[TT 022] Thrive path, fatherhood, free(?) will, language museum
Howdy Thrivers,
Today I'm writing from the top floor of a Stanford residence with a lovely view and breath-giving fragrance of a lush green courtyard. I thoroughly relished my weeks of travel and I feel calm and at peace as I complete the transition into my next chapter. I am continually astonished and revel in gratitude for the ease and beauty of my life.
With settled resolve, let's jump into this week's Thriving Thursday.
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This past week I did a dedicated brainstorm on how I can move forward with building my 50 year master plan vision with some of the tools from the Designing your Life book I mentioned in TT 020. As a procedural note, in 1 hour of dedicated brainstorming I went from stuck to engaged and empowered in directly actionable ways. I'm excited to keep practicing this methodology and framework for ever greater acceleration of the fly wheel of my life design.
There were two very important realizations that came out of my brainstorm:
- I want to build UTT & GIFT in public
- A huge part of the vision is synthesizing academic research in a digestible, intelligible format for lay people
For the former, I hypothesize that building in public will create a useful, valuable, and profitable business much faster by increasing the surface area for serendipity and decreasing wasted cycles on dead ends. Perhaps most importantly, I do not see UTT or GIFT as my own and so it is for all of us to witness its unfolding together. For the latter, navigating our abundant streams of knowledge and making sense of the noise will be directly impactful and meaningful for anyone seeking distilled awareness. Ultimately, I envision a library of such topics that are interwoven and interrelated in the Universal Theory of Thriving.
So here is my first ask of you: If you could have the top 100 academic articles distilled to a 1-2 page summary on any topic related to your daily life, what topic is most inspiring and interesting to you right now? If there are multiple areas worth inquiry, share as many as you like.
I'll consolidate the responses and build a running list so that I can prioritize my research and outreach.
On the ambitions of fatherhood
This past Sunday I celebrated Father's Day with a dear friend that, for the first time ever, celebrated this holiday as a father himself. As part of the lovely celebration, he offered three worthwhile prompts for all gathered:
- What are 3 qualities from your father that you appreciate and nurture within yourself?
- Who are 3 fathers (not your own) that you admire and appreciate? What about them stands out?
- From what you've seen and felt, how can I be a better father?
After the first round of shares, we said a toast to each father thanking them for all their love and efforts and for carrying on their lineage. After the other two shares, we discussed what makes a good father and how to nurture those qualities within ourselves. Our conversation was tender and thoughtful, and I think it was the most meaningful honoring of our respective fathers I've ever witnessed.
Most inspiring to me was the prompt we offered back to the recent dad: what qualities do you wish to offer your child (that they may one day respond to the first question in our share)? His answer was both supremely practical and metaphysical:
- Resiliency
- Adaptability
- Critical Thinking / Mindfulness (he offered them as two sides of the same coin)
- Creativity
This is squarely aligned with the modern analysis of empowering youth.
- Resiliency relates to Attachment Theory, coined by John Bowlby and brilliantly put to task by renowned neuroscientist Dan Siegel (Whole Brain Child is on my list to read) - effectively, children raised with secure attachment and parental attunement tend to be more emotionally resilient and more able to self-regulate earlier in life. To wrap back to last week's note, Gabor Mate talks A LOT about the neurochemistry and experiential reality of emotional resilience and it's impact on self-regulation as it relates to substance and behavioral addition in In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts.
- Adaptability relates to the rapidly changing natural, technological, and professional landscapes characteristic of our modern era. The case for adaptability is made by Yuval Harrari in 21 Lessons for the 21st Century (also on my list to digest soon).
- Mindfulness (the vaguely spiritual version) and critical thinking (the vaguely secular version) relate to the ability to witness the present moment without judgment but with discernment. To acknowledge and overcome internal biases and prejudices to shed light on what is really true right now. Both in daily life and in connection to something greater than ourselves, there is substantial research to underscore the importance and power of these qualities.
- Creativity is the ability to come up with novel solutions and modalities of expression in relation to what is currently present in the child's life. This includes, but is far from circumscribed by, but art and music.
The practice of constantly orienting daily direct and indirect interactions with a child to these four qualities is remarkably complex and involved. As my wife and I prepare for raising our family, we will certainly document our own qualities we wish to hand down (as well as the ones we wish to release from our respective lineages) and this is a fantastic place to start.
On the illusion of the illusion of free will
The same father noted above turned me on to a fascinating argument by philosopher & neuroscientist Sam Harris into the illusion of free will (just ignore the terrible animation and only listen to the awesome audio).
In short, we have a will, and our choices matter, but we have no free will. Moreover, the illusion of free will is itself an illusion. Sounds esoteric, I know, but Harris' lecture is accessible, coherent, and very well reasoned.
Most compelling to me are the positive moral implications of releasing our hold on free will. In fact, Harris' treatment of the notion of free will and determinism is closely aligned with the compassionate approach to treating addiction espoused by Gabor Mate. Honoring the work and worldview of the latter is very much accepting the fundamental scientific and philosophical tenants highlighted by the former.
Frankly, I'm intrigued. I've long felt the internal tension of agency and inspiration, and this is an elegant resolution to my impasse. If you happen to take a listen, I'm curious about your take on the mechanics of choice. That was my biggest sticking point in the whole lecture - how do we make individual choices (that really do matter!) in light of the sum total of our conditional influences?
On a voice-activated museum of language
There is a new museum at the Franklin School in DC called Planet Word and, you guessed it, it's all about words.
I am a fond lover of language and words and also enjoy deliberately designed interactive art sculptures. Put the two together, and I'm very curious to check it out!
Incidentally, there is an older Museum of Language in Maryland just outside DC that is also devoted to linguistics and language, though it does seem a little less engaging and playful than Planet Word.
If you happen to check out either museum, let me know!
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With unconditional illusory agency, I lay another brick on our shared path. Until next week!
~Henry