Tag: life

THE 300 PEOPLE YOU INTERACT WITH IS ONLY 0.00000375 of 8.2 BILLION PEOPLE/GLOBAL POPULATION

THE 300 PEOPLE YOU INTERACT WITH IS ONLY 0.00000375 of 8.2 BILLION PEOPLE/GLOBAL POPULATION

You probably have more options than you realize. You probably have more reach. With the modern digital landscape, you can be influential because your ability to expand, grow and be recognized by a larger number of people is so much more ample. Meanwhile, your everyday life experience may be limited by the number of people you encounter and form both shallow and profound relationships with.

Dunbar’s number suggests that most people interact with and form stable relationships with 150 to 300 people in their life (and that’s a generous range!). The problem with these 150 to 300 people that we mostly see and interact with is that they provide a very limited “small pond” effect to our brains. This is a cognitive bias.

Thus, in reality, we interact with a VERY SMALL FRACTION of the global population. It’s impossible for our brains to internalize the vastness, the scale of it all. Instead, we rely on our limited understanding to gauge the world–especially OURSELVES IN THIS WORLD. Our thoughts regarding our opportunities, chances and options are simultaneously shrunk down to size.

We start to judge ourselves based on the overall tenor and consensus of how these 0.00000375 people in the global population respond to us. We’re constantly worrying about our character and how it is being perceived, evaluated, from the metrics coming from that very small population we are working with. For example, if we get fired, a few times (or even many times!) we assume our experience of ourselves is representative of THE LARGER REALITY.

If we blow it on our blog–with our you tube channel—with our social media posts- or even with something like the kiosk that we run at our local Farmer’s Market–WE ASSUME THAT WE HAVE A FIXED AUDIENCE or FIXED CLIENTS/PATRONS. You do not.

If you’re like me, your blog will attract some people from Pakistan one day and people from Iceland another day. Audiences change. People grow out of what you have to say. People find newer, fresher, younger faces or maybe they remember you and come back. You still have a chance to grow and have influence and success if you manage to hook even just a few people. You have to make people remember you.

Back to what I was saying earlier, if most of those people “in your current circle” think a certain way, have very different personality traits than we do, or are super judgmental, you’ll start to regard yourself through the same lens. Perhaps these individuals don’t make any outright negative statements–only little ones that diminish you or make you feel “you don’t have what it takes”, “You’re incomplete” or “You’re not there yet”.

Because of our cognitive biases, we project the opinions of a HANDFUL of certain people onto an entire hypothetical “public”. If our boss or work mates show disappointment for our idea, we feel like EVERYONE is disappointed with it. If a particular social group show’s aversion or dissatisfaction for your choices, it can feel like your’re just a general loser.

Often, we inflate the long-term impact of a single mistake.

We start to think that that circle of people defines who we are. Or, that must be the way the world is. But maybe we have it wrong. Maybe we just have the wrong 150-300 people in our circle from the get-go. Maybe we’ve been dealt a bad hand of people from the start.

Maybe someone like Steve Jobs had a bunch of “the right” people around him at the right time. Without that specific concoction of people, maybe he would have never had the sustained inspiration to carve out a successful path and put his ideas out there.

Afterall, it’s easier to try new things and throw our ideas out there with the right kind of people surrounding us. It’s much harder when we feel fear of what kind of half-hearted commentary we’re going to receive or worse, someone who changes the subject to talk about “the weather” a “recent event” or something very mundane like something they noticed about a particular street, car, celebrity, place. It can feel dismissive and boring at the same time.

My go-to thought when I’m feeling like I’ve been handed the wrong surrounding of people:

There are 8 BILLION people on the planet. Considering that number, my reputation is not at stake as much as I think. Like me, you need to NOT let those 12 job-related encounters–or even 30–establish your baseline identity or character.

To reiterate, maybe the successful people in the world had the right 150- 300 at there disposal from the very beginning. They had people who were cheerful, positive, successful themselves, happy, open to new ideas–philosophically minded, dreamers and willing to keep working at it and trying etc. Those are the kind of collaborators you want. If you don’t have them now, you can change things up. You can use the vast numbers of people who navigate the internet as a potential wellspring to draw from.

These are trite, already known thoughts. But the point is you must constantly remind yourself that there are 8 Billion people to exploit.

Maybe you can’t change things up right now. But at least you can remember THE LAW OF LARGE NUMBERS. That is, despite the common mantra “It’s a small world after all”. It really isn’t. There are 8 BILLION PEOPLE to exhaust your resources, time, attention and talents. There isn’t enough time in your life to remotely scratch the surface or all that’s out there. “The tip of the iceberg” platitude doesn’t even BEGIN to convey how FEW PEOPLE YOU’VE really interacted with or even more, formed a meaningful connection with or could have an impact on.

Don’t let those 5 people at your company/work determine who you are. Even if you’ve ruined your reputation at an entire company, remember there are literally millions of companies globally that you could reach out to or that may find your skills or personality admirable. BEEN IN PRISON? Guess what? If you’re out, there are TONS OF POTENTIAL opportunities if you’ve truly committed to a crime-free life and you have a willful determination to make something of yourself. There are literally thousands of countries where you could stake out your next project or business pursuit.

Remember the doctor who killed Michael Jackson? Guess what? In 2023 he successfully opened his own medical institute in San Juan and also in Trinidad and Tobago. He is back to not only being a successful doctor, but developing thriving clinics.

The odds are in your favor because the global population is enormous. And don’t let me get started with your ability to use AI and use it to carve out even more bifurcations that lead to EVEN MORE OPPORTUNITIES. Imagine the global population surging with robots? That’s even more “people” to work with.

There are so many mistakes you can make with different people and yet still billions of more people to “try it out on”. And, if you were making some sort of cardinal, egregious mistake, that mistake will eventually be corrected or modified after so many iterations and interactions with different people. You just have to keep reaching out to more people.

To conclude, remember that your REPUTATION isn’t a single, monolithic thing. It’s really just a bunch of perceptions held by different people in different contexts. A gaffe in one area may be unknown or irrelevant to other people who are not in your direct circle. Most people–even that small group of 150 to 300 that you might engage with yearly–are too busy to care about your mistakes for too long because they have their own lives to dwell on and their own mistakes.There will always be TONS of people on the globe for you to work with and have an impact on.

SOCIAL MEDIA “CREATOR TYPES” ADVANTAGE!

The SOCIAL MEDIA SPHERE may already be saturated with accounts.

Here are a few things to remember while you’re vying for presence, subscribers, followers, noticeability, views and engagement:

It will always be easier to CLICK and SCROLL and CONSUME than to CREATE and to create regularly.

There will always be MORE PEOPLE in the population willing to waste several minutes of their day (and from the research literature, SEVERAL HOURS) scrolling than several minutes CREATING. Always. This is a fact. The most rudimentary fact of human nature is probably our tendency towards ease. We have an entire country filled with health problems and obesity, not bodybuilders. And most of this can be attributed towards our human tendency towards relaxation, comfort and often laziness.

Humans choose the easier path. This is good otherwise we wouldn’t have invented technology in the first place. But this is also good for YOU because it means that you as a content creator or blog-post writer or aspiring influencer have a distinct advantage.

Remember, you want to create. You LOVE the process, the act of creating both physical items and digital items. You’re spurred not solely by gaining some kind of number or position but simply by the fact that you love the creative flow you experience while making anything. You know what this feels like. You’ve done it before. You know how much better you feel after you’ve put in some effort. Sure, you’re flawed. Sure, other people will notice too, but you’re on this creative trajectory.

Think of it like this: some people try to acquire a college education for the sake of getting good grades or simply for the high paying career at the end. Other folks pursue education because they enjoy amassing tangible and abstract truths about the world. They love the interplay between disparate things. They love the “Aha moment” when they discover a useful link with something they’ve learned. They learn because they know it enriches their character, performance and intelligence. Learning becomes a long-term life goal.

In the same way, creator types who want to create and have that instinctive drive to create, are not motivated by gaining a following or establishing some kind of internet notoriety or making lots of money.

While it may be fun to track your progress and to see the views you’re getting, it’s even more fun to jump back into the act of creating, producing and synthesizing relatable ideas.

As much as I try to take a break from posting on various social media platforms, I find myself inexorably compelled to create and post whether it is my art attempts, my woodworking creations, my decorations, my gardening activities, my children’s summer fun moments etc.

I enjoy the process of making original stories on Facebook or composing short reels. I like posting on my ART facebook page. I like wrestling with my thoughts in my blog. I like attempting Shorts on Youtube every-once-in-a-while. I have an entirely separate blog where I posted philosophical ideas for YEARS and it has almost 300,000 views but only 98 subscribers. And, while I haven’t posted there for over a decade, I’m still gaining views! My 2009 posts are still getting views.

If the above felt relatable, you know you’re certainly a “creator type” and you have an edge already. You have intrinsic motivation and nothing can ever take that away because you’ve felt it too many times before. You notice you spend hours making things but only minutes (or less) scrolling. If that’s you, YOU HAVE WHAT IT TAKES!

Think of all the BIG content creators out there. Do you think they spend a ton of time or effort scrolling through other people’s content? My guess is RARELY. They’re going to have to spend tons of their time working on, editing and thinking about THEIR NEXT PIECE OF CONTENT. It becomes a constant pursuit for them. And believe me, when they start to grow, it’s even more time consuming. So NO, they’re NOT SPENDING VERY MUCH TIME SCROLLING. I can guarantee where they’re spending their moments. They spend their time thinking about their projects and tossing around ideas for their next one.

The only thing you need to do is to convert SOME OF THAT TIME STARING AT YOUR PHONE BRIEFLY ON THOSE BIG ACCOUNTS TOWARDS directly working on your own projects. It’s a habit that you must inculcate into your brain. If you’re going to spend any time in the social media sphere, always do it for you!

BETTER WAY TO THINK ABOUT HAVING “TOO MANY INTERESTS”

My problem is that I have too many interests. I can’t quite figure out what I like more: woodworking, painting, writing and making blog posts, making reels after doing my creations/projects, self-help and motivation, roller-skating, sewing, gardening and landscape design…philosophy and learning about consciousness.

Then, there are the things I enjoy slightly less but I love the results when I do them: cleaning the house, cooking, nutrition, exercising and fitness, learning to play the piano, reading books, skincare and esthetics, learning and education and working towards my bachelor’s degree in nursing and teaching my 3 children things.

In the past (2011) I would make youtube videos–some would go VIRAL. It was an incredible opportunity in the early days of Youtube before the platform was saturated with creator accounts. Now the best and brightest are at the top of Youtube. I don’t stand a chance now. I’ve come to accept it and I rarely invest in this hobby anymore.

A lot of people struggle with having TOO MANY INTERESTS. But I think we should consider the positive side of this struggle. This means that at least we’re not sinking into boredom and nihilism. We’re probably less likely to be on the path towards addiction. This means we’re actively using our brains and still trying things out. We’re finding different ways to engage our conscious experience by seeking out interests and hobbies. We want to work with the world, not stagnate and diffuse our potential.

More and more studies reveal that actively learning and finding hobbies in MIDDLE AGE will help prevent cognitive decline. When you’re not passively consuming the world around you–but actively working with it and even butting your head against it–trying to find ways to make it work, solve a problem, figure out a new strategy and come up with something new, you’re thinking more.

This original thinking that comes with having tons of interests will do wonders for your sense of confidence. It will literally BUILD TRUST IN YOURSELF. You tried some of your ideas and integrated them into your hobbies in the past and gained some knowledge. Some of the things you did worked. You may have solved a woodworking or artistic issue in a more unorthodox way. You start to trust how you go about the process more–HOW YOUR OWN BRAIN GOES ABOUT THE PROCESS MORE.

As you gain confidence in your own style for doing things you are fueled to do more. Nobody died or got hurt. People may have admonished “That’s not the way to do that” or “This is how I do it.” But everyone thinks their way is much better, have you noticed?

Perhaps you applied lateral or non-linear thinking to help figure out something in the past. This approach often feels better than following the step-by-step directions from a brochure or a youtube video.

So, in essence, having tons of interests develops lots of new and unique connections. These inspire more tangential thinking. More ideas can mix together in your mind so you come up with even more and better ideas. Remember, unrelated ideas can be integrated and may lead to even more surprises or potential solutions. You will feel and be more inspired and you will be pushing down the tendency to escape into addictions.

Having a surplus of hobbies, passions and interests may feel overwhelming. You may feel like you can’t go very deep into any of them. The tradeoff is you’ll have more crossover of unique ideas. You may even come up with an invention or business idea. If you naturally possess this tendency, don’t beat yourself up! You’ve figured out a way to beat boredom without screens and scrolling. It’s always better to have a surfeit of hobbies than zero hobbies with a proclivity towards addiction.

WHIPPING UP DESIRE FOR PURSUING GOALS

WHIPPING UP DESIRE FOR PURSUING GOALS

I’m not at the end of my rope. I can do more than I realize. The market is saturated with influencers, attention grabbing headlines. It’s coated thickly with social media content and ideas. But this speaks more of this moment and moments change. Everything is in a state of flux and there are times for luck, for chance to find its way. You’ve got to find something, figure something out…make a way. You’ve got to keep up the momentum.

The realization that I’m coming to this week is that SO MUCH can be credited to simple desire. If you don’t have the desire or interest, nothing happens. DESIRE IS WHERE IT’S AT. No desire, no initial thrust towards something. No interest, no energy flow to the next possible thing.

Desire is the first (and usually easiest) thing that seems to pull us in a direction. Then we need the energy and motivation to sustain. But first, it’s desire. To gain desire you need to play around with something. Sometimes it’s a concept, or maybe it’s playing with paint, photography, wood, fabric or cardboard. Perhaps you need to spend a little time writing some words down or listening to a music piece. Maybe you just need to take that device or appliance apart.

So, if you ever notice you have a particular interest for something or maybe an idea appears and pulls at your attention, the next step is to give in to it. Try to see this beckoning as a natural push to get you out of homeostasis and maybe into a temporary flow state. This can yield dramatic returns on your life and wellbeing.

It takes effort and sometimes resources to pursue even the smallest desire. But this is worth the investment. You can use this opportunity of desire to turn a new leaf. At the very least you can get out of an anhedonic state.

And this is the crux of what I’m getting at. So many of us are in a mental state where we don’t have tremendous desire or interest for ANYTHING. Even just the act of stirring up intrigue seems exhausting. Yet, nature does present you with the occasional desire. Think of desire as a gift. Not everyone has desire. Not everyone has enough desire to make it happen or to finish even a basic small creation. We can’t even finish a longer video; much more initiate our own project. Most of us are living our days taming our boredom. Usually, we’re just scrolling along and being as stationary as possible.

This kind of static behavior on a daily basis induces a state of apathy for many things. Even more, it trains the mind for auto pilot mode.

Do you know what I’m getting at? You start to think only through the lens that is shaped by various content creators. You’re not allowing your mind to sublimate on its’ own stew of subconscious content.

Great things arise out of your subconscious mind when you let it happen–when you give your mind time to let it happen. When you give your mind time away from attention grabbing headlines, media, social media, or other online or in-person sources. Giving your mind a pause or fast away from online content (typically the ones that you find yourself compulsively checking–those are the worst!) will start to allow you to bring novel ideas and inventions to the forefront of your brain. I’ve seen this happen myself. It surprisingly works but you must take a refrain from the auto-pilot state.

Here’s another thought. The next time you have the impulse to criticize someone else for “wasting their time”–SOMEONE WHO IS ACTUALLY EMBARKING ON SOMETHING OR MAKING SOMETHING–maybe even some dumb creation–a cardboard sculpture, a blah blog post, or something that looks almost “useless” remember, somebody whipped up the DESIRE to DO THAT THING and even FOLLOW THROUGH WITH IT. They first had to have that initial uncanny desire to even approach the creation that they did. Then, they had to see it to the end. And many of these people are consistent and CREATE WEEKLY. Now that’s hard. It’s one thing to create something. It’s an entirely different thing to create monthly or weekly.

You may not appreciate someone’s final product. But you should have some sort of inspiration or admiration for the value of human desire. Some humans have discovered this desire and furthermore have the deliberation to untangle some aspect of physical reality and then to recreate, re-think, re-imagine, repurpose it. Desire is a gift. You, too, can take notice of it when it arises. We all get the desire feeling at some point or another. Next, take advantage of it. Don’t take the feeling of desire for granted because that feeling WILL PASS and you will be back to mental homeostasis.

MOMS ARE THE MOST OVERWHELMED, BUSIEST PEOPLE ON THE PLANET

MOMS ARE THE MOST OVERWHELMED, BUSIEST PEOPLE ON THE PLANET

Moms are the busiest, most overwhelmed people on the planet. I don’t think I can emphasize this enough. It can’t be said more. Today I want to take a chance to fully embrace and support all the moms out there!

Back in the days before I had children, I heard a story about a mom who melted the bottom of her laptop. She inadvertently placed her laptop on the top of a (previously) hot stove. I couldn’t fathom how someone could do such a thing. How careless!

Years later after having 3 little children, I recall this story often. I now KNOW, with CERTAINTY how likely this could happen if you’re a mom. I have days where my laptop is sitting on a counter with a mountain of clutter, kids are shouting orders at me in slavedriver fashion. I’m dashing around the kitchen trying to get someone milk or water or clean up spilled milk that is now being tracked through the hall. Two of the kids are screaming and one is in full-scale tantrum mode. I’m juggling my children’s feeding and drinking requests while I’m trying to check on kids’ assignments/grades on their education portal, paying bills, reading the recipe for dinner or just trying to keep my mind sharp with a podcast in the background. I’ve got a full bladder, and a crayon stuck to the bottom of my foot.

In such frantic chaos, I can see how easy it would be to accidentally shove a laptop through the mountain of counter clutter onto a cooling stovetop. Moms are juggling too many things. We’re doing about 5 things AT ALL TIMES. WE’RE STILL BEHIND. I see people leisurely sitting around scrolling very inane social media posts or tik tok videos. I’ve never actually been on Tik Tok. Not once. I can’t imagine the amount of productivity and time being wasted daily on these platforms. I see the loss of human potential.

As moms, we’re told we can’t complain because “we chose to have kids”. Meanwhile, our friends who are working a job they dislike complain about it non-stop but we don’t say “You can quit your job and find another one.” We listen with an attentive ear. We empathize and realize how hard it must be to work full time in a semi high-paying career, being mentally challenged and then come home to an empty house without screaming children and non-stop messes where one could then pursue various passions and hobbies. Life must be so terrible and depressing.

We realize how tough it must be to not have big gaps in our career and resumes. Don’t we all want big career/job gaps on our resumes? Isn’t that an advantage these days? Additionally, it must be hard to fully engage one’s brain and be challenged by a cutting-edge career that has the potential to increase one’s monetary success, opportunities and social clout. Nobody wants that! How tough it must be for career women!

All the sarcasm and whining aside, the studies reveal that MORE AND MORE women are pursuing education and careers instead of child-rearing. Women with children are also pursuing careers and education. Life is stressful for everyone.

But………. women with several small children have it much harder. Sorry. I had to say it. I’ve done it both ways and I know that making money or pursuing education are quite fun in comparison to managing repetitive disasters all day whilst listening to an orchestra of screams and shouts. And yes, I know this period only lasts a little while and then it’s over. But I still think the burden is almost unforgiveable. And yes, I complain about it because I know my mom, my grandmothers and my aunts never did. They weren’t allowed to complain.

To end this rant, I want to salute all women with multiple children juggling so many tasks all at once! Whether you’re a single mom working or not, a working mom or a stay-at-home Mom. The survival of the HUMAN SPECIES (before AI and AGI takes over) LITERALLY DEPENDS ON YOU MOMS!

The world population is sharply declining! People are less likely to have children or have a desire for children. With advances in AI technology, even fewer children will be born. Perhaps, we humans will morph into part-robots with fewer social needs because AI and AGI will fulfill those needs. We won’t need to “Make more humans” because technology will give rise to conscious beings that will serve as the next tier of evolution as we know it. Theoretical speculation, but fun to consider!

So just remember, being a mom is very important for the human species. It’s not very fun a lot of the time but it is the feature that has brought humanity to where it is right now. Civilization needed a long line of mothers to get to where we are. We needed a surplus of humans with skills and interests that would usher in scientific innovation and the chance to fulfill our potential as humans. Thank goodness for all the moms in history who gave birth to all the incredible brains out there! We are discovering solutions to some of the world’s most complex problems!