Hi there!
I’m focused on learning about the different causes of death and how to get rid of them: Viva Immortality! I organize rationality meetups in the Hampton Roads, VA area.
Willa
Karma: 493
The Norfolk, VA meetup everywhere today at 3pm has been cancelled due to rain & not receiving any rsvps.
Solve easy problems & what’s your default query tool?
I am committing to solving at least five problems in my life per week that aren’t just regular chores. Here’s the current list: (most of this list is: I am tired of seeing my deadname around too frequently)
Done: requested name change with US Department of Education
Done: requested new card from $bank1 so my name is correct on it
Partial: Called $bank2 about name change and they are snail-mailing me the paperwork for that.
To do: Call $university1 & $college1 to do name change at both places and get updated diplomas
To do: Purchase decorative but functional window privacy film so I can raise blinds halfway on most of my windows and line the sills with plaaaaaaants!
Bonus: picked up my car from a local automotive electrician today, it now has working air conditioning again!
Challenge: switch my default informational query tool from a web browser search engine to ChatGPT (gpt4) and see how that goes. exceptions for local or timely or emergency info apply, of course.
I started this today, was very useful for some Excel specific keyboard shortcuts I needed during the workday.
Note: I did not comment about publicizing events via Facebook, Twitter, nor Meetup.com, because I do not have much experience using those platforms for doing that. I also don’t really use Facebook and my Twitter is basically a read-only feed I check once every few months. Would love to hear from anyone who regularly publicizes, promotes, or otherwise advertises meetups via those platforms.
Thanks for coming out all! The meet-up has concluded. Until next time 🙂
I have made it to fair grounds and claimed the big table. I brought a dry erase board for the sign, someone with artistic capabilities should probably redo it once they get here.
Tomorrow’s ACX Meetup will take place at Fair Grounds starting at 10:30am instead of the Pagoda due to inclement weather. Address: 806 Baldwin Ave # 2, Norfolk, VA 23517
I will get there early to secure the round table.
So, there are supposed to be thunderstorms much of Sunday including during the meetup time according to a few different weather sites + the National Weather Service. The Pagoda is fine (very well covered) for drizzles or light rain, but might not be a great spot for heavy rain or thunderstorms. If the forecast hasn’t improved by 2pm tomorrow I’ll send an update out, we can meet at Fair Grounds instead (might be a bit cramped cause it’s a Sunday, but I can get there earlier to try to secure a good spot).
We are on the William and Mary campus: (37.2712247, −76.7129380)
We are heading outside to walk around, message on Discord to reach us.
We’re just inside of the cafe entrance on the right
Finalized Venue & Schedule:
11:00 Meet at Aromas Coffeehouse Bakery & Cafe (431 Prince George St, Williamsburg, VA 23185). If the weather is nice then we’ll likely sit outside, otherwise find us inside. I’ll wear a green shirt and a green & yellow hat.
13:00 Walk around the festival, check out the arts & music, check out the marketplace vendors, etc.
13:45 Meet back up at Aromas Coffeehouse Bakery & Cafe
14:00 Official end of the meetup
After 14:00: If I haven’t eaten already I’ll probably want to get food at this time and otherwise/then go for a walk around the town & university campus, company welcome.
April 9 Williamsburg VA Meetup, AI, and thank goodness Spring is almost upon us
If you find yourself in or near Williamsburg, Virginia on 2023/04/09 come join for a Virginia Rationalists Meetup and the Williamsburg 2nd Sundays Art & Music Festival.
This week was a bit overwhelming in AI news, with GPT-4 releasing, new Midjourney, Stanford’s Alpaca, more AI offerings from Google, Microsoft CoPilot 365, and honestly a bunch more things. I’ve spent too much time already talking with the GPT-4 version of ChatGPT given how long it’s actually been available...oh well, it’s a very useful cognitive prosthetic, I’m finding myself actually wanting to write & produce content again since drafting things got so much easier (none of this post was written by an AI, this is a casual shortform so it’s all me). I wish the AI Safety folks the best of skill in updating to account for this new burst of capabilities.
Seems that SAD knocked me out a bit for some of January and all of February (I improved my home’s lighting considerably this winter, but didn’t go far enough it seems, among other things). Temperature fluctuations in Norfolk aside, Spring is definitely starting, and I’m very happy about that. Time to touch grass and do more things outside again!
There is no overarching narrative conclusion to see here, just the end of a post :)
Cheers,
Willa
Shortform #147 Working & Considering Partial Digital Nomadism
I experience significant value-add to my life / nice things when I travel. I trialed working semi nomadically in December when I stayed at 7 or 8 households over 10 days while working remotely full time. That was fun, exhausting, and a very valuable learning experience! I definitely overbooked myself on that trip and did not schedule enough downtime, plus, I found working from a single laptop screen a bit less efficient than my normal 4 screen work setup & other desktop accoutrements.
With a bit more equipment optimized for working from anywhere, a few more optimized habits picked up from frequent travelers, and ensuring that I schedule in downtime, I feel confident that I could go a solid month or two working fully nomadically without experiencing significant issues or drawbacks. I do occasionally go onsite for projects & team meetings at my job so I likely would want to not be gone for longer than a month or two at a time anyhow.
For a variety of reasons I don’t really want to go too too far out of state and work until late summer, so I’ll practise digital nomadism in the meantime by doing multiple local, near local, and nearby state trips so I can find remaining pain points and build the habits, get the equipment, or otherwise develop solutions to address those pain points. Then late summer I’d like to head out to the other side of the country (US) and visit up and down the west coast. It would be fun to visit rationalists in all the cities I travel to, so when I do travel I intend to reach out in the meetup groups, discords, and elsewhere to coordinate such visits for each city I end up in!
Shortform #146 Happy New Year! (a few updates; all dates from 2022 unless specified otherwise)
Resuming on October 16th didn’t happen, oops. Looks like January 3rd (today) will have to do! Now for some updates:
I changed jobs in October: I went from a contract employee to a full employee at the healthcare org I work at, with a promotion to a new team! Now I am supporting clinical & medical technology systems, it’s cool stuff, I’m learning a ton, and I love the position, it’s a very good fit.
November disappeared into the abyss of working a lot, I can’t say I did much this month besides my normal routine, work & lots of learning at work, and increasing healthy eating habits. I did journal a decent amount in November, so I can use those and other electronic items (messages to others) to piece together a memory prosthetic for that month if I become so inclined.
December was a very long month, with quite a bit of activity. In addition to normal holiday stuff, I went to Texas for ten days and had a great time travelling & hanging out with friends. I’m happy that I was able to attend a Houston Rationalists meetup and an Austin LW meetup while in Texas, those were fun and it was great to meet a lot of new excellent people & see a few people I already knew too!
The book club that another Rationalist Organizer and I co-organized ran to completion and finished in December. I learned a lot, and also really enjoyed participating in a book club with other Rationalists & Organizers. The discussions were excellent and everyone had helpful anecdotes to share related to the book we read: “The Art of Gathering: How We Meeting and Why it Matters”, by Priya Parker
Sadly, I was unable to make it to Washington D.C. for New Years like originally planned, but the large winter storm & mass cancelling of flights by Southwest Airlines prevented my friends from flying in to where I’m at (we were going to take the train to D.C.), so we had to cancel those plans. I look forward to visiting D.C. and also meeting up with the local Rationalists community while there another time!
I don’t have any explicit New Year’s resolutions, more so I will be continuing with life improvements already deemed desirable (improving diet, sleep, and exercise) and continuing to learn more and do well at work. I’d also like to continue improving consistency & conscientiousness because I find those to be very high reward areas to skill-up in. I have a YouTube project in the works, but will not be launching that until I’ve written a more coherent business plan than my current draft and have completed scripts for at least five videos. I haven’t forgotten about my Substack, but I think I launched that a little bit too early. I intend to continue that Substack and write more there, but this time without as much of a rush & with more deliberateness. I am hopeful and excited for 2023!
I can see the egregore of Overwork & Hustle looming as I think about how much I both have to do and want to do in 2023, but I will make sure to take time to rest & take care of myself. Staying deliberate with my time and actions helps with that, so I expect to write Shortforms at a decent cadence this year; they help with such deliberateness. It may be better to move to a personal blogsite for them...but I’m still on the fence about that.
May you have a most excellent and profitable 2023!
Cheers,
Willa
Fair Grounds is closed today, so we will be meeting up at Cafe Stella instead at the same time. The address is 1907 Colonial Ave, Norfolk, VA 23517
Shortform #145 Audio Journaling | Rethinking Shortforms
I tried audio journaling for the first time today, it felt weird but I think the experience was actually great! Recorded for about 30 minutes on an old non-internet connected phone (to pacify my paranoia) and then listened to the recording and got hit in the feels in all sorts of good and helpful ways.
I like writing these shortform posts, but am not sure how valuable they’ve been over the last few weeks in particular (I know writing the posts as a whole has been incredibly valuable to my personal development and overcoming shyness so just targeting the last few weeks). I’ve increased my in-person organizing commitments and have a lot going on in my life, including a possible job change. Those things plus...I do feel bad when I write a shortform post that feels rushed or low quality, and I’ve felt that way about too many of my shortform posts recently. My time is important and your time is important, so I’d like to ensure these posts are generating the kind of value I want them to. No more shortform posts this week, I will post again on Sunday October 16th.
No shortform post today...I developed a migraine early afternoon and it’s still with me though not as intense as the worst part of it thankfully. I met my “wake up at 5am” commitment today and felt really well rested & great today until the migraine struck me in the early afternoon (not sure the cause, might have been too much caffeine). I enjoyed having the extra full hour or so in the morning to devote to whatever I wanted: I listened to more of a good audiobook, sent an email, and did another thing or two, it was pleasant.
Shortform #144 Pre-Registering commitment actions
This week I may have meat on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday.
Saturdays I am intending to Sabbath hard and go home for the sake of supporting my increased workload on the rest of the days of the week and having one day where I really unplug and engage in pure non-work leisure. No shortforms on Saturdays.
Commitment: wake up at 5am three times per week, those days this week are: Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday.
2 mile minimum walk: I will almost certainly do this on Sundays, probably before or after Virginia Rationalists’ Sunday workshop.
Tomorrow I intend to go through the character sheet that I built today, sort the features by order of desired acquisition, and make my plan of action for acquiring those.
Shortform #143 Taking small actionable steps to improve my life
Starts Monday Oct 10. I am coasting now on my past commitments because they have become habits (for the most part). Time for new commitments! Note: I find that small continuous actions of improvement, (see also Kaizen), more sustainable & actually doable than big innovations, so those are my guidelines with most of my new commitments.
Health:
Eat one or less egg per day instead of the two I’ve been averaging
Eat meat no more than once every other day instead of the once a day I’ve been averaging
Increase stairs climbed per day from an average of 7 flights per day to 12+ flights per day (note that this is a full weekly average, not just during workdays where it’s easy to climb 10 flights a day given my current duties).
Continue walking as much as possible to reduce car utilization, plus, commit at least one 2 mile minimum walk per week that’s separate from my walking commutes.
Mind:
Continue the habit of going to bed by 9:30 and falling asleep by 10 except for occasional (no more than once a week) staying up slightly later. Waking up at 5:45am every morning for the last few weeks has been great for me, I want to continue that and possibly move the wakeup time earlier.
Set a five minute kitchen timer once per day and write in a designated notebook about thoughts that crossed my mind that day.
Set a five minute kitchen timer once per day and read a designated nonfiction book or textbook about biology (this will be one recommended by commentators from my Have you considered getting rid of death? post that was also posted on LessWrong).
This feels like quite a few new commitments already, yet I’m feeling like writing several more paragraphs worth. Let’s start with the above, I’ll add more as I go.
Alive and recovering
In 2024 I sought out and experienced a lot of new-to-me parts of life. Along the way I found out how low my self-confidence and self-esteem are, and that my typical coping mechanisms were routinely overwhelmed or not working as well. Over the winter I almost lost myself (i.e. died) to major depression. Unfortunately, I have more than that going on, but fortunately, with a lot of help, I’m feeling hope again and steadily working back to stability.
I write and share this publicly in the hopes that it may help even one other person. I also write this selfishly for the purpose of strengthening one of my self-care habits.