Searls of Wisdom for December 2023
I bought Becky a piano for Christmas so I've been brushing up on the only instrument I know how to play:
Congratulations on surviving 2023, everyone. Was touch and go there for a minute, but if you're reading this: you made it.
Don't worry, I'm not going to do a year-in-review for this month-in-review newsletter. One layer of retrospection is plenty. So let's just keep our heads down and focus on the month that was December.
Here's all the big stuff that happened on Earth in December:
- My parents visited for the first time since we moved to Florida
- As I mentioned earlier, you and I both survived
Okay, onto the smaller things going on. Here's one: I, Justin Searls, am reading a book.
Please don't tell us about this book you're reading
Look, I know some people like books. You signed up for this newsletter, so presumably you like reading—and if you like reading, then perhaps you like books, too. But when I imagine a Searls of Wisdom reader in the abstract, I imagine that you feel ambivalent about reading as a leisure activity. Truth be told, you read a median zero books per year. What's more, in my head canon, you like me so much that you've chosen to overcome an intense apathy towards reading to be here right now. And, since the version of you floating around my head seems (I am now realizing as I type this) suspiciously similar to me, I'm confident you'll be totally on board with whatever sentiment about books I choose to express next.
Anyway, as you and I both believe deeply, whenever a friend suggests you read whatever book they just read, it's basically a polite way for them to tell you to go fuck yourself. Like you don't have plenty of other stuff going on. Who are they to assume you have dozens of hours just lying around to devote to some book? Get off it.
So that's why I'm not going to recommend the book I'm reading to you. I'll mention it later, but I don't care whether you read it. In fact, I'm only reading it in spite of the fact that somebody recommended it to me months ago, and I apparently took such offense by the gesture that I've not only forgotten who suggested it to me, I'm pretty sure I've forgotten the human person themselves. So, anyway, all of that to say: if you are the person who recommended this book to me, please reply to this e-mail and (1) let me know it was you, (2) re-introduce yourself, as I appear to have purged you from my long-term memory, and (3) apologize. Thank you.
Reading books in Japanese
I'm ashamed to admit it, but I have actually been reading books continuously for the past several years. Not because I suddenly started enjoying the act of reading, books as a format, or the dangerous ideas contained within them, but because it turns out that reading books is a fantastic way to level up one's foreign language comprehension. I have now completed four (count'em, four!) books in Japanese. I never would have believed I could sucessfully read a single book in a foreign language, much less four, so I feel a modicum of pride about this.
The first four books I completed were all novels (well, one was a novel that baby-birds the reader with a cursory summary of Drucker's Management, but which is still mostly about high school kids being bad at baseball). Novels present language learners with a highly motivating trajectory, it turns out. Because learning the author's writing style, the relevant vocabulary, and any cultural context tends to be front-loaded as the novel's premise unfolds, one's reading velocity increases steadily as progress is made. Naturally, it feels good to be able to read more briskly as a novel reaches its climax, but I was surprised by how profound the effect is: it typically takes me six or seven times longer to get through a book's first chapter than its last.
Another surprise: if you were to ask what it's like to read a book in a foreign language, I'd answer that the ideas and emotions being conveyed land much harder than they would if I were reading in my native English. I'd normally roll my eyes at these novels' overly saccharine, hyper-dramatic plot lines, but here I am grabbing tissues to mop up my big, dumb tears every few hours. And when a book seeks to make a persuasive argument, I find I'm much more likely to be swayed than my cynical ass would have been otherwise. It took me a while to realize why, but I'm pretty sure the reason for this is that one's brain is so thoroughly occupied reading in a foreign language that there are fewer available cycles to also develop highly-critical opinions about whatever's being read. It's probably the same reason I listen to mainstream pop music and watch broadcast television in Japan, despite forsaking both their English-language analogues when I was a teenager.
Anyway, reading books is a fantastic way to learn a language once you've reached the baseline competency needed to do so. For this reason, I am willing to concede that books aren't all bad.
What's the book, though?
The book I'm reading is 嫌われる勇気, published as The Courage to be Disliked in English. It's a practical philosophy of Alfred Adler's individual psychology, presented as a Socratic dialog. I'm about halfway through and it's been reasonably interesting and thought-provoking so far. If nothing else, the book helped me finally wrap my head around teleology, something I failed to figure out in time for my Philosophy 101 final when I was in college.
As you might surmise from the title, the book presents ample opportunity to reflect on one's inter-personal relationships. But first, I need to tell the story of an old friend's cat.
My friend's extremely lovable cat
Years ago, an old friend of mine (come to think of it, I have forgotten who… maybe the same person who recommended me the book?) told me a story about their cat that left such an impression that I've been retelling the story as if it were my own ever since.
So this guy and his wife had several cats. Regular old cats. And they did what cats do whenever guests came over: scamper away and hide for hours. But one cat was different. Their youngest cat was as loving as the most affectionate puppy dog you'd ever seen.
Whenever my friend would answer the doorbell, this cat leapt down the stairs and bounded over the hardwood floors with such gusto that it would inevitably fall over and slide helplessly into his guests' legs. It would purr loudly for attention. It solicited and appreciated scratches behind the ears. Once it had acclimated to a guest's presence, it was content to sit and rub up against them for what seemed like hours.
At some point, the friend took the cat to the veterinarian for its annual check-up. They were told the cat was fine but for a particularly bad ear mite infection. They drove home and gave the cat whatever pills the doctor had prescribed.
Days later, the cat was nowhere to be seen. It didn't rush to answer the door like it used to. It had become, if anything, even less social than their other cats. They were worried the cat was having an adverse reaction to the medication or that it had gotten sick with something else, so they took it back to the vet.
And that's when my friend got to pay $150 to be told, "actually, your cat was only being so social because it was experiencing intense pain from the ear mites. It was probably seeking attention only as a cry for help. Mite infections are incredibly itchy, so it would scratch those hard-to-reach spots by rubbing and nuzzling against people."
My friend and his wife were stunned. What they had interpreted as acts of love were just their cat's attempts to mitigate the pain of its existence. Once its pain disappeared, so did its affection. Whoops!
I'm the cat, it's me
This morning, the story of the cat came to mind while I was reading Courage to be Disliked, and I realized that I have something in common with my friend's cat.
Since adolescence, I've existed in a superposition at either end of the social spectrum. I prefer to be alone in almost all contexts, but I go out with friends as many evenings as I choose to stay in. I do my best work in solitude, yet predicated my career on surrounding myself with thousands of consultants, clients, and other connections. Despite being a misanthropic loner at heart, I've lived my life as if I were engaged on a worldwide goodwill tour to win over as many humans as possible.
I've been aware of why this is and have even joked about it for years: I have an insatiable craving for validation. I've never known life without it. I was all of six years old when a friend first asked why I care so much about what others think of me. I'm not sure I've ever felt "loneliness" as others experience it—only a constantly rising tide of anxiety that is temporarily quelled when someone else signals I'm OK. Where does this compulsion come from? Nowhere good, if I'm being honest. Irrational fears of being ostracized, destitute, and helpless.
Disambiguating these darker forces from my own natural need for social interaction was never particularly difficult. In fact, early in my career I stumbled on a way to translate my ever-present angst into an engine of productivity. Rather than deal with my issues directly, I tapped into them as a limitless pool of corrosive energy in service of doing meaningful and impactful work, forming deep and lasting friendships, and becoming a more self-reliant and well-rounded person. Those deep-seated irrational fears became the heart of my unyielding motivational drive and an essential part of what made me successful.
At some point in this transformation, the locus of my concern shifted away from my obsession over what others thought of me and onto what might become of me if I were suddenly free of those worries. Would I melt into a useless puddle? Would I go full recluse, spurning all the relationships that I'd spent so long building and which had come to mean so much to me? Would I stop taking care of myself, gaining back the 70 pounds I lost over twenty years ago? Back in college, my life's goal was to spend every day playing videogames, drinking vodka, and eating gummy bears—if I removed the rotting keystone propping up my persona, would I finally manage to clear my Steam backlog while simultaneously wrecking my liver?
I may soon know the answers to those questions.
Remember what I wrote above about what it's like to read in a foreign language? That the content hits harder due to a lack of sufficient mental processing power to maintain a critical eye to it? Best I can tell, uncritically mainlining this book has had the unintended consequence of unwinding several of my core fears, which is forcing me to look at the world differently as a result. Ready or not, much of the inter-personal fear, worry, and shame that I've allowed to define me is melting away thanks to this stupid book.
The holidays are normally the busy season for people like me who crave social validation, and yet I've found myself reaching out to fewer people for fewer reasons. In the last few weeks, I've sent far fewer e-mails, text messages, and phone calls than I usually do. I've kept existing social commitments, but have felt pretty ambivalent about making new ones—comfortable declining invitations and experiencing zero FOMO in the process. Perhaps the biggest change has taken place in my own mind, as the ceaseless internal dialog causing me to fret about others—a constant companion since adolescence—has grown increasingly silent. I drank my coffee this morning and tolerated several minutes of total silence without once feeling compelled to rush off and distract my mind somehow.
I don't necessarily feel positively or negatively about the above because I'm genuinely unsure where it will lead. In fact, the reason I wanted to share this today (since it was assuredly not to recommend a book to you—who do you think I am?) is that I'm a little bit worried. Like the cat with the ear mite infection, what if my newfound contentment results in my feeling less of an impulse to reach out to friends and maintain relationships? In most of my friendships, I'm usually the one who initiates contact… will they ever reach out if I don't? Anyway, if you're a friend who I've trained to expect me to be the one to initiate communication, don't be shocked if you hear from me less. In fact, feel free to check in more often!
In other news
Before we wrap, here's some other stuff going on this month.
Public speaking advice
Just before the holidays, I published a video with some practical advice for aspiring conference speakers. Even if you don't intend to start public speaking anytime soon, I hope you'll watch and enjoy it for what it is. I had a lot of fun pairing every single phrase with a distinct stock video, to the point that I kept brushing up against Storyblocks' rate limits. They must not have anticipated people would make videos in my particularly unrelenting style.
How to RSS
If you've ever been curious about getting into (or back into) subscribing to RSS feeds as an alternative to allowing the social media platforms to mediate the content that goes into your feed bag, I updated the RSS page of my website with instructions on how to set up NetNewsWire, the best free RSS reader available for Mac, iPad, and iPhone.
And the Bug of the Year goes to…
Since I'm no longer tweeting or tooting, I'm spending more time writing long-form content. So rather than tweet a dozen "neat" software bugs every week, I sat in frustration with one especially terrible bug and kicked off a new annual tradition to announce Bug of The Year, detailing exactly how broken audio playback on Apple Watch is.
Family Reorg Underway
This is a big month in the Searls family of brands, because I'll be helping Becky build some custom software for her growing business. That means I'll be playing the role of developer to her product owner on a team of two humans. She has seen how bad I am at this from a safe distance for a long time, so she has no one to blame but herself for accepting my services now. (Can't beat the price, though.) But seriously, if we manage to get through this together, it means our marriage can survive anything. Stay tuned to find out!
Okay, that's enough me time. As usual, I wrote way more about way less than I intended to. I am now exhausted, which probably means you're extremely ready to be done reading this. Please reply with your favorite gummy candy and then go about your business.