Check-In Round

We start every newsletter like I start every meeting I run at work — with a quick question to get us checked in and ready to go. Feel free to send me your response to this issue’s question!

“What’s the first concert you went to and what’s the best concert you’ve been to?”

I’m almost positive my first concert was Something Corporate and Rx Bandits at Clutch Cargo’s in Pontiac, Michigan in 2003. Best is probably Manchester Orchestra at House of Blues in Anaheim?

*I’ve been exploring life as a 1920’s paper boy/man.*

What Has My Attention

It’s possible to be deliberate about lots of different things. When I think about the word — and my obsession with it — I tend to think about it first in terms of information. What’s worth paying attention to? How can you set yourself up to get the information and experiences that will help you live a life you’re proud of while not getting sucked into the distractions that our sorely overmatched brains crave?

Last week I published an article with my first take at a relatively holistic framework for thinking about how to construct and interact with an “information ecosystem.” To be honest, I wrote the first draft of this article over eight months ago and it had been sitting in a mostly finished state since then. I felt like I had started to put my finger on something profound, or at least interesting, and I wanted to make sure that what I ended up publishing would be as good and as clear as possible. Each week, though, it would fall to the bottom of my to-do list. Finally, I decided to just take it largely as written, fix the obvious typos, and get it out into the world.

Surprisingly, it has garnered the most reaction (primarily on LinkedIn, but also in text messages and on Twitter) out of anything I’ve recently written.

I have a long list of follow-up articles related to this basic idea that I’m excited to dig into: really defining an “information ecosystem” and why you should care about yours, deep dives into each of the quadrants in my framework, an exploration or what types of information are best suited for certain approaches — there’s a lot to dive into.

I’d love if you would check out the article and let me know what questions you have. What would you like to see me explicate more? What’s unclear? What resonates and what doesn’t?

What Has My Attention Elsewhere

After culinary and literary acclaim, she’s moving into the woods. (New York Times)

“After consulting and literary acclaim, he’s moving into the woods.” This is the header of the article they’ll hopefully write about me in like 30 years.

Finding the one decision that removes 100 decisions (or, why I’m reading no new books in 2020) (Tim Ferriss)

I love the essentialism of this. “I’m now asking myself across the board: what can I categorically and completely remove, even temporarily, to create space for seeing the bigger picture and finding gems?” I really like the idea of reading no new books for an entire year. As someone who generally reads over 50 new books every year it sounds kinda bonkers — which is why I think I like it.

Your New Year’s resolution has already failed (CGP Grey)

I wrote about the idea of yearly themes in my Year of Intensity/Simplicity article and Grey does a great job explaining the gist of the approach in this YouTube video. If you’re curious about the idea of choosing a yearly (or quarterly) theme to help guide your life this video will set you on the right path.

Doing a digital declutter (The Focus Course)

If you don’t want to read all of Digital Minimalism this article extracts the most actionable bit in a really straightforward and cogent way. I think I’m due for a digital declutter and this is the article I’ll use to refresh myself on the parameters.

Productivity advice for the weird (I Will Teach You To Be Rich)

If I was more comfortable coming across as a total ass this is the article I would’ve written. A pretty no-bullshit look at what sorts of fundamentals you need to lock in place if you want to be more productive.

I’m playing Stardew Valley as Ernest Hemingway and I finally learned how to fish (Polygon)

I’m not sure this has anything to do with attention — I just love the idea of playing Stardew Valley as Ernest Hemingway.

Closing Round

Work: Last week was a doozy. Back-to-back all day sessions (one of which with a SVP and her entire team). Knocked me off my daily habits a bit but after a nice weekend I feel mostly recovered.
Play: Because of the aforementioned tough week I haven’t played much of anything recently. I sunk quite a few hours into Card of Darkness (Apple Arcade) over the previous few weeks but I’m feeling like I’ve mostly gotten it out of my system.
Read: Re-reading Getting Things Done. Re-reading Make Time. Still working on The Fall of Hyperion. Just started Turing’s Cathedral. Listening to Why We Sleep. So much for WIP limits, eh?
Watch: I have the last two episodes of The Good Place waiting for me and I’m avoiding them because I don’t want the show to end :(

Your friend,
Sam