Neat: Strikingly

Awhile ago, I blogged about square space, which makes beautifully designed websites easy (without coding experience).

I've recently stumbled upon Strikingly, which is even easier to use and created by a Singaporean!

You get one free site -- try it out!  I made a mock this week for a start-up idea I'm testing with a few friends.  It was unbelievably easy.

[Mental Health Break] Texas State Fair

D Magazine

Yes, that actually is a sculpture made entirely of butter in honor of the Texas State Fair.

To compliment the image, check out this list of crazy fried foods -- including salsa and bubblegum. 

A Silent Dinner Party. Could you do it?

Not sure if you've heard of it, but PechaKucha is a newish (cool) public speaking event concept started in Japan.  Think TED Talks for normal people... Except more concise.

The presenter gets 20 seconds per image.  20 slides in total.  That's 6 min 40 seconds.

No rambling allowed.  The powerpoint slides will move on their own regardless if you're ready.  Note: I desperately wish this happened at business meetings...

Today, I watched one on silent dinner parties.  Two hours.  No talking.  All strangers.  It sounds like a fascinating (and very tough) social experiment.

Think you could do it?

I'd have a very hard time based on my 2 day silent meditation retreat (I need a monk to keep me in line).

Can you imagine life before anesthesia?

I've been a regular at the dentist lately.
3 fillings last week.  
2 fillings this week. 
Lots of anesthesia.

It's been a relatively painless experience, but what if I was transported back in time?  

Let's say 1840 in Boston.

"In those days, even a minor tooth extraction was excruciating. Without effective pain control, surgeons learned to work with slashing speed. Attendants pinned patients down as they screamed and thrashed, until they fainted from the agony." - NewYorker

I can't really imagine what an amputation would have been like.  Luckily, things changed.

"On October 16, 1846, at Massachusetts General Hospital, Morton administered his gas through an inhaler in the mouth of a young man undergoing the excision of a tumor in his jaw. The patient only muttered to himself in a semi-conscious state during the procedure. The following day, the gas left a woman, undergoing surgery to cut a large tumor from her upper arm, completely silent and motionless. When she woke, she said she had experienced nothing at all." - NewYorker

By December, anesthesia had spread to Paris and London.
By February, it was available in all major European capitals
By June, it was available in most regions around the world.

That's fast.  That's also before Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone.

Why did it move so fast while other ideas move so slow?  

It cured a very visible problem (people screaming, doctors slashing, nurses holding down patients).  
It's also why it's taking longer to fix global warming or hunger in countries where we don't reside.

Advertising Technique: A Visual Pun

"All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts, his acts being seven ages."

- Shakespeare 

Spikes Asia (i.e., the Cannes of Asia or for non-agency people, the Emmys of advertising) took place in Singapore last week.  Here's a list of the award winners.

I was personally amused by the print ads by India's Penguin books.

The illustration beautifully conveys "classics on audiobook" by turning Shakespeare, Mark Twain and Oscar Wilde into headphones.  Awareness increased by 15% in a few days and sales went up 7%.  Plus, they came home with a Gold.

Advertising Technique: Displaced Actions

"Every two days now we create as much information as we did from the dawn of civilization up until 2003.  That's something like 5 exabytes of data"

- Eric Schmidt

We get a TON of messages of everyday.  If an advertisement is not interesting, it won't stick.

That's why I like this ad from the Texas Department of Transportation (TX DOT).

Instead of using a generic crash scene, TX DOT displaces the crash and brings it to the dinner table.  By doing this, it grabs the audience's attention and makes them think about the actions which cause drunk driving.

PS - Check out this other great PSA announcement from Melbourne

A View from a Stranger

I discovered this photographer, Satoki Nagata, via My Modern Met yesterday and absolutely loved his work.  The images evoke feelings of nostalgia -- of americana and people making their way in the world.

Here's his artist statement:

"I am a Japanese photographer who has been living in downtown Chicago since 1992. In the sixteen years I’ve lived here, the city has not just changed; it has changed me. My goal as an artist is to find and show the various connections that form the reality in which the city and its people exist. 

 I have learned from Zen Buddhism that our existence is composed of various relationships. This notion has inspired me to use photography to create relationships with the world to find myself. 

The camera is a powerful tool that allows me not just to approach the subject, but to capture the relationships as well as create a new relationship between myself and my subjects.I am always trying to create intimate bonds with my subjects while photographing, and I believe that this is the only way to show their reality and their relationship to the world. For me making photographs is equal to making relationships with the world. Through these images, I hope you will discover the subtle but substantial links captured in my photographs and feel a connection to the world I document"

Even Janis Joplin had "girl problems"

When I tell people I'm from Texas and sense judgement in their eyes (re: my entire time in San Francisco), I like to say "Janis Joplin is from there."  

She was a bad ass.
"The Queen of Psychedelic Soul"
#46 on Rolling Stones List of Greatest Artists of All Time
A member of the rock-and-roll hall of fame
A trailblazer for female rock musicians.

"Janis put herself out there completely, and her voice was not only strong and soulful, it was painfully and beautifully real. She sang in the great tradition of the rhythm & blues singers that were her heroes, but she brought her own dangerous, sexy rock & roll edge to every single song. She really gave you a piece of her heart. And that inspired me to find my own voice and my own style." 

- Stevie Nicks

She was also very vulnerable.  
I forget that legends can feel the same emotions as mere mortals.

I'm currently reading "Just Kids" by Patti Smith (a must read), and she describes her last interaction with Janis before her death.  

Janis was in New York playing in Central Park and then met up with other artists afterwards for drinks at the Remington.  She spent most of her night talking to a good-looking guy who eventually left with a prettier groupie.

Janis started crying and said, "This always happens to me, man.  Just another night alone"

Patti took her back to the Chelsea Hotel and listened to her bemoan her fate.  She then wrote her a poem:

I was working real hard 

To show the world what I could do 

Oh I guess I never dreamed 

I'd have toWorld spins some photographs 

How I love to laugh when the crowd laughs 

While love slips through 

A theatre that is full 

But oh baby 

When the crowd goes home 

And I turn in and I realize I'm alone 

I can't believe 

I had to sacrifice you

In response, Janice said, "That's me, man.  That's my song"

I guess we're all more alike (and vulnerable) than we think.

[A Poem for a Sunday] Power

Power by Adrienne Rich

Living in the earth-deposits of our history 

Today a backhoe divulged out of a crumbling flank of earth 
one bottle amber perfect a hundred-year-old 
cure for fever or melancholy a tonic 
for living on this earth in the winters of this climate. 

Today I was reading about Marie Curie: 
she must have known she suffered from radiation sickness 
her body bombarded for years by the element 
she had purified 
It seems she denied to the end 
the source of the cataracts on her eyes 
the cracked and suppurating skin of her finger-ends 
till she could no longer hold a test-tube or a pencil 

She died a famous woman denying
her wounds
denying
her wounds came from the same source as her power.

Eliminate and Replace

I've been reading the book, Do Cool Shit, based on a blog recommendation.  The author, Miki, left her stable banking job and became a serial entrepreneur.  

It reads like a female version of 4 Hour Work Week, telling us to "follow our passion"

I think our generation expects a fulfilling career (including me) without wanting to go through the pain and monotony of adult life.

"Cal Newport points out that "follow your passion" is a catchphrase that has only gotten going in the last 20 years, according to Google's Ngram viewer, a tool that shows how prominently a given phrase appears in English print over any period of time. The same Ngram viewer shows that the phrase "a secure career" has gone out of style, just as the phrase "a fulfilling career" has gotten hot." - Wait, but Why 

Therefore, I'm reading the book with caution -- taking in the advice, but not getting too carried away with Gen Y cliches (i.e., "i'm so special -- i can do anything!" ideals)

Here's two good (very simple) pieces of advice from Miki:

1. Eliminate the "negative"
We've all heard of "spring cleaning," but we only apply it to physical objects.  
Instead, why not apply spring cleaning to the rest of our lives?  

Make a list of what de-energizes you (i.e., a boss, a task, a friend, a chore, etc) and get rid of it.  You'll be happier and have more time for positive people and activities.

For example:
I hated doing my laundry and outsourced it in 2011.  Now, I don't spend my weekends in a laundromat
I hated working in private equity.  I quit and moved to Google (and never looked back)
I wasted time on Facebook.  I quit in 2011 and now spend my leisure hours on better things.

2. Replace by pursuing 3 things you really care about
In the book, Miki woke up hungover and missed her alarm.  She desperately called a taxi to take her to the World Trade Center -- it was 9/11 and all the lines were busy.  Thankfully, her office was across the street from the attack, so most of her co-workers survived.

The experience led her to create a list of 3 things she really cared about -- they were: A) soccer, B) making movies and C) starting her own business.  From that point, she started pursuing those goals, rather than the ones prescribed to her at work.  She accomplished A first by making the New York Magic women's soccer team.

I've thought a bit about this, and I think my goals are: A) travel the world (100 countries by 35), B) pursue a creative outlet and C) start my own business.  

I'd say I'm the furthest on A -- I've been to 50 countries / 7 continents.  
I've started working on B with art and photography classes
I need to get started on C.

Gathr: Your film, your friends, your theatre

A lot of movies at theaters... suck.  Ever wish you had more choice?

Well, Gathr lets you bring new documentary films to your hometown.

Here's how it works:

• Enter in your location (I chose my hometown, Plano, to see if it works outside big cities)
• Check out the options playing
• If there's a green bar, you can buy the ticket
• If there's a red bar, you can "reserve a seat."  If enough people do the same, you'll tip the theater and the movie will show.  If not, you lose $0
• If no bar, you can request the screening, including the date, time and location.  Gathr will then work with theaters to bring it to you.  Just make sure to tell your friends and family :)

Neat, right?  I just saw "Girl Rising" last night.  I'd recommend you bring it to a theater near you.

Is a child in the US equal to a child in Africa?

I saw the documentary "Girl Rising" tonight at a Room to Read event.  I was in charge of the registration desk -- with great power comes great responsibility some would say.

It was a well-made documentary, complete with good storytelling and solid cinematography.  I even started getting teary-eyed at the end.  

As the lights turned on, I immediately felt a pang of cognitive dissonance (i.e., the discomfort from holding 2 conflicting beliefs or values).  I looked around and saw an auditorium full of upper-middle class, nicely dressed women living in one of the wealthiest countries in the world.  Yes, we "care" about causes, but not enough to really sacrifice our comforts or conflicting belief in the power of capitalism.

The documentary made a strong case for educating children in developing countries.

Here's the sad stuff I learned:

• 66M girls are out of school WW (UNESCO)
• 33M fewer girls are in primary school than boys (Education First)
• 150M girls are victims of sexual violence per year (UNIFEM)
• 14M girls under 18 will be married this year -- that's 26 girls per minute (UNFPA)
• #1 cause of death for girls 15-18 is childbirth (WHO)

Here's the education stuff I learned:

• A girl with an extra year of education can earn 20% more as an adult (the WorldBank)
• If India enrolled 1% more girls in secondary school, their GDP would rise by $5.5B (CIA Factbook)
• Girls with 8 years of education are 4 times less likely to be married as children (National Academy Press)
• A child born to a literate mother is 50% more likely to survive past the age of 5 (UNESCO)
• School is not free in 50 countries WW (UNESCO)

Okay, now get ready for a little market sizing.

Assumption 1: Let's say we agree that the 66M girls should be in school

Assumption 2: And, that a child, regardless of nationality, has the same innate value

In the United States, 6M children are enrolled in private school, paying an average tuition cost of $10K.  Technically, none of the students need to go to private school since public school is free.  It's a luxury.

That's $60B spent on over-and-above schooling.  According to the Girl Rising website, it costs $50 to pay a girls' fees for a year, in places like India, Peru and Sierra Leone.

That's enough to pay for 1.2B children to go to school -- way more than the ones that can not attend right now.

Which, brings me back to the title of this post.  Our actions are not connected to our beliefs.

We believe an American child is in fact worth
(a lot) more than an African child.

Teaching Kids to be Entrepreneurs

"A true bubble is when something is overvalued and intensely believed ... Education may be the only thing people still believe in in the United States. To question education is really dangerous. It is the absolute taboo. It's like telling the world there's no Santa Claus." 

- Peter Thiel 

Photopin

I believe education is important.  I think it's even more important that it's widely accessible and encourages "real" learning.  I also do wonder though if the standard, 4 year university degree is meant for everyone.  Being good at traditional "academics" is only one form of IQ.


Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal, started a program called the "Thiel Fellows," where he gives recipients $100K to NOT go to college and work on their business ideas for two years.  

Likewise, Cameron Herold, in the TED talk above, discusses how the traditional school system does not nurture the characteristics that make a good entrepreneur.

Schools teach kids to follow, not lead.
Schools teach kids to memorize, not create.
Schools teach kids to follow a path, not set out on a new one.

Essentially, schools teach kids to be good employees not good entrepreneurs.  In fact, free public education was developed during the Industrial Revolution to ensure the subservient class could sit still and work for 8 to 10 hours a day. 

Kids that can not focus (especially those that have been diagnosed with ADHD) often get left out of the traditional success ladder of academics -- i.e., doing well in class & on the SAT leads to getting into a good college;  doing well in college with the right major leads to the right job.

But, what if we question this widely held belief system.
What if ADHD is natural?
What if we let kids explore the things they are really interested in?  
What if it's actually more abnormal for kids to sit still and memorize obscure SAT vocabulary words than to show signs of boredom and unrest?


If I look back at my childhood, I showed a lot of the entrepreneurial traits mentioned by Cameron Herold, along with a wild imagination and a strong bent towards the arts.

Here's a few examples:

• After our neighborhood easter egg hunt, I decided to leave the other kids behind and sell my candy door-to-door.  I was 6 years old, and thankfully, my parents stopped me after the first house.
• On family road trips, I'd laboriously draw cat pictures and then sell them in the hotel lobby when my parents were not looking. 
• I had a stand at every neighborhood garage sale, selling beverages, food and handy crafts.  I was a staple on Campstone street.  When not in session, I'd sit for hours on the porch trying to sell my sticker collection and "kleenex ghosts"
• I'd have my dad photocopy fliers for my latest "childcare / pet sitting / random domestic help service" and then distribute in neighbors' doorhandles.  By age 12, I was working 40 hours a week in the summer because no one could guess my age.

Despite these childhood traits, I never had to use them.  

I was also pretty good at school.  I was uncomfortably shy, so it was easier for me to do my schoolwork than talk with the other kids in class.  I graduated high school and college with a 4.0 GPA and now work at a well-paying, stable job.  

Overall, life has been pretty good to me.  I've done relatively well climbing the academic ladder of success, but I do wonder what path I'd be on if school nurtured these other traits...

Skip the hotel... Get a Tree

I'm not sure why, but I'm fascinated by treehouse hotels (and tiny houses).  I've tried to stay in this human nest several times in Big Sur, but it's always booked out.  Instead, I've stayed in Junk Boats, Glam Tents and A-Frame Cabins... but no treehouse yet.

Maybe I want to escape back to my childhood or Robinson Crusoe hit a cord with me...

Regardless, I saw this in my inbox today from Tablet Magazine, and it brought back the desire.  I know staying in a normal hotel is more comfy, but a treehouse seems more "with nature" and "exotic."

Enjoy.

Inkaterra Reserva Amazonica

Bangkok Treehouse

Treehotel, Mirror Cube

Treehotel, The Nest

Treehotel, The UFO

[A Poem for a Monday] The Summer Day

Photopin

The Summer Day (Mary Oliver)

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean-
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down-
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

How do I love me. Let me count the ways.

Photo Pin

As previously mentioned, I've been taking a Social Psychology class on Coursera.  It's fascinating, especially how much we love ourselves.

In fact, we exhibit a thing called "implicit egotism," which means we like what we associate with ourselves.  And, it's more than just liking people that went to the same college or are from the same home town...

Here's some crazy examples of implicit egotism:

• We are more likely to marry someone with the same initials or similar sounding names
• Men named "Jack" are 2.2x more likely to live in Jacksonville
• Men named "Phillip" are 10.4x more likely to live in Philadelphia
• Dentists are 2x more likely to be named Dennis & 2.5x more likely to be named Denise
• When shown 2 self-portraits (the actual picture & the mirror version), most prefer the mirror version.  For other women, we prefer the actual picture.

Isn't that wild?

Is gathering the dots just as important as connecting them?

Sorensen Grundy

We've all heard the phrase "connecting the dots" -- It even has it's own wikipedia entry.

But, what about the stage before connecting...

Gathering.  

If we don't have enough dots, they won't ever connect into anything interesting or different.

In Anna Rascouet-Paz's creative mornings talk, she argues that it takes curiosity to collect the dots.  

As a general rule, I'd say I'm pretty curious.  I've travelled around the world, love to read and was even on a child-leash as a kid because I ran away so much (maybe a precursor to my adult life).  

Regardless, I can still get into a thinking rut.  Here's some of her tips on staying curious.

1. Aim for breadth over depth
Where did the Renaissance man go?  How about the polymaths?  For some reason, we've started honoring the specialist -- the person with focused knowledge.  While that may be good for your dentist, it doesn't really produce creative thinkers.  As Roman Krznaric suggests, maybe we should start seeking after breadth of knowledge vs depth.

"The bag's not for what I take, Colson -- it's for what I find along the way."  

- Macgyver

2. Curiosity is like a muscle.  It needs to be exercised
It's not enough to be curious every once in awhile or on one particular topic.  You need to apply it as a way of life -- why?  what?  how? should be the foundations of your vocabulary.  

One tip that I like is to "take a different path home" from work.  Our minds tend to "chunk" things together to speed up our processing power; therefore, we often miss the things our brains have become accustomed to seeing everyday.  A new route means that you notice new things, like the man that works in the corner store or the flowers that bloom in your neighbor's windowsill.

3. It's okay to change your mind
I've been told that I've "changed so much since college," usually with a hint of criticism.  

As my favorite philosopher says:

"Anyone who isn't embarrassed of who they were last year probably isn't learning enough."  

- Alain de Botton

4. Get out of your bubble
We tend to befriend people similar to us.  In fact, one of the greatest predictors of who you will marry or become friends with is proximity (see this study from the University of Leipzig).  If you work at the same place, live in the same neighborhood or sit next to each other at school, you likely have a lot of base commonalities and routine interactions, even if your interests or senses of humor may be different.

Likewise, social psychology proves that we are strongly attracted to look-a-likes.  According to Byrne's "Law of Attraction," attraction towards a person is positively related to the proportion of similar traits associated with that person.  On the other hand, cognitive dissonance is the discomfort experienced when holding two conflicting beliefs, which makes it difficult for people to befriend others that have very different attitudes and beliefs.

What does this mean?
The people you follow on twitter and interact with on Facebook are probably pretty similar to you.  Find people that challenge you.  That will debate with you.  That can broaden your world view.

5. Travel
It's the easiest way to see the world through fresh eyes.

“Journeys are the midwives of thought. Few places are more conducive to internal conversations than a moving plane, ship or train. There is an almost quaint correlation between what is in front of our eyes and the thoughts we are able to have in our heads: large thoughts at times requiring large views, new thoughts new places. Introspective reflections which are liable to stall are helped along by the flow of the landscape. The mind may be reluctant to think properly when thinking is all it is supposed to do." 

- Alain de Botton, The Art of Travel

Do you believe in "flow"?

By me :)

"Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes.  Don't resist them; that only creates more sorrow.  Let reality be reality.  Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like." - Lao Tzu

A few weeks ago, I was in an "experimental videography" class and casually chatted with the students around me.

One middle-aged Singaporean, Michael, introduced himself as an actor -- an actor in 150 movies, TV shows and commercials to be exact.  I immediately started questioning why I signed up the class in the first place.  My last acting debut and finale were one in the same --  a 7th grade play where I forgot my lines and stood like a deer in spotlights for what seemed like an eternity.

I probed a bit further, and I found out Michael had been acting for less than 3 years.  He was an information security engineer (just as sexy as "an actor," right?).  One day, someone contacted him on Facebook and asked him to play an extra in a short film.  He said yes and loved it -- he felt a natural "flow" towards acting and decided to follow it.

He now acts full time and is unbelievably happy.  He also home brews his own wine (I just added that fact in because I think it's cool).

When we come to point of conflict or resistance in life, it might be because we are going in the wrong direction.  Rather than putting down your head and charging harder, maybe it's to reevaluate and jump paths.

[A Poem for a Friday] Laughing Heart

Laughing Heart.

Your life is your life
don't let it be clubbed 
into dank submission.

Be on the watch.
There are ways out.
There is a light somewhere.

It may not be much light but
it beats the darkness.

Be on the watch.
The gods will offer you chances.
Know them.
Take them.

You can't beat death but
you can beat death in life, 
sometimes.

And the more often you learn to do it,
the more light there will be.
Your life is your life.
Know it while you have it.
You are marvelous
the gods wait to delight
in you.

[Charles Bukowski]