--- ## Notes/Brainstorming ### **✨** In My Life How I stopped doomscrolling - I've been hitting back-to-back 20 hour leisure days, majority of it is doom scrolling - Started getting into chess - Sure it's not entirely productive, but I'd say it's much better - A chance for deliberate practice - Replacing habits - Use readwise reader app instead of social media Here's what my weekly time allocation looks like now: [](https://gyazo.com/cae180128727db2b0e49df4ffc3db460) Uploaded a new video showcasing my power-user workflow for reading and taking notes. ### **🔗** Links to Thinks **Writing better** - On Writing Well shortform - The ultimate guide to writing online **Finding deeper meanings in the entertainment media we consume** - For my second channel, I've been analyzing videos where TV shows like south park or anime are being used to illustrate more philosophical topics in society - Social media south park - Loneliness and capitalism ### **🚀** Actionable Tingz **My Cyber Monday Purchases** - Electric Toothbrush - 5-HTP - To cater to my new audience, I bought a controller to play games with **Learn to speak better** - Dynamics is key - From ultraspeaking - Accordion method - Went on google docs, used voice to text and kept track of what i was saying - Pacingw ### **🤔** Food For Thought I tuned into Andrew Kirby's zoom call for a second - Think of a time where you were struggling for days, weeks, or even months on something, but suddenly, you came across a video or an article that gave you the key to solve the problem - Knowledge is the answer https://youtu.be/R0wZZ6TKQBc believes that young men with no purpose are the most common but most neglected part of society as they just don't know what to do and instead they just cope through tiktok and other content consumption he believes that just finding something to obsess over is the key to getting out of that initial phase and from there you can slowly start to build a foundation that protects you ### 😤 My Ramblings ## Publishing Copy Welcome to _Weekly Wondering_, a sacred time where I share the resonating links, reflections and learnings from my past week to influence your next one ;) ### **✨** In My Life **I finally stopped doom scrolling** I've had back-to-back 20 hour leisure weeks, where the majority of it has been unintentional mindless scrolling. But this week, an odd new interest has helped me take back control of my time. Playing chess. Surely it's not productive, but I'd say it's much more intrinsically rewarding. In terms of the [self-determination theory](https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/community-health/patient-care/self-determination-theory.aspx#:~:text=Self%2Ddetermination%20theory%20suggests%20that,is%20willingly%20endorsing%20one's%20behavior.), it satisfies - Autonomy as I'm getting freedom back on how I want to spend my time - Relatedness as I get to talk about it and play against my coworker - Competence since there's a tangible sense of progression to work towards, which is accessible through chess.com's lessons Thanks to it, it's rekindled the pursuit of improvement inside me, which reminded me of [Josh Waitzkin's passion for learning](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/857333.The_Art_of_Learning). The ability to make mindful small choices while still remembering the long-term vision. Practicing self-awareness by analyzing mistakes and finding solutions to overcome them. Considering the learning route I want to take my channel, it's a nice first step :) ### **🔗** Links to Thinks Wanting to add my own voice and depth to the content on my second channel and overall thinking, I went back to the drawing board on how to write. --- I want to write better so I can find my writing voice and add depth to my content. And so I read: - The timeless piece, On Writing Well, by William Zinsser - @davidperell's [Modern Guide to Writing Online](https://perell.com/essay/the-ultimate-guide-to-writing-online/) Here's what I learned 👇 **The fundamentals of good writing** I saw lots of reviews for On Writing Well, so I decided to read the [Shortform summary](https://www.shortform.com/?utm_source=johnmavrick&utm_medium=partner). The three main proposed principles for good writing are simplicity, clarity, and identity. To help be mindful of the three, we can always ask guiding questions throughout the writing process. To maintain simplicity, review your writing and ask: - Are your words and sentences simple to the point of conversational - Do your chosen words effectively illustrate your ideas? - Have you reduced or rewritten the piece? To keep clarity, we need to think critically of the central message our writing explores: - What is your central message? - What is the best structure to communicate this message? - What background is needed for a general reader? - How long should each point of the topic be? After each sentence, ask “What is the next thing the reader needs to know?” Lastly, identity can be cultivated through our writing style (I'm getting flashbacks to English class 😵), which we can sniff out for ourselves by asking, - Does the punctuation accentuate our voice? - Are the sensory details unique to my story and experience? - Is the figurative language used personally curated rather than a cliche? But of course, the above style guide is just an opinion, and writing gurus don't always have the same advice ;) **The Ultimate Guide to Writing Online** Standing at 17,000 words and a reading time of 1 hour, David Perell's writing guide lives up to its name. I'll distill what I took away in 9 bullets with a reading time of 1 minute ;) [[My Resources/My MOCs/Writing|Writing]] - When editing your piece, remember the CRIBS framework to be mindful of what sections are confusing, repetitive, interesting, boring, or surprising - Surprising content is the goal, to challenge world views through novel ideas - Focus on content distribution on one platform so you can focus more on refining your writing - Find things to write about by analyzing patterns in your online feeds, conversations, and previous posts - Make your writing POP; personal, observational, and playful - Each piece should only have one central point, remove any writing that doesn't relate to it - Reverse engineer your favorite writer’s pieces and critically analyze their content, diction, and sentence structure - At the same time, to stand out, don't follow trends like the simple `assertion -> research` formula - Instead, build your own personal monopoly by combining your unique skills and experiences in a specifically useful way for other people - Make your posts and ideas memorable by labeling them with your own personal terms (ex. Personal Monopoly, POP writing) - These phrases should hook the reader's curiosity with ambiguity, then deliver surprise, visuals, and fun Now, whose advice should you follow? They both advocate for focused and unique writing, so I'll take it as a fundamental requirement for my content to be engaging. I'm personally going to embody David's expressive vision but with a skeptical revision process. I was curious about how I would be mindful of these principles while writing my own content, but just writing about it and chunking it into condensed parts for future reference seems to do the trick ;) Thank you, Feynman technique! ### **🚀** Actionable Tingz **My Black Friday Purchases** I decided to set aside my frugality and reward myself for this year by investing in myself 🤪 And so, I started looking into supplements and found this [handy visual](https://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/snake-oil-scientific-evidence-for-nutritional-supplements-vizsweet/) to stay away from placebo products for those with scientific evidence. I mainly wanted to find supplements for peak cognition, and ended up with the following list: - Dark chocolate for cognition - Caffeine for memory - Creatine for muscle mass, memory, mental fatigue, and depression - 5-Htp for mood and increased serotonin - Ashwagandha for mood and anxiety I also looked into other nutrients for overall health, like: - Zinc for mood and metabolism - Magnesium for sleep - Vitamin D3 - Vitamin B6 - Cinnamon for antioxidants and lower blood sugar _This is what I'm deciding to look into after like 2 hours of research. Don't take my recommendations as absolute_ 😅 I'd recommend just thinking about what health concerns or problems you have in your life, and see if you can turn to any natural remedies. **The keys to Ultraspeaking** Speaking is my biggest dread. Especially public, spontaneous presentations. But thanks to @AliAbdaal 's PTYA I got to listen in on some public speaking workshops hosted by @Ultraspeaking And throughout each session, they emphasize the power of dynamics. Ultimately, speaking is merely an outlet for expression, so you need to practice being dynamic with yourself and the topic at hand. They let people play two different games to practice using their interactive web app as a timer and prompt. The first game is Conductor, a game to practice your different speaking levels and tone. At the start, you're given a random prompt to talk about. Personally, that's enough difficulty for me, even with my English BS skills 😭 But there's an additional challenge; instead of staying at the same level throughout a speech, the screen will show a number from 1 to 10. 1 is your quietest and most contemplative self, 5 is your average, and 10 is the point of no return. As you progress, the number on the screen will change, indifferent to the point you're making. By learning to use these different ranges at your disposal, you engage the viewer through a cycle of emotions. The second game refers to the accordion method, a way to explore the nuances of a certain idea through time constraints. First, you start by storytelling your idea in 2 minutes to see what naturally comes to mind. Next, you cut the time in half to one minute, then 30 seconds, to refine the central message. The time constraints force you to be more concise and eliminate the irrelevant. Then it's time to go back up to 1, then 2 minutes again, now with more room to better illustrate what's most important. There's a certain vitality through authenticity and spontaneity. Unconsciously generated gems are discovered, the continuous reps improve your skills, and flow reduces the processing power required. I ended up trying these techniques myself, but with an audience of only myself ;) Using the accordion method helped me with idea generation, almost in the same way just rambling in the shower does. You can judge whether it helped or not [yourself](https://docs.google.com/document/d/17_lI7HdADs-iA77xtGqjqQaQGMbDeliVuplCpKnRvDM/edit?usp=sharing) 🤷♀️ Being mindful of the time helped me realize when to jump from intro to body to conclusion. Once I finished the script, I stayed mindful of my range while testing its flow, getting a feel for the tone of the part of the script I was on. I marked the script with 3 levels, `down, mid, up`, and used them as reminders in case I already didn't make the tone shift. Being someone who feared class presentations in school, these workshops and practices helped unchain me from one of my more limiting beliefs to no longer fear working towards the art of spontaneous and dynamic speech. Maybe soon I'll be able to go on a podcast or just make videos by speaking out of my ass 🤪 I'd recommend trying these practices for yourself even if you don't make content, just to be more comfortable and expressive of your ideas.