A big inspiration for me is my friend Ben. You look at him and you always see him doing interesting things: Learning new languages, acquiring craft skills, joking with strangers, working weird jobs, you name it. And you can see how he profits from it. Don’t get me wrong here. Ben is a very laid-back […]
All posts tagged ‘interestingness’
Paradoxes I Live By
“How wonderful that we have met with a paradox. Now we have some hope of making progress.” –Niels Bohr “Since the beginning of time, tricksters (the mythological origin of all clowns) have embraced life’s paradoxes, creating coherence through confusion — adding disorder to the world in order to expose its lies and speak the truth.” […]
Two Kinds of Freedom
Here’s the kind of freedom I’m not interested in: It’s the freedom to choose between other people’s options. Some examples: The freedom to buy one brand of shampoo or another. The freedom of flextime, choosing to enter a job either at 8am or 9am. The freedom of fashion, showing good taste by choosing Apple over […]
How to Make Change Real
How is that icicle in Columbus doing? Did it grow? Did it melt? Whatever you personal icicle is, take a moment to look at it. Look at the situation you find yourself in. Look at your job (or your unemployment), look at your relationships, at your friends, at your hobbies. Look at your talents, your […]
How to Live an Interesting Life
When I felt two guys trying to grab stuff from my pockets for the fourth time in a row, this year’s fiestas somehow lost a bit of their appeal. Sure, everybody knows that the main event of Cartagena’s independence celebrations can get a little chaotic at times: People throw firecrackers, cornflour and blue dye powder; […]