Just keep skimming, just keep skimming. I thought to myself as I paced through my open plan living room and dining room while reading Attention Span by Gloria Mark. You need 1735 steps anyways, so you might as well get through this chapter…or at least to the next subheading of the book. God, I was bored.

Earlier this year, I came across a Tumblr post that I keep thinking about.

It’s the story of a man who is writing an article on people achieving high scores in classic video games. He finds out that the record for tetris is 327 lines. This man’s wife, regularly clears 500 - 600 lines on long car rides easily.

So, they go to a tournament, and she sets the record at 841. That wasn’t even her best score. She’s just a baller like that.

After setting a baseline at Tough Temple last July, I was ready to make some improvements at my next weightlifting meet.

I am remarkably disciplined. Structure, control, gamified goals, delayed gratification paired with living a non-routine life and only committing to doing things that are important is a pretty good way to describe how I operate my life. It has helped me achieve some big fitness goals and maintain healthy lifestyle habits.

Now, I have a new habit I am trying to form, and I am stuck. Really stuck.

It took me almost two years, but I finally finished reading Poor Economics by Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo. In one of the last chapters, they discuss a concept that really resonated with me. It’s called the three I’s, which stand for Ideology, Ignorance and Inertia.

Olympic Weightlifting has quickly become a big part of my life - dedicating a couple of hours 3 times a week to something will do that!

So, when my life started getting chaotic (travel, moving, career changes), the preparation and anticipation for Tough Temple started to serve as an anchor of sorts. As I would start to spin out about future uncertainties, a common mantra was I’ll figure everything else out AFTER Tough Temple.

Here’s a terrifying article from the Washington Post. It’s titled: AI is more persuasive than a human in debate, study finds. Subheading: When provided basic demographic information on their opponents, AI chatbots adapted their arguments and became more persuasive than humans in online debates.

Here is my position on balance.

Balance is a worthy goal, but I don’t think we have a correct calibration of the scale on which it is measured.

This weekend I lost my community.

My weightlifting gym BASA (Baltimore Area Strength Athletes), run by Jason Morstein, permanently closed.

I feel dramatic saying this but it’s true.

Work chat channels are the worst. When left to occur organically, chat conversations are disorganized, nothing is tracked, and everything is forgotten in a day.

This year has been hard. Really hard.

It’s like 2024 decided to be 5 years at once. Maybe it’s a tax thing.

Lately, I’ve been having regular conversations with my mentor and friend, Simon Carcagno, and this man has been on a roll. He will make these, seemingly throwaway, comments and observations that worm there way into my brain and unlock and unblock these mental obstacles I’ve been struggling with since the beginning of 2024.

“Pro-bleeeeeemmmmm?!?!?” she exclaimed, while sticking a microphone taped to a golden mannequin leg into my face.

I stare at her, my eyes wide, slightly panicking while scrambling for a better way to explain what I want to say. I draw a blank. I resign myself to saying “existential dread”.

So there I was, minding my own business, when the Digital Wellbeing app on my phone decides to inform me that I’m spending an average of 15 hours a week on Tiktok.

Sir, I think at the app, how could you say something so controversial, yet so brave?

This blog post is inspired by a tiktok video created by @notwildin.

My experience completing the RunDisney 2024 Dopey Challenge. Four days, four races, 48.6 miles.

Ever since I learned about it on Tiktok, I have always wanted to got to a Taste Film event. Unfortunately, they are based in the UK, so it’s going to require a little extra coordination.

Have we ever earned anything in our lives?

What does it mean to be young? In the broadest of terms, it means to be on the early side of the spectrum, to have a path ahead, to be certain that progress is possible.

A few weeks ago, I was listening to a special episode of the Teacher’s Off Duty Podcast with Daymond John and they were talking about teaching kids financial literacy. One idea they mentioned was having an in-class economy, where students earn classroom currency and then have to budget their money accordingly.