Before losing my tech job last August, becoming an independent consultant had lived rent-free in my brain for years. “Will going independent help me live the life I want? “ “Will it help me work on projects I’m energized to work on? (Knowing that not every project will be as exciting?)” “Will it allow me to use my expertise in a way that helps organizations and people whose values I align with?”…
Guy Billout Climbing year in review 🔗 here ! This below is more personal and not entirely about climbing. The Tyranny of More and The Power of Enough Every year, I set a theme. A yearly theme is a word in my mind that stays present as I make decisions daily. It’s not a New Year’s resolution that I can ✅ check off. Nor is it a 🎯 SMART goal. A theme is a frame for the year, the ambient idea that…
Originally published on my newsletter Unsend It . Me on Once Upon a Time ( video ). Isamer doing a solid job spotting me. I loved this climb. Not exactly everyone’s definition of a good day 🤣 You ever climb outside and spend the whole time at the strongest climber’s proj? “Yeah, we just spent the whole day at Dan’s V9 proj. Really wished I got to try more stuff.” Or maybe you showed your friends…
Originally published on Unsend It . Ah, fall season. Cool weather is currently struggling to find its way to the West Coast. Any day now please. Dyno’ing to the good hold on Fear and Loathing III , in Red Rocks last Friday. Two hung it, so it’ll definitely be one of my fall projects! Like many other climbers right now, I’m getting stoked for the fall. And my outdoor projects. If you’re not a…
Originally published on Unsend It . Our obsession with extracting the greatest future value out of our time blinds us to the reality that, in fact, the moment of truth is always now — that life is nothing but a succession of present moments, culminating in death, and that you’ll probably never get to a point where you feel you have things in perfect working order. — Four Thousand Weeks (135-136)…
Theo and Miquel supporting me on The Rookie in Squamish, BC. Originally published on my newsletter, Unsend It . To climb at my absolute limit, I have to fucking go for it. This is one of the most beautiful aspects of climbing. When you empty your mind and go for it, you do things you had no idea you were capable of. Failing, falling, or looking stupid in front of others is a possibility. But you…
I recently started Unsend It , a newsletter about uncertainty, growth, and change through the lens of climbing. I’m cross-posting essays from there to my personal site. Me working Telephone Maisen in Fontainebleau, France, April 2023. Photo by Leon Chatelian. In 2018, I fell in love with climbing because it made me feel like I was in a video game. Every climbing session I was leveling the fuck up.…
It’s awesome to be serious about something. Growing up, I used to be ashamed of how serious I was compared to other people. Of course, I had a sense of humor, but I always felt the need to hold back what was truly on my mind: my goals, practicing basketball , dance, mindfulness, psychology, relationships, and ways of seeing the world. I’d worry that I’d alienate others with pursuits and ideas I…
Every year, I reflect on my year and set some intentions for the next. I used to reflect on my years in my private notes, until last year when I posted my first public year in review . I enjoyed doing that — I felt like I was participating in a special practice on the internet. So, here’s my year in review for 2022. This is a 20-minute read. It’s not meant to be short. I reflect on most aspects of…
That dinner you said yes to? C’mon. You really didn’t want to go. You definitely flaked on that dinner. When you host your own party and invite others to come, you get a 20 people saying “yeah def!”. But how many people show up? 10. Flakes! People near my age (I’m 29) often flake on things. I’m trying to understand why. I think part of why we flake so much is because we fear missing out. We…
When I was in seventh grade, I didn’t like family vacations. Hawaii? Nah. Hawaii is going to take me away from practicing basketball. I so badly wanted to keep practicing. How was I going to practice consistently if I was transported into one of the most beautiful, laidback areas of the world? I’ve always been a fan of that word practice . Do that thing. Then take a break. Then do it again. And…
I say to people that I’m thinking about moving to LA next year even though I don’t really want to. It’s not that I don’t like LA. My partner lives there. I used to live in New York City. LA almost makes me feel how I felt when I lived in New York. (Although I enjoy New York much more than LA.) But I say that I’m thinking of moving to LA next year because I want people to think that I’m moving out…
Despite 2021 being the second year our world is in a global pandemic, 2021 was a good year for me. Here’s the tl;dr: I’ve learned to balance being less attached to my career while continuing to make positive contributions to my org. Climbing-wise, I finished my first outdoor V6 this year. But also had three finger injuries. I fell in love. I’ve been setting up the foundations to start my own…
From Doris McComics I often get messages from friends about my writing process. I figured I’d share it here! This may not work for you. This is just what currently works for me. This will also change and simplify over time. tl;dr I capture ideas on the go and write every Saturday. I write in Bear , mainly because it’s so clean. But the tool doesn’t matter. What matters is getting into the habit of…
Can’t find the source, but found this picture on Are.na . I recently came across this inquiry on Twitter: What are some metrics that are very unlikely to appear on a dashboard, but would tell you a lot about a company? — Ben Orenstein (@r00k) July 10, 2020 The variety of answers are amazing: The number of people involved in each decision — theodora chu (@chu_onthis) July 10, 2020 1.…
Picture credits: Dash “Should I learn how to code?” Before starting my first PM role, I read as much as I could about the skills it takes to be a successful PM. “Should PMs learn how to code?” was the one question that kept coming up. So many product managers agonize over whether they should learn how to code. However, I wonder why PMs don’t agonize over learning design as much as they do about…
I’ve always thrived on having structure. When I was a breakdancer in high school, I set a practice schedule. I’ve practiced a 9–5 workday since I was a college student. Today, I do weekly , monthly, and annual reviews. “Isn’t all this restricting, Tim? Are you ever spontaneous?” I’ll admit. My way of structuring my life isn’t normal. I think my craving for structure came from realizing as a kid…
“Fishmen” by Ang Kiukok, 1992 The phrase “bias towards action” is popular in knowledge work. It means do something before overanalyzing what you should do. I’m not sure who officially coined the phrase, but Google and Amazon made it popular. From Amazon’s values : “ Bias for Action: Speed matters in business. Many decisions and actions are reversible and do not need extensive study. We value…
In remote work, we communicate primarily through writing. We send messages in Slack. We document projects in Notion. We send meeting invites with a written description of the purpose. We’re writing all the time. Many organizations are working from home at the moment. Thus, writing is even more important. Here’s why. Writing saves time. Take this contrived example: You have a distributed team. Most…
In our time of social distancing and working from home, workplace collaboration software has become clutch. For instance: Zoom’s worldwide downloads has skyrocketed from 90,000 in January 2020 to 343,000 in March. Source Similarly, Slack’s number of simultaneously connected users grew 20% between of March 17—25. That’s 12.5 million simultaneously connected users in total. The shift to…