My superpower is thinking ahead
This is my first post for WeblogPoMo AMA, a challenge to write AMA-style (“Ask me anything”) blog posts during November.
The question
Anne wrote this question: What is a skill or acquired ability that you use all the time that you think other people take for granted or don’t understand? AKA what is your superpower and how did you get it?
You can read her response on her blog.
My answer
Here’s my answer, which is a reply to Anne’s question. This isn’t meant to be agreement or argument with her response. WeblogPoMo AMA is a conversation across blogs. 🙂
My superpower power is being able to think a few steps ahead, about anything in my life.
I do it at work.
For context, my day job is in marketing. My core skills are in strategy and writing, but I’m asked to do all kinds of tasks across marketing functions. And that means I have to figure out a lot of things for myself, which makes thinking ahead vital.
Once I have direction on a project, I don’t need anyone to tell me how to get from initial stages to the finished project. I figure out what I need to do, and I do it.
I’m usually the one in meetings asking for clarification and noting if we go this direction, that will be impacted.
I do it with zines.
Everyone’s creative process is different. Some people start with very little planning. Some people plan every step.
I’m somewhere in between. I usually know what I want in the finished zine, and then I figure out steps to get there. What will the format be? Should I start with writing or with art?
I think ahead about what I’m making, but I try not to plan every single step. I make zines for fun, and too much planning makes them feel like work.
I do it with weekend plans.
I rarely overbook myself, and that’s because I think about how one thing on the weekend might impact another thing. For example, if I’m planning to do chores on Saturday, but then there’s an event I want to go to…if my Sunday is free, I can moves chores to Sunday.
When I’m running errands, I try to cover what I need on the same end of town. Three stores all within a few minutes of each other? I can go to all of them in an afternoon. If I need to go across town for something else, I’ll figure out when the best time is to do that.
Does all this planning stress me out?
Usually, no. Even though I plan a lot, I’m also flexible as much as possible. I like knowing the tasks I have to do and thinking about the best way to complete them. But if something doesn’t work out and I have to change plans, that’s okay. I don’t consider my plans to be set in stone.
How did I get my superpower?
It’s chess.
I started playing chess when I was about 6 years old, and I’m convinced learning the game that young got me used to thinking steps ahead.
My uncle taught me how to play—how each piece moves, how to guess at what your opponent would do, and how to look out for traps.
The following year, my class had the opportunity to play chess at school, so I could play against kids my own age. Sometimes I played really well. Sometimes I made careless mistakes. But all of it was practice in thinking ahead.
I don’t play chess regularly anymore. But I have a chess app on my phone and I’ll play against the computer now and then. One of my favorite things to do is make a move, then the computer makes a move, then I undo our moves, and try something else. It’s a good way to understand different possibilities branching off from the same arrangement of pieces.
Some final notes
I don’t think my superpower is rare, but I do think people take it for granted. I think lots of people don’t think ahead unless they’re asked to or they actually have to. I think fewer people are like me, thinking ahead automatically.
I think anyone can learn to think ahead. I think anyone can learn to make it a habit. The next time you have a project to do, think about what you want the final result to be. Then try to figure out what your steps are to reach that final point. You can try working backwards from the final point, too.
You don’t have to follow the steps you thought of. You don’t have to get every step right. (I certainly don’t.)
The point is, you’re thinking ahead to make your work easier and better. It’s about trying to anticipate what will come up over the course of your project. It’s not about being perfect.
I’m going to participate in #WeblogPoMoAMA, at least for a few posts this month. Feel free to ask me a question, and I’ll answer in a post on my blog.
I’m also browsing what other people are asking and answering, so I might write replies that way, too.
I forgot mundane Halloween costumes are a thing in Japan. 😆
The tradition was started in 2014 by a group of adults at Daily Portal Z who kind of wanted to participate in the festivities of Halloween, but were too embarrassed to go all out in witch or zombie costumes. So instead of the flashy and flamboyant costumes they had been seeing gain popularity in Japan, they decided to dress up in mundane, everyday costumes.
via kottke.org
Paved Paradise (or, cars ruin everything)
I finished reading Paved Paradise by Henry Grabar. 📚
Overall, I liked the book. A lot of it is about how parking space requirements determine where and what size buildings can be built. (AKA we can’t have nice things because we need space to store cars.)
Grabar talks a lot about reducing parking spaces but not as much about reducing our reliance on cars.
My main criticisms of the book are 1) the author doesn’t talk much about improving public transportation and 2) the author doesn’t really address accessibility.
Public transportation
Many chapters of the book focus on larger cities with good bus and subway systems. Yes, you can live in New York City without a car. But for smaller cities and towns, a car is often the only way you can get to your destination.
You need good public transportation systems so that reducing parking spaces does not also reduce people’s ability to move around town.
I would have liked to see more discussion about areas where there aren’t effective public transportation options.
Accessibility
An issue with eliminating street parking is, you take away parking spaces that are the closest to destinations.
People with physical disabilities may not be able to park 5 blocks away from where they want to go. That can be a lot of extra walking for some people. That can be enough of a reason to stay home.
I would have liked to see discussion about accessibility, since limiting where cars can go will also limit where people can go.
Recommendation
If you’re interested in how parking regulations shape cities and neighborhoods, I recommend reading Paved Paradise. But its main discussion—reducing parking spaces—is only one piece of the solution to relying on cars less.
Ice cream truck appearances are circumscribed by unwritten curb-control maps established by custom, negotiated by handshake, and enforced with violence. The history of ice cream truck rivalries is bloody. In 1969, armed rivals held up two Mister Softee garages in Brooklyn and the Bronx, taking nothing but the vital blender blades from thirty-nine trucks—rendering them useless before the blockbuster Fourth of July weekend.
Paved Paradise by Henry Grabar 📚
I was not expecting to read about ice cream truck crime today. 😧
Email privacy and customer communications
I use HEY as my email client. It blocks privacy trackers, so the sender can’t see when I open an email, where I’m located, or what device I use.
Those privacy featurse are great, and I know other email clients have them, too. But I wonder how many companies have figured out how losing that email data affects their operations.
I have an example.
I pay my bills online, and I opt for paperless billing whenever it’s available. But today I got a credit card statement in the mail. The envelope included a note that said my account got switched to paper statements because I haven’t opened an email from the credit card company in a year.
Um…not true. I open those emails, but HEY blocks the tracking for privacy reasons.
The credit card company doesn’t see data from my email opens, but they have other data about my activity. I make my payments on time. I confirm personal info whenever I’m prompted by the website or the app. Why doesn’t that activity count as me being active online for the credit card company?
Why is email activity the indicator they’re using, especially as more email clients shift to stronger privacy features?
Today’s note in the mail told me to sign in online and I can change my settings to paperless statements. So, back to what the setting was, before the credit card company automatically changed it…due to what they see as me not opening their emails.
What do we call this stage of the internet, where better privacy causes inefficient communication?
Why I moved my blog off WordPress
I had a self-hosted WordPress site for my personal blog from 2015 until last weekend, when I migrated Mythical Type to Micro.blog.
The recent drama between WordPress and WP Engine didn’t factor into my decision. For the last few years, I didn’t feel like WordPress was the right fit for my blog. But I didn’t find any alternatives that I liked, either.
WordPress is great for a business site, but it’s too much for me for a personal site. Too many settings. Too many plug-ins. Too much to tinker with and troubleshoot when I simply want an easy way to share my art and writing online. I don’t want to think about which content blocks to use. I want to type, type, type, and hit Post when I’m done.
I don’t like the aspect of managing my own hosting, either. I can figure out a lot of technical things, but I don’t know a lot when it comes to servers and IT infrastructure. It felt tiresome to troubleshoot an issue when all I wanted to do was post on my blog.
Side note: I know the argument for self-hosting is that you have total control of your site. You won’t lose your stuff if/when a platform suddenly goes under. But I don’t buy that argument, because a hosting company could suddenly go out of business, too. So my requirement is that I can export my work and move it somewhere else if I want to. Not that I have to have total control of it.
I’m glad I found Micro.blog and that it’s a good fit for how I like to post online. And I’m happy I don’t have to manage the technical side of websites anymore.
My October newsletter is out. Urban Legends info, resource round-up, and super brief reviews of what I’ve been watching.
Spooky season, spooky zine! 🎃 This is “Wandering Through Wonders” by Vlasinda Stormdrain. Copies are available through their shop. I’m excited to read it!
I accidentally found out about discofox and went down a little rabbit hole. 😃
I’m low-key obsessed with how it’s freeform but also there are certain expected moves. (Yeah this is true for other dances, too. But at least here it looks like if you can stay on beat and not tangle up arms, you can do it. 🙂)
Intelligent but ignorant
Lots of writing advice goes along the lines of “write for your reader” or “know your audience.” That’s the guideline for how to frame your writing, what voice to use, and what level of detail to include.
But what happens if you’re writing for a general audience–not a specific group?
Then how do you frame your writing?
One of my college professors gave advice that I still use: Assume your reader is intelligent but ignorant.
Write with the mindset that the reader doesn’t know your specific topic, but they’re smart and can understand what you’re writing. Then it doesn’t matter what knowledge or experience they have. You’re giving them what they need to follow along.
That’s more useful to me than writing for a specific audience.
This post was originally published on Mythical Type on June 12, 2022.
Mythical Type (my site for zines and creative projects) has a new home. Now it’s hosted on Micro.blog!
I migrated my posts from WordPress, and that went smoothly. Thank you to @manton for building an easy way to transition from WordPress to Micro.blog. 🙂
I have some formatting to clean up and updates to make. But I’m excited to have an easier way to share my art projects online.
‘Lanterns’: Kyle Chandler Set To Star As Hal Jordan In DC Series For HBO
100% yes to this 😃
Constellation prize
When I was in elementary school, we had carnivals twice a year, one in the fall and one in the spring. The carnivals were family fun nights, where we went to school for a few hours and played games, ate hot dogs and cotton candy, and entered raffles.
One year, the prizes were themed after the solar system. There were posters, freeze dried ice cream (remember that?), key chains–things like that. If you won, you got one of those “good” prizes. If you played a game and lost, though, you still got a few glow-in-the-dark stars, the kind you can stick on your ceiling.
Those stars were at every game, so I played and lost a few times, and still got all these plastic stars and planets.
I heard one of the teachers explain the prizes to a parent. I thought I heard her say the stars were the “constellation prize,” and it made sense to me. I could take these stars home and stick them to my ceiling in formation. I could make the Big Dipper and Orion. That was pretty cool.
It was a few years until I realized what that teacher actually said–the prize you get even when you don’t win is the consolation prize.
Years later, this is my favorite thing I’ve ever misheard.
It sounds like a good band name. It was the name of an album, long after I misheard the phrase in elementary school.
I use “Constellation Prize” as a name for random creative projects I’m working on, especially when I don’t have a plan for where the project is going. It’s a label I use for my own reference, so later on, I know, yes, that was a random thing I did for a bit.
And like those random stars and planets I got in elementary school just for trying, the name fits.
I like my notebooks messy
If you spend any time on Instagram or Reddit looking at people’s notebooks–how they lay out pages, what materials they use–you’ll see there are essentially two groups of people.
For one group, aesthetics are very important. They use elaborate layouts, lots of color, and mixed media.
For the other group, using the notebook is most important, so it doesn’t matter how it looks. They tend to use simple layouts and simple materials–in many cases, simply a black pen and nothing else.
Both groups are using notebooks in the ways that work best for them.
But I like my notebooks messy. Here’s why:
1. My notebook is a playground
I use my notebook to play and experiment. Anything and everything can go in it–snippets of writing, lists, quotes. It’s okay if it’s random and unorganized.
2. My notebook is a rough draft
When I have new ideas, I start working on them in a notebook. It’s the place I flesh out ideas and refine them. The final outcome won’t be in my notebook, so I don’t worry about being neat during the process.
3. My notebook is my space
I don’t share most of my notebook on social media, because I use it as my own work space. It’s for brain dumping and collecting ideas, with the purpose of reviewing notes later to see if there’s something I want to work on more. By nature, it’s messy.
4. My notebook is for everyday writing
I treat my notebook as the place to capture anything, so I tend to write in it quickly, whenever, during the day. Treating it like an everyday, ordinary thing (and not something that might have to be polished to post on social media), helps take the pressure off of what I write down or how it’s organized. My pages can be filled with whatever.
This post was originally published on Mythical Type on May 3, 2020.
New zines I picked up from Antiquated Future. 🙂
I just signed up for Mastodon because my curiosity outweighs my attempts to spend less time on social media. 🤭 Any recommendations for iOS apps to use for Mastodon? I know there are options and I did some quick reading. But let me know if there’s one you like.