http://ranprieur.com/#9a417fe513f58988c3b5b1e84cfc57397194a79b 2021-02-04T16:20:10Z Ran Prieur http://ranprieur.com/ ranprieur@gmail.com http://ranprieur.com/#34e5e5988687655ede5ff369296d70c36a36467d 2021-02-04T16:20:10Z February 4. Off the usual subjects, today I want to write about role models. With the Superbowl coming up, I really don't like Tom Brady. And when another person bothers you that much, it's usually because they're reflecting something inside you that you need to come to terms with. Brady always says that he couldn't have done it without his coaches and teammates. But the myth of Tom Brady is the legendary individual, not a cooperator but a competitor, whose will to win is so intense that he can carry any team of losers on his back to a championship.

My counterpoint to Tom Brady is a 90's NBA player named Derrick McKey. Supremely talented, on the court he appeared to be lazy, and he never put up big numbers. But his teammates loved him. They said he took care of the little things that made the whole team better. His lack of quantifiable production eventually led the Sonics to trade him to the Pacers. Immediately, the Pacers won twelve straight games, including a playoff sweep on the way to the eastern conference finals. Meanwhile the Sonics lost in the first round for two straight years.

So I can't defeat Tom Brady, but I can defeat my inner Tom Brady, by aiming for subtle helpful actions instead of obvious personal achievements.

Another example. I love the Great British Baking Show, and in one early season (spoilers follow) the three finalists were Brendan, James, and John. Brendan was like the Dalai Lama meets Hannibal Lecter: serene, precise, deliberate, and extremely competent. James was the opposite: wild and sunny, a master improviser who would always try crazy stuff and still bring in a good result.

The third finalist, John, was an average baker who could only motivate himself through mopey self-criticism. Week after week, he barely squeaked by, and even in the final, he was no better than Brendan. But the judges, like the writers of the disastrous Game of Thrones finale, admired his story and declared him the winner. Years later, he would admit that he regretted winning because it derailed his life.

So I can't eliminate John from the show, but I can eliminate him from my personality, by not doing what he would do, and instead, doing what either Brendan or James would do.

Personality is made of actions, and small actions are more important than big actions, because there are more of them. If you want to be a different kind of person, just do what that person would do, in the smallest way, right now.

]]> http://ranprieur.com/#b1908880a32ef96ff97405b29477a2843c60c020 2021-02-01T13:50:08Z February 1. I got a lot of feedback from the last post, but all my ideas for a follow-up are half-baked. So today, some negative links.

The Paradox of Abundance is that abundance is only good for a small number of people who know how to manage it. The author starts with the example of food, where health-conscious people pick out the best food, while most people are drawn to the cheapest and best tasting food, which is bad for them. And the same kind of thing is happening with information.

The downside of clean: Scientists fear pandemic's 'hyper hygiene' could have long-term health impacts. I read somewhere that when kids in the slums of India got polio, it was only a mild sickness, because their immune systems were so strong from exposure to other microbes. Personally, I eat food off the floor, and walk barefoot outside whenever I can.

Moving on to mental health, a good thread on the psychonaut subreddit, There's a parasite inside of you feeding off negative thoughts and emotions.

And a smart article, The Seductive Appeal of Urban Catastrophe. It's mostly about the iconic ruined city of Angkor. We used to think that when the city was sacked in 1431, everyone suddenly left. Newer archaeology suggests that it was mainly the royal family who left, while nonroyals "continued to live at Angkor, repaired its ailing water infrastructure, recycled stones from temples into new structures, and planted farms where high-density housing once was."

The actual decline had already started, and would continue for a long time. The cause was that "leaders bungled maintenance of the city's water system in response to climate threats." Applying this to our own time, I continue to think that collapse will be highly local. The places that do the best job maintaining and retrofitting their infrastructure will thrive, and the places that do the worst job will be abandoned.

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