Practice Does Not Make Perfect
What I'm Up To (Cheerleading), What I Reflected On (Practice), and What's Occupying My Mind (Muad'Dib) - all part of Allen's Friday Flights
Welcome back to my Friday Flights!
These are a flight of personal updates from me and it’ll be centered around what I’m up to, what I reflected on, and what book (or even thing) occupies my mind. Makes sense why I’d have a different selection of topics since I often choose samplers and flights when I go out to eat and drink.
Ciao!
Allen
I am curious to hear from you on what I should reflect on.
You can use the button below to submit a question, or comment on this Substack.
Inside:
What I’m Up To
What I Reflected On (from my Career Break)
What thing occupies my mind
What I’m Up To:
TL;DR: Being a cheerleader to Startup Founders I know
Someone I know is launching his product called Frens, a Discord Bot, and it’s a great contribution to the Web3 Community Management Industry!
Another person I know launched his product called GoCharlie.ai and I got to have a swell chat with him - TL;DR: Ex-KPMG turned startup founder.
My Ecommerce campaign for a company I own has hit 600% growth in sales in the last 14 days; finally earning more than my ad spend. Dude it’s hard.
I have a fixation on STX Crypto, which is bitcoin (it is bitcoin) with smart contracts
Just crossed 300k in views on LinkedIn. I know it’s a vanity metric, but that’s 388% better than last year, for the same 5 month period. Also I have no idea how to structure my LinkedIn profile. LOL.
Patsy Takemeto Mink is the Asian American Version of Ruth Baders Ginsburg.
Oh I showed up in a Morning Brew Alumni Newsletter that went out to a lot of people. That was neat.
What I Reflected On
TL;DR: Practices Does Not Make Perfect. Learn to Unlearn.
Practice does not make perfect. Practices makes permanent.
I think about this often when it comes to building behaviors. Practices can make something routine, almost effortless to the eyes of the beholder.
But you know what else practices does? Practice also makes unhealthy habits permanent too.
Makes me wonder, what are some bad habits that have been practice by me because of corporate careers?
I’ve had 7 years of corporate working experience. Factoring overtime, that’s about 16,000 hours of work.
My career break has taught me I have a lot of bad habits that formed by sheer the repetition 16,000 hours of working can only give.
What are my bad habits that I have identified so far?
Well, 7 months later and I can tell you my bad habits surrounds a very strong and fixated work-identity that took my 3 months of my career break to unlearn.
I wonder if I have de-centered my work-identity and made way for new identities to coexist, or even overtake. I like to believe getting cats helped with that.
This leads me to my next thought-
Definitely give yourself time to unlearn…with a career break!
For each year you worked, that’s one month off you deserve to do nothing.
It is in this nothing that you will find your best self!
Practice makes permanent. But that’s not what makes you great.
What makes you great is your ability to unlearn something that was made permanent, and practice something new.
What SERIES occupies my mind
TL;DR: All hail Muad’Dib, and the Golden Path!
God Emperor of Dune
I have read probably an ungodly amount of Science Fiction in my life. But I haven’t read Dune until now.
I finished reading (hearing?) Book 4 of Frank Herbert’s God Emperor of Dune. Yep, it is related to Denis Villeneuve’s Dune that won a lot of Oscars. God Emperor of Dune focuses on the necessary and intentional “evils” and “suppression” that had to be done in the name of humanity’s advancement.
Just so we’re all clear here, if you’re looking for Heroes, there are none. It’s so wonderfully boring, where nothing is happening, but everything has happened, and I love it.
Book 1 & 2 are focused on power plays between factions, both apparent and byproduct
Book 3 & 4 are focused on the introspection of winners
The books are an amazing supplement, but not a competitor, to the movie.
Top Quotes
It is possible to know so much about a subject that you become totally ignorant?
We tend to become like the worst in those we oppose
The mystery of life isn't a problem to solve, but a reality to experience.
It is so shocking to find out how many people do not believe that they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult.
It is impossible to live in the past, difficult to live in the present and a waste to live in the future.
Survival is the ability to swim in strange water.
Show me a completely smooth operation and I'll show you a cover up. Real boats rock.
The most persistent principles of the universe are accident and error
How to experience it: I’m not someone who can read four books that span 60+ hours of content just like that. I highly recommend doing an audio book at 1.2x speed. The first book has terrific narration. Don’t worry if you miss a detail, Frank Herbert is great at reminding you of things and impressing upon a point. Yes you can watch the movie before reading the books - they complement each other.
Where to get it (Affiliate links to me <3):
BONUS
Bionic reading
