This week, I appeared as a guest on the podcast of my workplace; it is a new podcast, and this was episode number 2. We talked about AI, of course. hah!
I don’t remember the last time I appeared on a podcast – it was quite some years ago. It made me thinking, though. Maybe I should blog more seriously again. Meaning: more frequent, and more in-depth. I consider it.
Weekend!
This week, I attended yet another conference. The conference was about cyber security, and I was responsible for one of the tracks of the conference. It was a positive experience, but also quite draining. And today, Thursday August 29th, I held a 1 hour presentation for colleagues at work, together with one other guy. That was also a positive experience, but also – again – draining.
Tomorrow is Friday August 30th, and on Sunday is September 1st. I have other conferences coming up in October, November and January that I am either fully, or partially, responsible for.
Today, I finished reading my book #50 for 2024, and I recently upgraded my goal for 2024 from 50 to 75 books. So I now have 4 months or so to read 25 books; around 6 books per month. That should do fine. I find that I don’t do much in my spare time anyway. I spend time with my 13 year old son, I read, I go to the cinema in the weekends, and I meet friends sometimes, and sometimes I go to the gym.
But is this life of mine structurally sound?
Let’s see. What does Google Gemini Advanced have to say?
From the response:
“Structurally sound” in this context could refer to whether your current lifestyle:
Long-term goals. That is the tricky one. Because I see that – – yes, I do have my long-term goals. I work in a big organization in Norway with over 100.000 members. I work as project manager at the Competence Center of that organization. Ok. I have goals for my work there for the next 6 months, and the next 3 years, and the next 7 years. They are not fleshed out, but they are definitely there. They are there, and those goals fill me with a sense of mastery; of accomplishment; when I move one step towards my goal.
I feel that my lifestyle supports my well-being, and a sense of balance. I work a lot sometimes, but that is the exception. I am far from some workaholic.
I want to study again. That is a main thing. The last formal studying I did was in 2015 when I finished my bachelor programme of Project Management at BI business school here in Norway. So, I want to start studying again in 2025. Next year, in January.
Structurally sound. I may regret things that I have done, but mostly I regret the things that I did NOT do. I don’t regret the moves I made when I was enthusiastic about something; that gut feeling is important for me, and when I had it, I just let it flow, freely, without much consideration.
I have become more careful, and more introverted. I often prefer the company of a book to another person.
But I will think more about those long-term goals, that is an important point for me.
I started blogging in 2000; 24 years ago. The online name then was “Ehich”. I used Livejournal. And then in 2002, my online handle became DLTQ – Don’t Lose the Question.
And later, I was uncertain whether it was just a Question. Or if there are Questions that I should not lose.
Drop my questions on the floor vs Drop my question on the floor.
It’s a subtle difference, but it is also very real, very in my face. Because if it is A question that I should lose, then it points to a Core Question in my life; a starting point, that I should not forget even as I move through my life.
But if it is instead the plural, the QUestions that I should not Lose. Then – so what? Wha would that mean? What would it mean for me to know that it’s the totality of the questions that I should not lose.
And what does it mean to Lose a question? To forget it, lost in my past? Or that I drop it, on the floor, on my graveyard of questions and thoughts and ideas; I drop it, and I then decide to forget about it.
59.
Now, it is the 59 that is my focus. Will I lose that? In 5, or 10, or 43? The 59 that slowly drips down; decreases towards the nil, nothing, zip, nada.
DLTQ
Ehich
During my childhood, I recreated books in my fantasy, and I changed some things. Elements in the story. Now I might say that I change some of the parameters. Like twisting some knobs in the sound studio, making those little twisting movements, left or right, and I then see/notice the changes, or I don’t.
Weekend. August 23rd 2024. 59.
A friday. A friday in a string of fridays, about 52 per year, about 520 per decade.
This Friday, May 31st 2024, is when I thought about blogging again, here on this olde website, which has been there like a rope around my neck for many years. Last month I almost let the domain name registration relapse; not renew it. Get rid of it.
But that’s the whole point, for me. Don’t Lose the Question(s). And here I am, on this Friday night, at 22:29 CEST, and I wonder: Did I lose some of my questions?
What drove me earlier, fueled my passions? And how is that compared to how things are now?
I remember March 2018 clearly. I decided, one evening, to “get involved”. I spent so much energy for the next months in 2018 that my wife’s patience grew incredibly thin. “You are never home”, she said. And she was right. I knew it.
Well, she moved on in 2020 and now lives with her new partner. That is fine, life does go on, nothing lasts forever.
My blogging period certainly did not last forever. My passion for blogging was HUGE in 2000, and then I got more busy with other things for a while, and then from 2004 it went all over. And in 2005 I started dltq.org on wordpress.
19 years ago.
This evening I have not done enough reading. So I will read a few hours now.
(blogging, just one entry at the time, to try to get into the habit again)
I am 46 years old; and I started blogging in 2000, using first one tool, and then over the next years other tools. Back then, at the start of 2000, I was 21 years old, and all of this was very new then.
But now, in 2024, this is not new. This is not exciting. The way I consume information is not through posting, writing, pushing electrons out there. Instead, to a much larger extent, I read. I read and I reflect. By myself. In my Day One journal on my phone, and in my physical diaries.
Whether I should blog or not is the big question. I really don’t feel the need for it.
[Question 1 to ChatGPT 4o / Google Gemini Advanced]
Personal motivation
My motivation for blogging was several things:
Finding connections
Reflection through writing
Seeing dots in the landscape
But once the connections were found, and the dots were clear, I lost interest. I moved on. I had the most excited phase of blogging from 2004-2006 or so. Way Back Machine has quite a few saves over the years; 268 snapshots. Here is one from July 16th, 2005 or September 28th, 2011. The latter has a sentiment close to May 29th 2024 (this blog entry):
I have for some months planned to re-start DLTQ.org, finding a new path, a new set of themes to cover, improve my language, improve the readworthiness of my entries.
But at the end of the day, I never prioritized that. I never went down and spent those days it took to get a nice design here, or figure out how to plan my future entries, or how to enhance my language. At the end of the day, this site was simply sitting there, empty.
So I guess this is me saying that this is how it will be, for some time.
September 28th 2011
Why bother?
Now AI solutions are all over the place.
Why put this out there?
[Question 2 to ChatGPT 4o / Google Gemini Advanced]
What would a meaningful and fulfilling blogging experience look like for me in 2024?
ChatGPT 4o
- Envision what would make blogging worthwhile and satisfying at this stage in your life. Think about potential topics, formats, or approaches that could reignite your passion for blogging. Consider what you want to achieve through blogging and how it aligns with your current interests and goals.
Well, there IS no meaningful and fulfilling blogging experience for me in 2024, as I see it. Not because the technology has changed, really, but because of how I have changed. Me.
There is no simple solution. And it is 10 PM CEST here now, on this Wednesday night, and I will turn to reading instead.
Process video (22 mins, no sound)
Edit: I just watched this interview. It gave me a lot of thoughts.
The old saying: “A map is not the territory it represents, but, if correct, it has a similar structure to the territory, which accounts for its usefulness.” (Source: Alfred Korzybski, Science and Sanity, p. 58, [via])
Mapping my mind through the output I create does not really do justice to my mind. But at the same time, there is a usefulness to it, because I produce, and I feel that there is a “before” and an “after”; that there is a delta before my involvement/action, and after.
But as I got older, I became more and more cynical, and less of a believer that my actions will make a big change.
I am now 45 years old. How will I view my past of 25 years ago when I am 70? How do I now, aged 45, view my actions from when I was 20, in 1998/1999?
1998, the year I turned 20 in the month of March. 1999. January 1999. What was that month like, this month that was 25 years ago? How about January 15th 1999?
The Janury 15th of 1999, 25 years ago, was a Friday. I was 21 years old. I had almost come to the time when I had given up my writing ambitions; those loose ambitions that did not lead to much output of consequence.
January 1999. I wrote a diary. Yes. I was very active with my diary those years. I don’t have easily access to those 25 year old journals now. But I wrote, I thought, I read, I talked, I met new people.
Fast forward 25 years. Many pages of writing. Many GB of data. Many days of living later. It is now January 15th 2024:
In 25 years, it will be January 15th, 2049.
In those 25 years, I will look back at my mid 40s. I may laugh, I may cry, I may be proud of something I will do in 2024, or 2027.
22:06. This minute will never return. But can I use that minute to write a new idea, a new thought? A new thought among the billions and billions of thoughts that – consciously or unconsciously – run through my head during my lifetime?
One reason why I write a diary is to measure my expectations vs the results. I go to a cinema. I write about it in my Day One app. And I write: “Exp: 5/6”, and after I write: “Res: 5/6” or whatever. 22:07. That minute was gone. A new minute is here.
But the minutes until January 15th 2049 arrives?
So. I have many minutes, hours, days, to create my own maze, and to map the things in new ways. Some maps will be accurate descriptions of my mood at that minute, day, year, while others will be like reverse images, inverted, upside-down. Reality distorted into some fantasy.
Distorted. 22:13. Tomorrow I have another performance. And I look at new constellations, and new relationships that build, and new themes and ideas.
22:15. Time to read some more. Enough output – for now.