorite shared cultural experiences. The scramble to reposition yourself back to your work, family and home life always makes the first 24-48 hours back extremely chaotic. The sprint to send reminder emails and respond in kind to others is overwhelming for everyone.

Any number of projects, financings, fundraises, and other sundry needs and obligations are percolating back into my inboxes.

First it was the three day weekend folks. Then today the “extra” four day folks. And yet the materials I need most are still in that liminal space of “not quite back to the office” just yet.

I was at our normally quite sleepy local airport today and it was packed. People leaving Yellowstone and Big Sky with a few folks returning home. A milieu of campers and and millionaires all navigating back to reality.

The next 10 weeks or so are some the best of the year to fundraise if you are an entrepreneur. It’s the season of “let’s fucking go” even as the chaos of the American election season has everyone on edge. Rightfully so as nothing roils markets like uncertainty.

Summer has activity but August tends to be dead and this first week back is when we all shake it off and return to work. The other seasons to raise are January through March with spring break and Easter as the first cut off. Then it’s best to try to finish your fundraising before the end of May or at least by mid-June.

So if you are ready to be back and are a founder fundraising (or considering it) just slide into my DMs on Twitter.

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Culture

Day 1339 and Alienation

I don’t feel strongly alienated from the world. I am not confident I have the right to be at war with my reality. Certainly I’m frustrated with aspects of my reality and I’ve taken actions to feel more at peace with my lot in life.

Perhaps because of this bias towards action, I’m familiar with many flavors of alienation. Those seeking to remedy it are the people who bring change.

Being dissatisfied with the world is the first step in applying your will to solve your dissatisfaction. Some of us will build great things by doing so.

Through that lens, I have had the good fortune to meet many people alienated from and by the world. They don’t wallow in it because the point in the dissatisfaction is to take action to remedy it.

Problems naturally range from daily quotidian ones to full system wide issues. Even small actions are enough to remedy the feelings that arise from feeling separate or out of step with the world. Modernity isn’t a permanent state even in its own age.

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Internet Culture

Day 1337 and Leet

I’m officially a leet writer. I’ve now been at this daily writing habit for so long that on day 1337 I am cool saying I’m absolutely elite. I have done the thing consistently and gained skills. Because everyday is practice here I am l33t.

If this not-at-all humblebrag is confusing to you, let me explain why 1337 is a joking milestone to an internet kid like myself.

Leet, also known as “1337” or leetspeak, is a form of modified spelling used primarily on the internet. It involves replacing letters with numbers or other characters that resemble the original letters, creating a unique orthography. For example, “leet” can be spelled as “1337” or “l33t”

Leetspeak on Wikipedia via Perplexity

I’m no h4x0r but I’m not a n00b to being extremely online. While a being on the fourth year of a daily writing habit is nothing to scoff at I’ve been on WordPress for close to twenty years. It feels good to be leet at something as extremely online as blogging.

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Startups

Day 1334 and Heads Down

I had a couple days of flare in my autoimmune condition that had struggling last week. Down time in bed, especially when you are in pain, can be a bit dangerous when the news cycle is popping off. Pain and American politics are a terrible combination.

I do pay attention to politics alas as I am involved in a number of issues (#FreedomToCompute, regulatory reform, and housing) so it’s easy to over do it with being extremely online. My nervous system doesn’t need any additional stimulation.

I was relieved to be back on my feet today as it felt good to be heads down at work. I’m excited about how my seed investing has been going over the past few years and I’m taking the next steps to evolve the fund. I’m so optimistic about what can be achieved. Founders are particularly motivated to build. Ingenuity sparks when things are darkest.

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Chronicle

Day 1327 and Circling

I feel like I’m going backwards with my daily project of writing every single day. Maybe backwards isn’t the right direction so much as in circling round into comfortable spaces. No one wants to find themselves floating in solipsism.

I’ve given myself a lot of flexibility in capturing a mood or a tidbit or a theme from the day and running with it. Interiority is a perfectly acceptable vantage for personal writing but I want to connect to a wider perspective with it.

But I don’t know if I’m progressing in any real direction with this experiment as of late.

I could be speaking from the August doldrums (it’s more August exhaustion as I’ve been working a lot). It’s possible I will have a streak of great essays just around the bend. But it’s safe to say that day isn’t today.

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Travel

Day 1325 and Road Warrior Season

I’ve begun booking some of my fall travel. Much as living the good life in Montana is pretty much paradise, one is obliged to make pilgrimage to the main cities in which business is done.

Some juggling of priorities will be involved as Asia and Europe compete against home turf cities like San Francisco and New York. Plus we have conferences in some pretty weird places from rural Wyoming to South Beach Miami.

I am resting today and enjoying running the logistics of the fall season through my little packing and organizing rituals. I enjoy thinking through the logistics of grooming and dressing more than I do working through the health and medical routine.

It’s nice to daydream about the cold fall. I put on a cashmere sweater and pulled out my bags as I thought about the return of the cold and the return of work. I can’t wait. I better catch up on sleep while I can.