I’m a big fan of the podcast Hardcore History by Dan Carlin.
Like, if you want six episodes on the fall of the Roman Republic, and each episode is 5 hours long, Carlin has you covered.
I went digging for anything about Carlin’s creative process, and this jumped out at me, from an interview with Tim Ferriss.
Oh you should also know that Carlin’s voice and intonation is pretty… distinctive.
Dan Carlin: We talk around here a lot about turning negatives into positives, or lemons into lemonade, or creatively taking a weak spot and making it a strong spot. I always was heavily in the red, as they say, when I was on the radio where I yelled so loud - and I still do - that the meter just jumps up into the red. They would say you need to speak in this one zone of loudness or you’ll screw up the radio station’s compression. After awhile, I just started writing liners for the big voice guy: here’s Dan Carlin, he talks so loud, or whatever.
That’s my style; I meant to do that. And as a matter of fact, if you do it, you’re imitating me. So it’s partly taking what you already do and saying no, no, this isn’t a negative; this is the thing I bring to the table, buddy. I copyrighted that. I talk real loud, and then I talk really quietly and if you have a problem with that, you don’t understand what a good style is, Tim.
Tim Ferriss: I like that. I think I shall capitalize on that.
Dan Carlin: Right, just copyright your faults, man.
Love it.
This comes up in product design too, though I hadn’t really thought about applying it personally.
The design example I always remember is from an ancient DVD burning app called Disco.
Here I am writing about it from before the dawn of time in 2006:
It can take ages to burn a disk. Your intrinsic activity is waiting. What does Disco do? It puts a fluid dynamic smoke simulation on top of the window. And get this, you can interact with it, blowing the smoke with your cursor.
It’s about celebrating your constraints.
If your product must do something then don’t be shy about it. Make a feature out of it. Make the constraint the point of it all.
Ok so applying this attitude to myself, there’s the Japanese concept of ikigai,a reason to get up in the morning, and what gets shared around is an adaptation of that idea:
Marc Winn made a now-famous ikigai Venn diagram – it puts forward that you should spend your time at the intersection of these activities:
That which you love
That which you are good at
That which the world needs
That which you can be paid for
(Winn later reflected on his creation of the ikigai diagram.)
I feel like I should add a fifth…
That which you can’t not do.
Not: what’s your edge.
But instead: what do you do that no reasonable person would choose to do?
Like, Dan Carlin talks loud, he can’t not. So he’s made a career out of that.
Some people have hyper focus. Some have none and are really good at noticing disparate connections. Some are borderline OCD which makes them really, really good in medical or highly regulated environments.
(Though, to be clear, I’m talking about neurodiversity at the level of personality traits here, not where unpacking and work is the appropriate response. There’s a line!)
I think part of growing up is taking what it is that people tease you about at school, and figuring out how to make it a superpower.
Not just growing up I suppose, a continuous process of becoming.
If you enjoyed this post, please consider sharing it by email or on social media. Here’s the link. Thanks, —Matt.
‘Yes, we’ll see them together some Saturday afternoon then,’ she said. ‘I won’t have any hand in your not going to Cathedral on Sunday morning. I suppose we must be getting back. What time was it when you looked at your watch just now?’ "In China and some other countries it is not considered necessary to give the girls any education; but in Japan it is not so. The girls are educated here, though not so much as the boys; and of late years they have established schools where they receive what we call the higher branches of instruction. Every year new schools for girls are opened; and a great many of the Japanese who formerly would not be seen in public with their wives have adopted the Western idea, and bring their wives into society. The marriage laws have been arranged so as to allow the different classes to marry among[Pg 258] each other, and the government is doing all it can to improve the condition of the women. They were better off before than the women of any other Eastern country; and if things go on as they are now going, they will be still better in a few years. The world moves. "Frank and Fred." She whispered something to herself in horrified dismay; but then she looked at me with her eyes very blue and said "You'll see him about it, won't you? You must help unravel this tangle, Richard; and if you do I'll--I'll dance at your wedding; yours and--somebody's we know!" Her eyes began forewith. Lawrence laughed silently. He seemed to be intensely amused about something. He took a flat brown paper parcel from his pocket. making a notable addition to American literature. I did truly. "Surely," said the minister, "surely." There might have been men who would have remembered that Mrs. Lawton was a tough woman, even for a mining town, and who would in the names of their own wives have refused to let her cross the threshold of their homes. But he saw that she was ill, and he did not so much as hesitate. "I feel awful sorry for you sir," said the Lieutenant, much moved. "And if I had it in my power you should go. But I have got my orders, and I must obey them. I musn't allow anybody not actually be longing to the army to pass on across the river on the train." "Throw a piece o' that fat pine on the fire. Shorty," said the Deacon, "and let's see what I've got." "Further admonitions," continued the Lieutenant, "had the same result, and I was about to call a guard to put him under arrest, when I happened to notice a pair of field-glasses that the prisoner had picked up, and was evidently intending to appropriate to his own use, and not account for them. This was confirmed by his approaching me in a menacing manner, insolently demanding their return, and threatening me in a loud voice if I did not give them up, which I properly refused to do, and ordered a Sergeant who had come up to seize and buck-and-gag him. The Sergeant, against whom I shall appear later, did not obey my orders, but seemed to abet his companion's gross insubordination. The scene finally culminated, in the presence of a number of enlisted men, in the prisoner's wrenching the field-glasses away from me by main force, and would have struck me had not the Sergeant prevented this. It was such an act as in any other army in the world would have subjected the offender to instant execution. It was only possible in—" "Don't soft-soap me," the old woman snapped. "I'm too old for it and I'm too tough for it. I want to look at some facts, and I want you to look at them, too." She paused, and nobody said a word. "I want to start with a simple statement. We're in trouble." RE: Fruyling's World "MACDONALD'S GATE" "Read me some of it." "Well, I want something better than that." HoME大香蕉第一时间
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I’m a big fan of the podcast Hardcore History by Dan Carlin.
Like, if you want six episodes on the fall of the Roman Republic, and each episode is 5 hours long, Carlin has you covered.
I went digging for anything about Carlin’s creative process, and this jumped out at me, from an interview with Tim Ferriss.
Oh you should also know that Carlin’s voice and intonation is pretty… distinctive.
Love it.
This comes up in product design too, though I hadn’t really thought about applying it personally.
The design example I always remember is from an ancient DVD burning app called Disco.
Here I am writing about it from before the dawn of time in 2006:
It’s about celebrating your constraints.
If your product must do something then don’t be shy about it. Make a feature out of it. Make the constraint the point of it all.
Ok so applying this attitude to myself, there’s the Japanese concept of ikigai, and what gets shared around is an adaptation of that idea:
Marc Winn made a now-famous ikigai Venn diagram – it puts forward that you should spend your time at the intersection of these activities:
(Winn later reflected on his creation of the ikigai diagram.)
I feel like I should add a fifth…
That which you can’t not do.
Not: what’s your edge.
But instead: what do you do that no reasonable person would choose to do?
Like, Dan Carlin talks loud, he can’t not. So he’s made a career out of that.
Some people have hyper focus. Some have none and are really good at noticing disparate connections. Some are borderline OCD which makes them really, really good in medical or highly regulated environments.
(Though, to be clear, I’m talking about neurodiversity at the level of personality traits here, not where unpacking and work is the appropriate response. There’s a line!)
I think part of growing up is taking what it is that people tease you about at school, and figuring out how to make it a superpower.
Not just growing up I suppose, a continuous process of becoming.