I appreciate Dan’s daily blog. I especially enjoy this thoughts from the other day, being a first-principles-first type of learner. What type of learner are you?“If we rote learn a set of prescriptions, we aren’t thinking for ourselves. Solved tasks will be easy, but any new terrain will feel overwhelming.On the other hand, if we’re armed with a set of principles, we’ll have a way of thinking that is malleable to the moment and will help us traverse the unknown.” — Dan Cullum, “Principles and Prescriptions”

I canned tomato sauce last night instead of writing a blog post. My thoughts on canning:Every action counts.The future is not discounted — we do every action now because we are 100% preventing some form of mold or bacteria that could kill me.The future may be overrated — I envision all of these ways I will use the tomato sauce now. Will I still want to eat these things next month?The output is only as good as the input. Quality matters.Patience. If you want a thicker sauce, patience. Time is a great mixer of things.

If art is a result of the function of processing every experience of your life while not making art, then it can be said that what you do behind the scenes matters more than what you do in performance.In the same way, you - now, are the result of everything mistake and great decision you’ve made up to this point. It can also be said, how you think and what you decide behind the scenes only gives you returns when it’s not to show up and act.

I believe this song may speak to you. Be it in seeking peace, be it in the observation of the absurdity of life, be it in wild antics, or because you happen to love a diner.

My friend, Brian, sent me a passage from Zen Heart by Ezra Bayda.“… much of what passes for profundity may be just confusion that’s well stated.”I don’t know if I agree. It’s my experience that well-stating the confusing part is hard for most people. If it was easy, we wouldn’t find it profound.

Charles Mingus teaches you how to toilet train your cat. Read here.Charles Mingus was a world famous bassist and jazz composer. You don’t expect an icon in music to write such a pedestrian, and absurdly well thought out playbook on toilet training — or do you?It makes perfect sense to me that a jazz musician should have such an interest. Jazz is about experimentation, testing, observation, making predictions, and studying outcomes — musically. Why shouldn’t these skills be used to toilet train a cat? You and I have skills that transcend our professions that make us able to do many things and pursue many interests. Be like Mingus, and don’t limit your curiosity.

Quincy Jones influenced my piano playing and my musical mental model. My parents gave me a Quincy Jones “Best Of” album when I asked for a jazz album. Not much jazz on the album, mostly R&B, but that’s probably better — I play much more like a R&B player from the 70s than I do a jazzer from the 60s. In college, a friend - Germono, introduced me to the film score of “The Wiz”. I became hooked. I wanted to arrange like Quincy Jones, I wanted to write like Quincy Jones, I wanted to do the work he did. I transcribed his scores onto score paper; I still remember a composition teacher I worked with criticizing my transcriptions. Quincy’s passing is a chance to (not that I need one) to reinforce his contributions to the culture and to the music industry. Germono shared this 49-min Quincy tribute with me. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.Also, check out Germono’s music and work here.

I attended my city’s international holiday folk fair yesterday. I learned that Pomeranians are a group from modern day Germany that live near Denmark. I learned of the Donauschwaben, ethnic Germans that live in the Kingdom of Hungary. I watched two different types of Polish groups dance — northern and southern. I ate a Senegalese “fataya” which is similar to a beef empanada. Ultimately, I learned that we people have more in common than not. We all seem to be proud of our language, our customs, our food, our dance, our music, our homelands, and our stories. And I believe that’s good. Because if we cherish something that makes us truly unique, our culture, we have something to share with the curious adventurer who wants to learn. Some of the most timeless wisdom is simple: show and tell.

Inspired by a question from a friend. The full question what will you do with your life.The question requires an element of certainty with words like will and do. Additionally, the question contains a time vector - life. I wonder if some humans experience anxiety when they are asked to be certain about an inherently uncertain thing — life. I thought about this more — if you asked me what I wanted to do with my life I would have responded: be a ghostbuster, be a vet, be an architect, be a musician. I work as a musician and made a career out of music. But I don’t believe “being a musician” is what I did. Doing requires an action — a verb. The act of being a musician is a function of these verbs: collaborating, listening, considering, reflecting, practicing, solving, conceptualizing, communicating, and many others. These verbs are verbs I do now in the work I do in sales/marketing. These verbs are verbs are functions of my earliest proclivities.I discovered these verbs by way of interests. Pursuing my interests forced the expression of the aforementioned behaviors. I’m privileged and fortunate that my parents allowed me to pursue many interests — even at the expense of school (which was not their hope). I conclude — if interests allowed me to express actions that I realized I wanted more and more in my life, and if my life is a product of those actions, then it was the freedom (and privilege) to pursue my interests that helped me get to where I am now. If that’s true, then the question “hat will you do?” may not be as helpful, or as stressful, as…What are you interested in now? And what do you love most about pursuing them?

With thanks to James Clear’s newsletter. From The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkein.Frodo: “I wish none of this had happened.“​Gandalf: “So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.“My own theory of how meaning is derived from living is (kind of simple).You decide to do somethingYou do the thingYou observe an outcomeYou receive feedback from nature/world/people about your thingYou learn something about yourself and life.You make an update and try again.I observe that the story people tell themselves about themselves occurs around step 4 and 5. However, I also observe that step 4 or 5 would only be reached because step 1 happened — a decision. My (unscientific and highly personal) hypothesis is: life’s meaning is derived from the meaning of our decisions. To test my hypothesis I propose you think about major decisions you’ve made. What happened just before you decided to take action? How did you feel? What did you consider? What outcomes did you predict? What was the actual outcome? And what would you do differently? After asking the aforementioned questions, write down your answers in a notebook or in a doc. Catalogue your decisions. Review them often and determine if you’re getting better at making them, and if you are, are your outcomes getting better. My hunch — the more you see your life through the decisions you made, the more you can be honest with yourself, the more you will be able to propel yourself forward, the more life will mean something to you. You have to decide what to do with the time you have.