🇪🇺 Andreas post is a kinda perfect follow up for my US observations above: Dear Europe, please wake up – eu/acc. I share his feeling below:
Europe is special to me as I consider myself a proud European, but damn we need to talk.
I am equally extremely bull-ish on Europe and equally extremely bear-ish.
🚴 like Taylor, I bike everyday, under any weather -kids included- so taking this as an example for his comfort ≠ happiness made me smile: Any sacrifice for comfort is a waste.
📱 talking about kids, Katherine's post is a must read: it's the adults, not the kids! We welcomed our family yesterday to celebrate both our kids birthdays and I can confirm the benefits of a strict ‘no-phone policy’ when you’re with them. It’s a game changer. This statement took me off guard:
This is our paradox. When we are apart: hypervigilance. When we are together: inattention.
🏦 I like the way Morgan thinks about debt:
I think this is the most practical way to think about debt: As debt increases, you narrow the range of outcomes you can endure in life.
♾ aaah the power of commitment. Nix's post is a must-read: what's a good commitment? It also reminded me this famous quote by the french writer André Gide: “To choose is to renounce”.
The world continues to be one glorious pool of endless optionality, infinite choice. Multiple places to be in one night. Hobbies to pick up. People to meet. That’s comforting but scary because it means you have to choose, a la Sylvia Plath’s fig tree. The anxiety of having infinite possibilities branch out before you. You think you’ll suffer if you continue down one trail and neglect all other pathways. The truth is: you’ll probably suffer more if you don’t choose at all.
🛠 as a skateboader, I always embraced the whole DIY ethos. On top of that I’ve been raised by a formula3 racer turned mechanic. Then my father fell in love with motorbikes and started to work on them and spent more and more of his weekends literally ‘inside them’. So when Jim points out the different between 40 year-old cars and modern ones, I feel I’ve heard and seen this a million times already. I get the analogy with modern websites: Motorcycles, Cars, Websites, and Seams.
Being able to repair the problems on that bike with such little know-how or experience made me reflect on the simplicity and elegance of such a simple piece of engineering. Everything I needed to know on that bike I could inspect myself.