John's Blog

Setting goals about the future is easier when you visualize what you want your life to be like rather than listing bullet points of a future resume. Viscerally visualize.

I once had a clock that didn’t work for two years because I didn’t buy the AA batteries it needed. I once wore unwashed dress shirts for months because I didn’t go to the dry cleaners.

I knew I should have done something. But the inertia was too strong. I made mistakes, and the clock and shirts were the reminders that I didn’t come through for myself. 

But I’m glad it happened.

My clocks work, and my dress shirts are always pressed. Sometimes it takes big mistakes for lasting change to stick.

Getting good sleep may be the best habit I can develop in my life.

Things that have helped me sleep include: hot showers before bed, drinking banana water (boiling bananas with their skins, which are especially high in magnesium), taking melatonin, wearing earplugs, using blackout curtains, and watching mindless TV.

The most important day when you’re building a habit is not the day that you stumble.

It’s the day after the stumble.

You don’t ask what time it is.

You forget where your phone is.

You don’t read the news.

You sweat more than you scroll.

You get a minor sunburn.

You sing loudly.

Beaches are colder and windier than you expect.

It’s often better to park near the beach, open the trunk, put the backseats down, and picnic in your car facing the water.

When you stand at the ocean, waves crash uniformly, one after another. But look at the ocean from a distance and at elevation, and you’ll see waves of all shapes and sizes, crashing in all directions.

Such are the thoughts of our minds. The thoughts we express as words or actions align to a consistent and uniform narrative. But the choppy haze of thoughts chattering in the background are what drive it all. You cannot tame them. But observe them, and you may plan for destructive waves before it’s too late.

Our tasks are air, and our time is a container. What we do expands to fit the time we allot it. 

Give yourself thirty minutes to draft an email, and you will expand the task until the half hour is over.

Imposing constraints on yourself isn’t constrictive. Constraints fill our time balloons so that they neither drop nor pop.