Around 1pm today I was overcome by a kind of drowsiness. I couldn’t seem to shake the feeling so I lay down. For the past 5 hours or so I’ve been in a not quite waking not quite sleeping state. I wasn’t dreaming but I couldn’t force wakefulness on myself either.
I had to crawl my way into just enough consciousness to call and text my therapist to let her know I wouldn’t make my session or group therapy. Had I not seen proof I left a message when I woke up I would not have been surprised to learn that I had been somnambulant texting. I barely recall managing the effort.
I had a medical procedure a few days ago so I am likely still recovering from the stress my body endured. But I’ve felt reasonably energetic. I was entirely unprepared to fall into a liminal state between consciousness and sleeping for most of my day. I could tell I wasn’t fully awake but I couldn’t quite tell if I was asleep.
I kept trying to force wakefulness upon myself only to find my mind falling further away from the effort. It felt like some horror movie effort where a character has been put under but is still aware of what is happening to them. I didn’t love it. But clearly I needed the sleep. I was just barely able to get myself up to take my evening medications. Certainly wasn’t what I was expecting out of my Monday but so it goes.
What kind of values are crucial in a PR or communication DAO or interest group?
Open
Participatory
Trustless
It’s important that whatever we do on behalf of crypt it must be done in the spirit of the space and why so many disparate types of people believe in its values. While there may be structures like executive teams, core teams, board members and studios and contractors to execute on our mission we want to use the tools and transparency of crypto.
But to what purpose are we organizing? We will create content and engage in conversations to shape media narratives and public sentiment aimed at promoting the positive elements, potential, and impact of crypto.
How will we do this? We will hire publicists to promote our stories in mainstream media along with commissioning content meme-ers and creators to share opinions. We will engage with spokespersons to share talking points created from the priorities of the community. We will place our content, from memes to editorials, on our own properties as well as in supporting communities and member publications.
I expect I’ll be doing quite a bit more note taking and research. If you want to be a part of this effort I’ve started a shared Google doc for collaboration. Email me Julie @ chaotic dot capital or DM me @ AlmostMedia. This won’t be built in a day but together we can push it forward.
Being physically sick sucks. But having your mind take a turn for the worse can be worse. I’ve written about being in the grips of pain and the fear I have of exhaustion, but I don’t think I’ve written about what it feels like for one’s mind to struggle.
Whenever I read about recovering from covid and it’s challenges I can’t help but notice how often brain brain gets mentioned. The Lancet published a study of over 80,000 people that offers some concerning evidence that Covid has significant impacts on brain function.
“Finer grained analysis of performance across sub-tests supported the hypothesis that COVID-19 has a multi-domain impact on human cognition.”
If you don’t rely on your mind to make a living maybe the prospect of losing cognition isn’t as scary. Though I doubt it. I’d argue that the primary fear of losing one’s mind has much more to do with feeling one cannot communicate as effectively with one’s loved ones. We tend to get used to our cognitive capacity and finding it lacking can be quite terrifying.
I’m quite lucky that my own disease, ankylosing spondylitis, messes with my spine and not my mind. I’ve generally retained my sharp mind even if my body occasionally fails me. But I’ve still felt the frustration and confusion that comes with reaching for understanding and problem solving and coming up short.
Occasionally if my pain is bad enough my mind feels like it slows. It’s almost imperceptible but it’s still there. Like I am grasping for something that’s just an niche or two out of place on a shelf. You reach expecting it to be there and startle with confusion when it’s not. You adjust and get your grip and can carry on, but you are frustrated as you felt sure that the extra inch wasn’t supposed to be there.
Lucky for me this is fairly rare and easily solved with an NSAID. Once acute pain recedes my thinking is quick again. But what if it wasn’t? How would I learn to cope with that sense that my thinking wasn’t as clear as normal? Sure, maybe aging will do me in eventually, but I wouldn’t chose anything that could slow my mind.
I’ve got a bad relationship with work. Since I was a teenager I’ve been compulsive about the idea of hard work. I don’t know how I got to have a problem with the Protestant Work Ethic but it seems likely I developed it long before I read Max Weber and found it’s comforting rationalizations about work’s inherent morality.
I’m fascinated by things like commodity aesthetics, the history of consumption, and theories of leisure & status. Partially because I got a kick out of supposing I was a better person than those wretched lazy types. I wasn’t so sophisticated to sneer “rentier” class as kid but I was well on my way to veneration of hard work and productive capital. An economics degree finished the job.
This was compounded by growing up in a family that worshipped the culture of Silicon Valley. The innovation of computers and the people that worked all hours to bring their creativity to the world were the most important people on the planet. They hadn’t quite crossed the cultural rubicon of power that the tech industry has now, but the power of making the future was hard work and heady stuff even before it captured the mainstream. I wanted to change the world like the people my father admired
There was a time when computing and automation raised questions of a new era of leisure. If we could move all of the work we’d previously done manually to automated systems perhaps humans could ascend to The Culture of Ian M Bank’s novels. In a distant future of abundance, sentient AIs run industry and production, so humanity can do, well, whatever it likes.
But we haven’t achieved a post scarcity world. If anything accumulating resources and showing you’ve done it by the rules of the meritocracy makes hard work even more crucial. You’ve got to play and win two games. You’ve got to make the money and show you’ve demonstrated the proper status while doing it. It seems like leisure is losing the battle quite soundly.
I’ve been pushing all year to get back to hard work. I’ve worked hard at my health. I’ve committed myself to biohacking. But really what if the obsession with working myself to the bone is killing me? I’ve been completely relaxed as I prepared for a medical procedure this week. I’ve never felt better. Which forced me to ask myself if maybe I better come to live leisure like the way I have loved work. It might be a much better life for me. The future sentient AIs might approve as well.
Yesterday I was fucking around on Twitter, as I am prone to doing. I made a barely sit-com worthy joke about divorced guy energy.
You ever notice how women thrive in the aftermath of divorce but men implode? Why is that?
My husband Alex replied with a searing burn “don’t worry, I’ll be fine” response and we were off to the races with all our mutuals dunking. I was howling with laughter. The two of us were trading zingers and watching the DMs roll in from friends.
Obviously the undercurrent of any thread on social media got dark very fast. So quickly I ended up putting out resources for men who were struggling in the replies. The amount of pain on display was enough to make you want to donate to the first domestic abuse charity I could find.
So why is it that I can shitpost about a topic and come away unscathed, indeed it was a fun and entertaining night for both myself and Alex, but others melted down? I think it might be about class and social signaling. It takes a lot of social capital to shitpost. And those that shitpost on the most socially contentious topics are demonstrating their social capacity to discuss whatever they want without consequences. I can shitpost because I’ve got enough social capital to do so.
One theory I’ve got is that shitposting is a backlash to Ted Talks, super serious reverential coverage in glossy business magazines, and the proliferation of HBS style “business” books. We’ve had an saturation in performative professionalism.
Once it became unclear that every self seriousness biography or magazine puff piece was placed by professionals to make their clients look like geniuses (visible effort undermines certain kinds of status) the savvy social seeker knew they needed a more authentic way to telegraph in-group power. The next logical step was demonstrating that you were so smart, so powerful and so connected you didn’t even need to demonstrate it. Hence the shitpost.
The weirdest part of “shitposting” being an actual status symbol in venture capital is that a couple of billionaires are going to see me and Alex making jokes about divorced guy energy and this will only increase our status. Which is ludicrous on its face ans yet absolutely true.
This isn’t even a flex on my part (though it obviously is a flex) as it is now accepted that having a following for saying whatever you like gives you a leg up in startups. A friend likened it to “dressing down” or the practice of wearing causal clothing even in formal settings. It shows you are so powerful and wealthy you don’t need to give a fuck about manners. Shitposting on Twitter is like wearing ripped jeans at the country club.
I want to explore this topic in more depth so this post is just some sketch notes. But I wanted to get it down and organized so I hope it’s alright to have some half baked ideas. It’s my blog so I figure it’s fine b
I miss being able to enjoy time out in the world. You know that feeling when you’ve spent the last two hours at your favorite bar with your friends just talking about nothing? The ease that you feel being with your community and enjoying being together? The casual camaraderie and easy laughter that comes from no expectations time together has been lost to many of us. I miss it.
It doesn’t seem like those days are coming back for some of us in the near future. If I give too much thought to the impact of things like the pandemic I think I just spike my cortisol. That’s a stress hormone. The stress of reactivity is killing all of us. Constant panic over floods, heatwaves, outbreaks and all their downstream effects is overwhelming our capacity to live. And yes, granted a more globalized war with a changing climate is capable of killing us. But we don’t have to let futility do us in early. We can find our way into solutions. But only if we stay alive to do it.
I’ve been coping with apocalyptic nihilism by shitposting on Twitter. Yes I realize this is a popular upper class pundit class past time. I’ve got some self awareness. But it’s also the only thing that mimics being out socializing with your friends. And I think that’s worth a lot. Shitposting is good for the soul.
You don’t have to shitpost, but if you cannot find a way to lower your stress response, as we say in crypto, ngmi. Everything may be going to hell but you aren’t there yet. You’ve got a life to live, people to love and who love you, and a chance to be happy.
Fuck cortisol. It’s not good for you. That’s some metabolic poisoning eating away at you and you chose to let it kill you. There is no reason to give yourself unnecessary stress. Some stress is good. It makes you resilient. But stuff you opt into? Fuck that noise it’s only going to make you sick.
And despite whatever family trauma circuit you may be playing out in your head, YOU DO NOT DESERVE THAT SHIT. No I’m seriously disease and suffering aren’t a moral good. Everything might be rough but you need to find a laugh. It might just save your life.
The only downside of spending a day intaking a significant body of knowledge is that it’s nearly is that it’s nearly impossible to do synthesis on it at the same time. I suppose this holds true for new emotions as well. Synthesis and understanding takes time.
I’ve been on a tear working through how I feel on a number of topics just as I’m trying to ingest a new body of knowledge. I’ve got some inklings of where I will net out on all of it but it’s still a gut feeling. Any capable articulation that will be external to myself will require some synthesis. I can’t tell you what I’m on about as I don’t yet know.
And while I’ve set personal deadlines for continuous daily writing I cannot simply apply willpower to everything. In other words, I can force myself to write today it’s not possible to force sense on it. The synthesis hasn’t arrived even if the force of daily habit has.
It’s not that I’m admitting defeat on willpower, I’m sure I’ll be able to push my understanding over time. But expecting it today is probably a lost cause. The spirit may be willing but my wetware is fragile.
Fragility is of course one of my life companions this year. I’ve had to face that life is cheap and it’s simply not possible to worry about everyone. I have to sacrifice some of my own goals in order to keep myself alive. I suppose it’s not always a choice, except in that I’ve chosen to live and not die. That’s a choice.
But how I fortify and defend myself against the realities of biology, cultural frustration and freedom is in the end up to me. The pandemic has brought this home in a particularly acute way. Forced choices on us all, but particularly the vulnerable.
But I suppose I’m done trying to protect myself and gain ground. It’s going to be one or the other. It is time to take some risks even knowing that it will harm me. I’m recalculating what kind of destabilizing my body can take in the face of societal exhaustion. But the emotional synthesis of knowing consequences and having made a choice in freedom isn’t done in a day.
It’s fairly common to struggle with boundaries. The desire to come through for everyone is strong, but not half so strong as the fear that if you set a firm boundary, then no one will accept you for where you are and what you want. What if love is only ever available on someone else’s term? This is a terrible fear straight from our inner child.
We’ve turned loyalty into a obligation test. But how perverse is that? “If you love them, set it free” is a culturally touchstone for a reason. We want the freedom of choosing our the loyalty that works for us. And we know each demonstration of loyalty means nothing if it wasn’t in consideration of the other person’s boundaries, needs and desires.
I suppose this hit me today because I’ve been astonished to see athletes like Naomi Osaka and Simone Biles holding their boundaries firm. They loyalty to sports, their countries and to us as fans only matters if it’s given freely and with joy. They owe us nothing, so when they do perform as their most elite selves, it’s what’s most beautiful and courageous thing. It’s a feat without ego. Those victories come in freedom.
Prioritizing one’s boundaries and well-being doesn’t need any apology or explanations or attempts to change yourself to fit another, if someone requires obligation on their terms it’s natural to feel invaded.
It’s the most loving thing in the world to set out what you actually want and need. It’s always the right thing to do. We don’t own each other. We each get to choose what’s best for us. And that fear we won’t be loved if we stand firm? Let it go. We always feel safest and most cared for when we know what we are offering is genuinely wanted.
I don’t have a thesis or a point in mind so I’m just going to get started and ramble. I’ve felt like shit for most of July. Must have picked up some kind of infection on top of my usual bullshit autoimmune nonsense. I finally caved and asked my doctor if I could just try good old fashioned doxycycline. Six hours later I felt like a million bucks.
Sometimes it’s the simple shit that makes a difference. I don’t know if that is an Occam’s razor thing but I’m a little pissed that just tossing an old faithful antibiotic at me did the trick. But then I could be throwing some cool bias at this problem and be equating a bunch of causality that just isn’t there. Humans are prone to that.
Like did you know Occam’s razor was actually a justification for miracles? No shit. Occam was a friar and so into simplicity that he figured God was the easiest explanation. It absolutely blows my mind that there are logicians out there who will stomp on complex answers and holler “Occam’s razor” on your ass when the dude was saying my bias says probably miracles because that’s easier.
I don’t have anything more useful to say than that but this meets my daily criteria to write something every single day. So I’m calling it. Maybe tomorrow will be better. Which it might be because doxycycline!
When I was a kid it was considered common knowledge to “get off the mountain” before the afternoon thundershowers. Along the front range of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado, the afternoon or evening storm is a mainstay of summer. A quick occasionally terrifying show of nature in all her glory.
One minute the sky is clear and the summer heat is bearing down on you, and the next torrential rains with lightning and thunder cracking one after the other explode. Temperatures can drop 20 degrees in as many minutes. The wind is the first sign a storm is bearing down on you. A reminder why it’s wise to pack layers and be prepared with rain gear even on the sunniest day.
I personally love the storms. The relief from the heat is welcome. But it’s more than comfort. It’s the emotions that come with something so powerful bearing down on you. The smell of ozone permeates the air. The excitement and fear from needing to get to safety when the first signs of a storm moving in snow themselves.
Most Coloradan that hike have high country lightning safety training to rely on, but it doesn’t make those bursts of light any less terrifying. The hairs standing on end a visceral reminder why the god of thunder featured so heavily in mythology. The power on display is clear. Thunder clapping as lightning strikes a reminder that you are in the middle of a power that has no interest in you. It just exists.
But like a god, natural phenomena is capricious. As quickly as a mountain storm blows in it blows out. The clouds part. Sun shines through. The occasional rainbow will cross a valley. I just watched a downpour from the safety of my house in the foothills. I guess I still know to be off the mountain before the storm comes. It was a beautiful mesmerizing twenty minutes of rain, lightning, hail and thunder. And then it was gone
