We went to the snow this week and my 2-year-old was too scared to go sledding. It didn’t matter that the slope wasn’t even as steep as playground slides that she likes to go down at home. It didn’t matter that her 5-year-old brother wasn’t afraid of it. It didn’t matter that her mother and …
Author Archives: Mitch
From Packrat to Neatnik: My Journey to Neatness – Lesson #1: Choose your destination.
One of my New Year’s resolutions for this year is to keep my living and work spaces cleaner and tidier and to declutter. I have seen the benefits of it and have wanted to do it for a long time but it conflicts with my inner packrat that knows that almost everything could be just …
My Thoughts on Blogging Every Day for a Year
This year (2020) one of my New Year’s resolutions was to write a blog post daily for a year. I did it. Today’s the last day. I’m glad I did it and I’m glad I’m done. Just like a marathon. It’s been fun and rewarding but I’ve decided not to do it again next year. …
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Get an uncomfortable chair
I recently had some back pain and bought a new chair that looks more like a pogo stick than a chair. It has just one main leg and intentionally wobbles easily with your movement to keep you moving. It works pretty well and one other factor is that it’s a little uncomfortable. This is actually …
Don’t be afraid to go your own way
There’s conventional wisdom, and there’s unconventional wisdom. Conventional wisdom is given to you. Unconventional wisdom is discovered—by you. Or people like you. Question conventional wisdom. That’s what leads to better wisdom. It will feel uncomfortable, because how could everyone before you be wrong? But it’s worth doing. It’s the only way forward. You’re in the …
Encourage someone
I still remember verbatim a comment from my tutor in my first college philosophy course: “I would encourage you to explore what I suspect might be a talent for philosophy.” It was followed by a disappointing “B+”. Never mind. I held on to that little bit of encouragement and ended up majoring in philosophy, getting …
Add your perspective
I am sure that many of the things that I’ve written about in my blog this year have been said before by other people. For whatever reason, that didn’t seem to be a reason to not write about the things that were on my mind. Sometimes it’s only the 11th time that you hear something …
The joy of not knowing
There are two unknowns in poker: what cards your opponents have, and what cards the deck will provide as the hand progresses. If you knew both of those things, poker would be no fun at all. If you knew just one of those things, it would be a lot less fun too. The joy of …
Everything I Needed to Know about Business I Learned from Surfing (#10): You can’t control everything. You can always do something.
There are a lot of things you can’t control in surfing. If there are no waves, you can’t make there be waves. If the wind is coming in from the wrong direction, you can’t change it. I remember a surf report once given where the scout said, “Today is a good day to do something …
Everything I Needed to Know about Business I Learned from Surfing (#9): Surf more waves.
The more surf spots you visit and the more waves you surf, the better you will become at surfing. Waves that don’t look that great from the shore can be really fun when you get in the water. Waves can be better or worse than you think they will be. Surf reports can be right …