Happiness isn’t always a good metric to deliver against. Why? Because happiness can be manipulative. Extreme example:I have an employee who scores high on the employee engagement survey. They show up as “super happy.” When I meet this person, they’re happy. When others talk of this person, they say “oh my gosh, they’re sooo happy.” At the end of month the employee’s outputs are negative or nominal at best. Wait I thought they were happy?Analysis: happiness lied! If anything, we learned this person might have been happy doing nothing!Another example:Someone wants you to do something for them. They signal that if you do the action they will become happy. The incentive for you to do the action is to generate happiness in the other person. You are a people pleaser, and you do the thing for the other person. You spend the money, you invest the time, you buy the things, you break your back, and you do all you can to please that person. The problem is — the person is never pleased. Analysis: happiness lied! Happiness served as the means to an end, a red herring. To my knowledge, you - faithful reader, do not have the ability to control the feelings of others. You can do things that cause someone to experience the world a certain way which causes a reaction. But can you make a feeling happen? To my knowledge, no. And if that’s true, why deliver against happiness? A more useful metric would be to deliver against commitments, or better yet — against spec. Now the weight is on the person who benefits (the employee or the requestor) to describe their need in detail and for you (the manager or the do’er) to decide if delivering on that spec is your work that matters.Parting thought: don’t discount happiness all together. Enjoy it for what it is — a byproduct of a job well done.

I read “The Alchemist” last year and took a note that reads:War is a balance of power. War is rarely a fight between good and evil. Both sides believe they’re “good”. Instead, war is power’s way to balance itself in the world.In many ways - life is a war. It’s a relentless push and pull on a system seeking to optimize for its equilibrium. You fight wars every day. Some of these wars are truly moral in nature, and some aren’t. The challenge is realizing what’s what and proceeding forward. Happy Monday.

Musicians I grew up looked for a good meal after a late night gig. Taco Bell is a reliable stop. It’s almost always open late, cheap food, and (for some) the taste is so bad that the disgust will keep you awake for long drives back to your home. There are musicians I know that read this blog. For those of you who stop at Taco Bell at 1am along some interstate, ask yourself if you could be getting the same meal at a cheaper price further down the interstate?Apparently, the price dispersion of a meal at Taco Bell is quite large across the United States.HT Tyler Cowen/Marginal Revolution for the link

I am learning this about myself — what fears I have may be more about me and less about how the outside world interacts with me. Sometimes I wonder if my fear prevents me from optimizing for maximum effectiveness.

There are many kinds of memory. Some things are remembered in the body, other in time, other in smells, the list goes on.

I see my dad — he doesn’t remember the past or has a hard time visualizing the future; however, he has knowledge of things — he can recall some things given the proper context and environment.

Context matters… especially when it comes to visualizing time.

“I have a good memory. I simply can’t visualize the past or the future. However, I see the present very clearly.” — Dad

It resonated.

Today is your day. It’s always your day.You get to decide what to do with your day.Don’t interpret the ability to decide as “every day is fun in the sun.”What makes each day awesome is that you got to decide.

Stanley Kubrick said (edited for clarity):I had one thing I think that perhaps helped me get over being a school misfit. I became interested in photography. I started out by getting a camera and learning how to take pictures, and learning how to print pictures, and so on and so on, and finally learning how to sell pictures and would it be possible to be a professional photographer. And it was a case of over a period of say from the age 13 to 17 of going through step by step without anybody really helping me the problem solving of becoming a photographer. This particular thing about problem solving is something that school’s generally don’t teach you. If you can develop a generalized approach to problem solving it’s surprising how it helps you in anything. I think that photography might have been more valuable than doing the proper things in school.

Made in 1908, Émile Cohl, created one of, perhaps “the”, first animation. Watch it. I love how the animation is like a stream of consciousness. “First I was here, then I did this, and then whoah this happened to me, and then… and then!” I have a bias for wanting the endings ruined — I want to go right to the end. However, there are times when I can suspend the mind and appreciate the absurd and surreal — that animation made my day. I enjoy Monty Python for similar reasons.Do you take enough time to enjoy the nonsensical?

If you’re a bear in Yellowstone park, your summer might suck. Finding food. If you’re a mother bear, preventing your cubs from being killed by a male bear. Hoping wolves won’t steel your skills. Bears have it hard.It’s said that most animals born in Yellowstone never live past a year. Death by mauling, starvation, abandonment, or something else.I can’t complain about a mosquito bite or annoying people. I’m in my 40s . Compared to a young animal in Yellowstone, I’ve got it made.