**Notice something real, then think it through clearly**. Collection of essays. **[[Good Taste is the Combination of Both a Long and a Sensitive Feedback Loop]]** There has been a lot of talk of the importance of good taste recently. Taste emerges when a sensitive feedback loop (quickly noticing subtle differences) is sustained over a long feedback loop (careful, accumulated experience). Sensitivity gives you precision; duration gives you depth. You will need both. **[[The Best Problems Never Fully Go Away]]** The best type of problems don't disappear when you solve them—they simply evolve. They become deeper and more interesting as you engage with them. Your goal shouldn't be to eliminate them, it should be to upgrade them **[[Beware the Second Curve]]** The first curve is clean. You learn fast, you move fast, the goals are in front of you and they respond to your input. But if you hit a nail long enough, at some point it will stop reacting the way it used to. You've run out of easy wins. Congratulations — You're on the second curve. **[[All Spaces Have a Grammar]]** Every physical space silently teaches you how to use it —where to linger, how to move, what’s allowed and what’s off-limits. This grammar is subtle but not neutral. Notice how a room arranges bodies, attention, even emotion; Some notes on becoming fluent in the worlds most quiet language **[[Suspicion Slows Everything Down]]** Trust isn't just morally appealing; it's strategically valuable. Suspicion is optimism’s quiet opposite—not through obvious conflict, but through hesitation, hedging, and subtle delays. The greatest cost of suspicion isn't what breaks—it's everything that never gets built. **[[Depth is Just Persistence in Disguise]]** Deep understanding frequently emerges simply because you didn’t stop asking questions when others did. **[[Never ever stop believing that you have something to contribute]]** If you look at the greatest cities in history, the ones that really mattered -- **they were diverse**. I explore this in depth with respect to my current home city (Amsterdam) and how we should mentally model that in our life and in our work. Fully brewing: - **[[Be Very Patient, Be Very Urgent]]** - **[[The Most Interesting Lives are Built Around Friction]]** - **[[Good Conversations are Slightly Awkward]]** - **[[Attention is Wonderfully Generative]]** - **[[Great Experiences Arise out of Great Curation]]** - **[[Personal Metaphor Audit]]** *Archive* [[Urgency Uncertainty and Innovation]] [[Distance swimming]] [[Mind opening music]] [[Structured strength training]] [[A Blog is Simply an Advanced Tool for Paying Attention]] [[Catching Crumbs from The Table]] [[You should feel agency over your future because you are going to be the one building it]] [[AI Policy and Africa]]