Writing

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Writing is hard. You’re condensing your thoughts into more general concepts that can (hopefully) be understood by others. It’s equivalent to compressing a giant file (your mind) into some smaller artifact (some scribbles on a page).

Writing is valuable. It’s how we can give the gift of knowledge to the future. One can learn some concept and teach it to others with no investment other than the time spent compressing that knowledge.

Writing is introspective and philosophical. Writing delves into the nature of knowledge. What’s worth sharing with others?

The process of writing is good practice for thinking. It forces you to focus on communicating clearly. It makes you think about language and how to effectively convey concepts. It makes you consider if your examples are truly clear and engaging, or just a distraction not adding any value.

I’m really bad at writing. My thoughts are chaotic and disorganized and hard to communicate. Praciting writing gives me the chance to hone what I’ve been thinking about, and work “muscles” to help me communicate more clearly.

Recent posts from blogs that I like

On Reflection: Extending the image

Little used for 400 years, in the 19th century painters extended their scenes by including reflections seen in a mirror. Here are some significant examples.

via The Eclectic Light Company

Love is about being invested in someone’s continual expansion

This is one of the joys and challenges of love: the more skillfully you love someone, the more held, encouraged, and accepted they feel, the more they change.

via Henrik Karlsson

Prompts are technical debt too

It’s common and correct to say that “all code is technical debt”. Adding code is a necessary evil for developing new features: you almost always have to do it, but each line of code adds to the complexity and maintenance burden of the system. All future changes to the system have to work with the ex...

via Sean Goedecke