What Do You Optimize For?

I. The world is texting while driving and nobody seems to care. I don’t mean it literally (although that’s also true). It seems like everyone’s continuously living with half of their brain-power away on something else. Damn. Another “old man yelling at cloud” post. Fuck it. I have to write this. II. Recently, a very special group of friends of...

I. I always thought of myself as weird. Well, not really. But when I did start thinking of myself as weird, my life improved a lot. As a kid, I struggled to conform to other’s expectations of normalcy. Everyone played fútbol during school recess, but I hated it. One of the few times I ventured to the field, a classmate accidentally kicked the...

I. In December 2001, Argentine President Fernando de la Rua imposed an ATM withdrawal limit of $250 per week. The country was in a drawn-out recession since 1998, and the government tried to stop a precipitating bank run. I was 12 at the time, and my whole life savings were $80. My godfather had given me a $100 bill as a gift a few years back,...

I. Not long ago, you could play the guitar while singing along to almost any song just by googling “song name + chords” on your phone. This was a really nice social gathering activity, especially among musicians. Your phone (or tablet) was invisible, just a tool. The focus was in expressing yourself through music and connecting with friends....

Summary: I share techniques I use to protect my brain when using computers. Part 3 of a 3 post series on good practices for using tech. In part 1, I shared some tips for preserving digital privacy. Part 2 was about digital security basics. I’ll now explain what I do to protect my mind from going crazy with overstimulation from computers. This...