Minmax Perceptual Motion
Between Early Life, Marinating while Blogging & Impending Death
This is a take on phases, a facet to revisit during off-kilter times. It’s a method to remain anchored yet ever-moving.
Two traps you need to avoid:
1) Caring what they think and
2) thinking that they care.
You know the song that goes ‘It's so hard. Can we skip to the good part?’
AJR — The Good Part
Well, here’s an option—pivot. What follows is pure backstory, marred by anxious tendencies circling ideation.
This initial newsletter. ‘Twas unpublished, the same autogenerated starter post meant to signal that something new was imminent. It was embarrassing and inconsistent, always “Coming Soon” overshadowed by what lay ahead.
nudge-nudge, wink, wink
say no more!
Last summer through autumn, I avoided getting on with writing by workshopping many potential names for this project.1 Happily, I finally settled on a name: 2. Be Real. I didn’t mentally connect it to the app practically sporting the same name until I received a comment.
Originally Going with the Tide
Me: In a nutshell, I was building sandcastles, oblivious to the approaching tide. A bit slow on the uptake, and of course, a bit sad.⛱ To be real, the name ultimately doesn’t matter much (sort of). I plan to change it to something else in the coming days, but we’ll have to see how that goes.
Pivot*
It starts by acknowledging that personal choices are not solely driven by relationships alone but also by wider social factors. Our perspectives are shaped by our immediate reactions and by deeper, Elective Affinities that connect us to others and the world around us.
Several moons back, I had the privilege of discussing life, and alike, with a mentor who admitted that, in hindsight, they made poor time investments. Though they were committed to their work in finance, believing it to be a worthy cause at the time, stonks, turned out to be anything but.
Now, single and without descendants, their days are filled with reflections on missed opportunities and choices not fully capitalized on.
Drawing from Benjamin Walter’s exposition of Goethe’s work [Die Wahlverwandtschaften], personal decisions are influenced by a mix of conscious thought and inherent attractions or repulsions.
But in the domain of civility, what is noble is bound to the relation of the person to his expression…
Recognizing this relation can help understand and possibly change outlooks.
If there are unquestionably areas of expression whose contents are valid regardless of who gives them a distinct stamp… the former binding condition nonetheless remains inviolable [absolute] for the domain of freedom in the widest sense.
To this domain belongs the individual imprint of propriety, the individual imprint of the spirit—everything that is called cultivation [Bildung].2
(Bildung is fundamental thinking. German for creation, image, and shape. A combination of education and knowledge is tied to autonomy and self-cultivation. Literary term Bildungsroman.)
Suggesting that views are not static but develop through the interaction of internal tendencies and external forces. Moving beyond the uncertainty of a decision is the first step forward. What we believe and the information at our disposal can change, but the main ideas stay the same.
On Being, you’ve got to keep moving forward.
Start. I promise;3 They care. Well, find the people who genuinely care. People who care, care enough to pause briefly and focus on you. For your sake, find your people and reciprocate.