16 - Nov 2024 - monthly reflections and some updates

Hello! It’s warm in November here in New York and it is concerning. Even if I wanted to live in denial about the climate getting increasingly unpredictable every year, this weather won’t let me. The election results are out here in the US. There is a lot of blame and hatred all over my social media feeds. A lot of people are lamenting being in complete bubbles because of the way algorithms curate their feeds. It has made me wonder just how deep is the social damage inflicted by algorithmic curation and online echo chambers and if there’s a way out.

🌊 Hi, I’m Sachi, and this is Currents, a newsletter talking about books, life, and more. If you want to unsubscribe, the link is at the bottom. If you like this, share it with someone or leave a response, let’s chat!

Yapcast

I started a new newsletter, Yapcast, named after what a friend of mine calls my long voice notes. Yapcast is where I take a subject of interest, dive into it and write about it. As a way to keep my curiosity alive and my judgment towards my own writing under control, I pick a new subject for 1-2 weeks. I’m now allowed to take more time. More time = stewing in ways that it's not good enough. 

Surprisingly, I haven’t missed a week yet. It’s an exercise to build my ability to write about things more critically and also a way to keep my spirits high as I look for work in this strange economic landscape. I wrote about the movie The Substance last week and I’m writing about anime opening sequence design soon. Check it out and let me know what you think! :)

On intelligence

When I was a kid intelligence was equated with knowing a lot (being well read and cultured) or being really good at problem solving (math or science specifically back then). I have a strange relationship with intelligence. It’s all I ever craved but I never felt like I ever made tangible progress towards it. My biggest growth spurts in learning about the world happened when I felt most inferior and far from being considered intelligent. I read and sought things out in a random directionless way. The environment where I grew up made it abundantly clear that there is nothing worse than being stupid. It might be a permanent fear for me. But is it possible to attain something without definition and clear milestones?

What’s great about growing up and meeting people very different from you is that you get to see that there are different kinds of intelligence. Reading a lot and being a math whiz might be two types and not the entirety of intelligence. I encountered people with incredible social skills and the ability to bring people together. I saw people with a knack, either natural or cultivated, for decoding businesses. I met people who processed information as they made things, which was fascinating too. Although I devalued it then, I learned that kinesthetic intelligence is impressive in its own way. I saw a tweet recently that questioned why we look down on people who place high value on building and maintaining their bodies. The discipline and effort that goes into that is hardly insignificant. I encountered these interesting people but through most of my 20’s continued to value knowing things and hungrily sought things out to learn. It was mostly driven by curiosity but there was always a little fear of being stupid.

I no longer think simply knowing things is aspirational. We’re all bombarded with information and it is no longer impressive to merely collect information aimlessly. I used to be good at math but it was limited to acing tests. I never understood the underlying principles of math and why it mattered at all. I still think physics, chemistry, and biology are extremely cool. I love to read but as of now it’s only recreational. Access to information and what’s valued is changing rapidly. It forced me to reevaluate the abstract and undefined intelligence I have been chasing all this time.

I have come to the conclusion that I find iterative and repeatable processes far more interesting than being particularly skilled at one thing. I’m more interested in being someone who can understand a subject deeply, improve repeatedly, and be able to use what I have learned in any situation. I find the process of learning and coming to your own conclusions far more compelling than being good at one niche subject that can only be used in certain contexts. The process is yours and catered to your way of learning. It isn’t institutional or publicly approved. It’s yours only. I also began to respect people who see patterns in huge amounts of information. This could be trend analysis or simply understanding what people are up to where we’re heading as a society. It’s a specific kind of intelligence but it’s more process oriented than goal oriented. Process > output. Process > awards, accomplishments, and societal milestones. A discerning eye, attention towards context, and adaptability are what I’m working towards. It might change in a decade. Who knows? Moreover, I disagree with vilifying not knowing something. It’s impossible to know much when you’re a beginner and it’s impossible to know everything when you’re a seasoned pro.

It annoys me a lot that it took me 30 years to develop an opinion of my own, grow a spine and disagree with what I was told as a kid. Surely, I could have reached this conclusion faster. To be that exemplary kid who was good at everything was an impossible goal from the start. It was something I did not care for and it did not excite me. I, fortunately or unfortunately, refuse to budge an inch unless it’s for something I care about. That halfhearted attempt for parental or societal approval went on for longer than it should.

An unexpected result of watching a ton of action anime in 2024 was watching character archetypes closely. The level-headed-genius-prodigy archetype who I thought I needed to be was almost never my favorite character. I have always been into the fallible characters who learn and level up continuously using unconventional methods. The appeal of all of these shows have been the growth arc of those characters and how they form bonds with the people around them to do so. Now that’s worth seeking.