Here's an interesting paradox, courtesy of David Whyte:
The deeper your commitment to the principles in your life, the more fluid life starts to feel.
True commitment often doesn't mean rigidity, it's more likely to result in flow and movement.
Commitment is liberating.
More brilliance from David Whyte on generosity in relationship
Learning to be generous with yourself ... for some of us, that's the hard part.
3/ Gratitude can be understood as a particular form of attention, one that unites awareness and appreciation in an open ended way.
In this sense it can absolutely be considered a practice, like meditation or prayer (though it's also not exactly the same as either of these).
Speaking of gratitude, there's a fine drizzle in the air in Oakland, CA, today.
It's barely there... just a few droplets... but it makes the air feel fresh and clean, and it's AMAZING.
Opening windows today.
Wow, that feels good.
It's green air quality for miles.
4/ "To hate our procrastinating tendencies is to hate our relationship with time itself" - David Whyte
5/ "any creative frontier is in its essence a conversational frontier"
First, a conversation within ourselves;
Then, that conversation carried into the broader world.
6/ "an endeavour achieved without delay ... is a bagatelle"
(NTSF, use "bagatelle" more often in casual conversation)
7/ This one is solid gold:
"Procrastination does not stop a project from coming to fruition; what stops us is giving up on an original idea because we have not got to the heart of the reason we are delaying, nor let the true form of our reluctance instruct us on the way ahead."
8/ my most Twitter-relevant David Whyte quote yet...
Note, he doesn't oversimplify by saying "distraction bad, focus good"...
Instead I think he suggests that both distraction and focus are necessary parts of the "dance of purpose".
May your distractions be worthy of you!
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2/ Years ago I lived in Cape Town, South Africa for a year. I was a volunteer teacher.
I lived in one of the central suburbs and took a train each day into Salt River, which was the township where the school I worked was located.
3/ Cape Town is a beautifully diverse city. Arguably one of the most diverse cities in the world.
A key refresh point on trade routes for centuries. A multilingual, multiethnic city at the tip of Africa whose inhabitants nickname it "The Mother City".
1/ You sit down next to someone at a dinner party.
After some small talk, the person effortlessly pivots to deeper talk on topics of personal interest to both of you. They make space for you, say things that are spontaneously funny, + seem curious about your perspective.
-->
2/ perhaps you have the distinct feel that this person sparkles
what you might take for granted about this whole exchange is that most of it is regulated by your body
Personal space, body language, and eye contact
Now consider what happens when you converse with an LLM.
3/ yes, what happens is, in its own way, a marvel
The fact that stochastic models function as well as they do is extraordinary + tells us things we have not fully grasped about human language
But consider for a moment that the model is essentially trying to backfill the somatic
@quotidiania @the_wilderless 2/ this paragraph right here: (the "melancholic", or, we could say, the "dysfunctional coper", fails, because he is making it all about HIM - which is to say, he falsely assumes that HE can "fix it all" with his intellect or his effort somehow, instead of simply feeling the loss)
@quotidiania @the_wilderless 3/ his delusional coping style comes about, because he has a poverty-mindset - his reaction to loss is to become more "grasping"
A thread about the "note taking wars", + why famous s$%-p#$ter Tiag@ F@rte does not have a clue what he is talking about
@obsdmd is a gorgeous, well executed product with a fantastic community behind it. Yay!
♥️🚀 ♥️
... but it is *not* a "roam-like".
2/n block referencing and outlining, as implemented by @RoamResearch, are WAY more than just check-boxes to tick, in some arbitrary feature-comparison list.
They are *core* features of the product.
... CORE features that cannot be tacked on, if they're not in the product-DNA.
3/n Yet, it takes time to see this.
... when I first started using Roam, I was so conditioned by the Wikipedia model of backlinked pages, I couldn't 1st see that the true revolution, is at a deeper level.