• Why Don't You?

    edited by Alexander Becker

    The difference between excellence and mediocrity? Action.

    Initial output is important. What initial input triggers your action in the first place?

    Is there any moderate amount of anything that could get you started? No? I thought so.

    It's only after you've lost everything that you're free to do anything.

    While it helps to start from scratch, you don't necessarily have to lose everything in order to evolve -- it's the easiest way though.

    I could. Complacency. Inertia. Hesitation. Laziness. Insecurity. Being content enough. Mediocrity?

    Why does it always have to be a shock, something extreme, something radical, some drastic experience, to get us moving? Why do we look best when we're totally exhausted? Why do we have to run a whole marathon? Why do we literally have to burn the ships? Why can't we just start?

    Because maybe -- maybe, it would be too easy. If it would be so easy, everyone could and eventually would do it.

    Enough, sufficient, moderate -- that is what is holding back and keeping together the mediocre.

    Mediocrity is not the problem nor is it the enemy. Mediocrity is the result of not getting started. Get started and you will eventually evolve and excel. But if you don't -- you won't.

    I can. The world is not enough, nothing will ever suffice, and moderation is not a means to achieve anything remarkable.

    You know that you could. I know that you can.

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  • Question: What's the Difference between iTunes and Life?

    edited by Alexander Becker

    Playlists. To be more specific, the human interface that makes playlists so easily usable. In iTunes. Let's take a look at real life's playlists.

    There is this software -- iTunes -- that let's us create playlists, our own mix du jour, we listen to what we want and when we want, we schedule our music.

    Enter the shuffle mode. Random playlists and random sequences. There is no such thing as random, there are no misunderstandings either.

    We have the option to control every second of our listening experience, yet we, you, most of us, consciously opt for the delivery of a surprise.

    You could, but you prefer the random playlist. You could control everything but you don't. Why?

    Now, how does this relate to life? Is iTunes somehow related to real life? Isn't iTunes even modeled after real life? Is it not possible to create your own playlists and plans and set up everything in great detail?

    You say it is not? What if it was?

    Say it is possible to not live at random. Would you choose the party-jukebox anyway? Would you consciously choose the random mode just because it's possible?

    What if life is too easy and you need the excitement of the unknown?

    Is true mastery the balancing of preset playlists and the jukebox?

    (...)

    And then you find yourself on shuffle, only to be crazily hitting next, next, next, to get the one you want, the one you hope to recognize by the time it is presented to you. You're asking for more options when in reality, even in your reality, the same options, presented in ever changing contexts are more than sufficient.

    How would the shuffle function know what you want, when you yourself do not know it in the first place?

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  • The News Diet: Less News = More Productivity

    edited by Alexander Becker

    News Fasting. The deliberate avoidance of all forms of news media, particularly to relieve stress and relax the mind. Also: newsfasting.

    The concept is tried and trusted. Achieve moderation through deprivation. Go on a controlled fast and recognize the difference it makes.

    If you want results and you want them fast enough, you have to go extreme ways. Don't expect a balanced approach, we're going all out here. This is no moderate diet, no zone, this is the no-carb, guaranteed fat-loss, whatever-it-takes solution.

    Try and temporarily avoid the news and see the difference it makes. Do not ignore but screen out the news altogether -- without even attempting to keep track of what's going on through blogs -- for a specific time.

    Think fasting, in the dietary sense. Go on a controlled news fast for four weeks, no local news, no global issues, no foreign politics allowed. Schedule one cheat day each week and indulge in the weather channel. Make sure to stay with your local weather and avoid the world weather binge fest.

    Potential benefits include less TV time, less newspaper expenses and therefore less waste, a better mood and a greater sense of control since you cut out the things you can't influence anyway. The double effect on productivity is a relative increase in actionable information and an absolute increase in time to take action.

    Focus exclusively on your business (supposed you're not in the news business, in which case this diet isn't for you) and monitor the time you save and the decisions you make -- unbiased from and not influenced by daily news events.

    After completing this special diet, start to participate in news-inspired discussions -- freshly resetted and devoid of all too current facts, you'll find yourself perceiving -- ideally without judging -- the assumptions and influences of world news on your peers.

    No, there is nothing wrong with it, news are no evil, nor are they bad per se, just as carbohydrates aren't bad as part of your diet. The reason for going on a total fast is the occurring break and the experience of the difference. Just as with carbs, we slowly and moderately and consciously reintroduce news into our information diet. Start by gradually adding section by section of your newspaper or news aggregator of choice to your reading schedule. Deliberately include them in your diet, choose one, two, or three sections, and deliberately exclude the rest. What can you do without?

    Please note that the four-week duration is capable of breaking the habitual news consumption once and for all. Appreciate and enjoy your extra time.

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  • WOWOW: Starred Sodium Lightbulbs

    edited by Alexander Becker

    What have salt and lightbulbs in common and why should you care?

    Both have issues. While I think that Eat To Live is potentially superior to many, if not most, dietary recommendations, the salt question is an interesting and apparently emotional one, culminating spectacularly in the Salt Wars: The Phantom Menace --

    Salt also pulls out calcium and other trace minerals in the urine when the excess is excreted, which is a contributory cause of osteoporosis. If that is not enough, high sodium intake is predictive of increased death from heart attacks. In a large prospective trial, recently published in the respected medical journal The Lancet, there was a frighteningly high correlation between sodium intake and all cause mortality in overweight men. The researchers concluded, High sodium intake predicted mortality and risk of coronary heart disease, independent of other cardiovascular risk factors, including high blood pressure. These results provide direct evidence of the harmful effects of high salt intake in the adult population.

    Without implying an actual call for prohibition, ... there is a great line in the movie Demolition Man which is the vehicle to deliver today's point --

    Stallone:
    Do you have the salt?
    Bullock:
    Salt is not good for you, hence, it is illegal.

    ... hence, it is illegal. Does anyone see a problem with this kind of reasoning?

    Let's take a look at the call to ban inefficient lightbulbs in EU --

    Germany's environment minister Sigmar Gabriel has written to the European Commission proposing that inefficient light bulbs be banned in the EU.

    It gets even better with House Inspectors checking your light bulbs --

    They will go into every room to calculate the number of low-energy light bulbs and while in the kitchen they will even examine the cooker to see if has automatic ignition or a permanent pilot light.

    It is the verboten approach which rings bells -- at least it should do so -- all over the world.

    While we're there, this is what you'll do --

    Stallone:
    You'll get a little dirty...
    ... you, a lot clean.
    And somewhere in the middle...
    You'll figure it out.

    Just take action and change things for --

    ... each event triggers -- almost domino-like -- the next and the following ones with the result becoming inevitable because of cause and effect.

    Moderation is important to break up black-and-white thinking since nothing is perfectly black nor white. Moderation is the complete scale from black to white and so is life which is -- to stay with colors -- taking continuously and simultaneously from the whole spectrum, including the extremes, incorporating every color that is imaginable, all side by side.

    Or is the old concept of moderation all of a sudden broken? I don't think so.

    Note: The weekly Linking Park editions will become less weekly and more themed, for there is no day and night on the internet, nor are there timezones and certainly no weeks to adhere to. In the meantime, please check out the starred items provided in the sidebar.

    To your excellence.

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  • Moderation in All Things?

    edited by Alexander Becker

    One of Benjamin Franklin's virtues was to: Avoid extremes; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.

    I am always a proponent of pursuing extremes, if not for the outcome then at least for the value of the experience. Yet recently, I discover moderation as a concept. There are many events in life that benefit greatly from a moderate approach. Selective moderation leaves time and energy for the really important, for the high-priority issues to be tackled in extreme ways, excessive in single-mindedness and with overwhelming determination.

    With the overall concept and pace being moderate, as moderate as possible, resources are shifted towards the high-leverage objectives that are treated with all the power available, with utmost persistance and through exaggeration and escalation of circumstances whenever possible, even beyond the likelyhood of success.

    Moderation adds variety and promotes diversity since active moderation is capable of breaking repetitive habits -- the prevention of having too much of the same too often, for example -- allowing fresh input into your life.

    It may seem to conflict with the issue of discipline and exceptions, but you can benefit from moderating discipline itself for too much restriction -- and that's what a good part of discipine is about -- is detrimental to your success and your well-being.

    Moderation is important to break up black-and-white thinking since nothing is perfectly black nor white. Moderation is the complete scale from black to white and so is life which is -- to stay with colors -- taking continuously and simultaneously from the whole spectrum, including the extremes, incorporating every color that is imaginable, all side by side.

    Moderation precludes -- by definition -- the effects of excess.

    For good measure, take a look at extreme moderation which seems to be a contradiction in terms. You can exaggerate everything, just apply the concept of excess to the idea of moderation.

    Contemplating the reasoning behind moderation does in fact temper the extremes by itself through showing the nature and the evident advantages of moderation vs. excess; variety vs. uniformity; diversity vs. similarity; &c.

    I still feel the urge to take moderation to the extreme...

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