🔬 Life Experiment 6, 2021

Hey There.

The past few days were crazy.

• Submitting the company papers.
• Company approved.
• A major PhD talk.
• Company finance papers.
• Moving all my stuff. Again.

To some extent, I enjoyed the pressure and the speed after being stuck at home the whole past year, but on the other hand, not that much.

It's like I need a hectic period every February, then I can slow down for the rest of the year 🙂 Or do I?

Moving

I'm moving out of the capital again, to the countryside. With this corona thing probably not going anywhere by the end of the year, I decided to stop wasting my money on rent.

So I started the packing party:

I had to update my skills for:

• wall painting,
• window cleaning,
• apartment cleaning.

I can report that the last two skills are not my strongest suit.

I mean the place was clean when I returned the apartment key, but we agreed with the owner to hire a cleaning crew and do a proper job for 100 bucks.

It hurt a bit to lose the cash. But here's the thing: I can't do it as well as the cleaning crew can.

My paint job didn't receive any complaints, though.

It's a bit wired to change your home once a year, so when I heard Song of Home by Rob Lane this part really got to me:

...
Home is the trace of those lives we leave behind
And home is the place that I yearn for all the time.
...

Why?

Since 2016 I've been jumping from one place to another, never really feeling like at home. To some extent, I yearn a place I could call home for a longer period. A place I could turn into whatever I want, but it will be a while before I can afford my won apartment.

I'm fully aware that I'll move at least a few times before I settle down for good. In about two to three years, another longer travel related to my scientific work ...

Sure I yearn a home. But I also miss the places where I lived in the past. They shaped me into who I am. And despite the flaws I still have, I'm pretty happy with the outcome.

Maybe this time I'll last more than a year in one place 😛 With the new view:

It might actually work out. Although if living on the seaside didn't convince me to stay. Will the mountains? Read the version of this newsletter in a year to find out 😉

January reflection:

With all the stuff going on, I still managed to reflect on what happened in January.

I can't believe that the first month of the year is over. It went by really fast.

I did a lot on my PhD and company front:

• Paperwork. Opened a company.
• Major PhD talk (important for the direction of my upcoming work).
• 19 pieces of content.
• Dived into Twitter.
• Launched a personal collaboration tool.
• Started participating in online communities and meeting new people.

Had to turn down a lot of "once in a lifetime" opportunities to stay on course. I'm getting offers for new opportunities on a daily basis. I know it's a good problem to have. But it's so frustrating to say no.

So I've been practising the mantra:

Am I interested? You know that I am. But I have to say no to remain focused.

So far, so good.

In the past month, I really changed the way I approach work. I'm starting to be less all over the place (I think) and focus on a few major priorities. For January those were:

Prepare the PhD talk.Open the company.

Both checked so all good.

You might have noticed that I reduced the number of pieces I publish. Again focus. I was spread too thin. I want to ramp up to more pieces, but more slowly, maybe? Will see.

🔬 Weekly experiment 5, 2021

Besides moving and reflection of the past month, there was not much time left for experimentation.

There are although a few things that I realised:

• For serious long coding sessions, I need big screens. 13inch laptop isn't enough. But it's a must that I have one completely empty wooden desk for writing at all times. Good that I'm moving to a new place where that option is on the table 🙂

• That I've been asking my self over and over again why I'm not building the business around the things I'm the expert in like (mathematical modelling & physics). For some reason, I have this idea that there's no market for that part of my skill set that I developed the most in recent years.

Reading material

Postponing the personal brand development journal again. Sorry ... For some reason, those weekly journals slip and slip.

Then read this on Digital gardens (not written by me), newsletters and knowledge economy.

Newsletters and knowledge economy are becoming a bit of a bubble.

If you're thinking about diving into it, I would say do it. The trick is that the market is flooded with crap. People are not willing to put the time in to produce high-quality content.

Several hours a week, consistently for years. That's a lot. Yes.

I haven't caught a break yet, but I've been writing for almost two years now. I enjoy every minute of writing and discussing the pieces I write with my friends.

Each newsletter sort of levels up a lot of my friendships. So no I'm not doing it for the money, fame or whatever another popular buzzword. I'm writing to level up my social interactions. I have to admit it's an effective approach 🙂

So if you can consistently create authentic content that's based on your experience, you have a chance. One example is this weekly rumbling which more and more people are starting to read 🙂 For some reason.

Writing this particular edition of the newsletter was really an uphill battle. New writing environment, every muscle in my body hurts due to carrying my crap from one place to another for two days. Yeah, even the fingers. I can feel them as I type.

Don't forget to experiment and cheers till the next experiment.

Ziga

P.S. Sharing is caring, so forward this newsletter to at least two friends. The friend who subscribes to the newsletter after you forwarded it to them has to send you a bag of gummy bears in return. Send pics, or it didn't happen 😉