Stamping Out Curiosity

Thoughts on LinkedIn conversation about curiosity it lean (LinkedIn's extremely poor Ux practices means I can't link to a web page of the discussion).

The strong sense of curiosity is in America but crushed out by bad management.
Allen Scott

And crushed by poor education systems and even just peer pressure. I have written about encouraging curiosity in kids (and adults).

I do agree bad management reinforces the anti-curiosity culture but it goes far beyond bad management - even the anti-fact or anti-critical-thinking aspect so prevalent in media and politics is a system designed to quell thoughtful questioning of existing systems, policies, results, affects... I think the decreasing of curiosity is likely strongly influenced by psychology, aging and coping as an adult (coping becoming the focus instead of curiosity and joy). And then we have several powerful aspects of our culture that discourage cultivating curiosity.

I wrote earlier this year that Critical Thinking is Needed to Counter Propaganda. It seems very obvious to me there has been a decades long concerted effort to decrease critical thinking, discourage curiosity and create a large group of people that will follow what they are told (Fox "News" etcetera). That makes things easy if you control what those people are told, but it also makes those uncritical and incurious followers susceptible to anyone that can create propaganda that appeals to them.

Related: Curious, Joyful, Happy Kids Grow Up: Unfortunately - Sarah, aged 3, Learns About Soap - Experience Teaches Nothing Without Theory

Surviving Modern Conveniences

Today my car wouldn't start. I guessed the battery died.

I try to use Lyft. Their app says it is a bad connection and so it won't work (using iPhone on Sprint in Charlotte, NC - the 17th largest city in the USA). Sad but ok, whatever, deal with it. Ok try my iPad mini with ATT. Lyft connects and doesn't let me use it requires putting in a phone number before it will do anything so that I can get pin and give it to them. Ok, give them the number. Nothing ever comes from them.

Ok try Uber on iPhone. Uber asked for permission to spy all the time (not just when you are using Uber. Decline that intrusion. Now it can't find my current location. So I type it in. It finds it. Uber says it isn't available where I am and only offers their "luxury" options.

Now I could go directly to work but I have a mover scheduled to unload my large moving items at my new house this afternoon. And my dead car is blocking the garage (and there is a fairly steep hill up to the house) so backing the truck to the garage seems like a much better option so I want to move my car out of the way before they arrive (it is parked front in so jump starting it would be very hard I figure).

I select the closest Walmart (that I went to the night before 3 miles away or so). Driver shows up in the most beat up car I have ever been picked up with by Uber or Lyft (including traveling around SE Asia (where actually they were always very new and clean). This is Uber's luxury option remember. They then drive me to some other Walmart at least twice as far away.

I get a trickle charger (to charge my car battery) at Walmart and am back on my way. I use my iPhone to request Lyft and they show up. The signal strength is actually good. Now I am late to my 3rd day onsite at a new long term client. So I ask the driver to wait and let me take 5 minutes to setup the trickle charger and then he can take me to work. He asks me to add the new leg to the Lyft app. I tell him it might not work since my Sprint signal is so bad usually and I try and it fails. He says he will wait but you can tell he isn't thrilled with it. I guess that Lyft has a bad process to deal with situations like mine (or maybe he just wasn't certain how it would work).

I try calling someone at work using my iPad mini (while the ATT signal is bad, Sprint is much worse) and it connects but constantly breaks up.

But he says he will wait. I hurry up and set things up and am going out the door in maybe 3 minutes and I see him driving away. I try Lyft again and it fails again (on both phones just like earlier).

Then I try Uber and decide to give them my address again and they come pick me up. I type in the wrong address (a leading 4 instead of a leading 1, sigh). It doesn't seem we are going the right way, I figure that out and ask what address we are going to... I am amazing able to update the address in the Uber app (the connection barely works). The driver and car were nice for this trip.

Now I am late to work but am able to put in a partial days work then have to leave to meet the mover. My workplace is one of these huge building with big delays for visitors checking in... I have no idea how you can get Uber or a taxi or anything or any idea who you can ask (those I did ask have no idea either). So I decide to walk out (the equivalent of a few blocks to a sensible public street. I actually have 4 bars on 3G on Sprint (the iPhone) which is the best I have seen yet in Charlotte. I try to use the iPhone Lyft app. Won't connect due to bad connectivity. Seems much more likely it is some caching bug but whatever it doesn't work. And of course the other Lyft app (on the other device) won't let me use it (due to it not sending my pin number). So I open up Uber on my iPhone (which as with other other times today Lyft said it couldn't work due to bad connectivity the Uber app on the same phone worked fine. But now the wonderful Uber app (that I didn't allow to continuously spy) has decided that the only place I can be picked up is my house that I entered the first time. They won't let me change it.

So I have now use 3 of the 4 ride hailing options I have at hand. So I try my 4th and final option, the Uber app with full spying privileges and thankfully it works. And the can is new and clean and the driver is professional.

I get home go look at my car. The charger is off. I think wow that is pretty good I didn't think it would be finished. Put everything away and try to start the car and nothing. I put everything back the way it is and it all lights up like it is fine and charging and in about 15 seconds turns off. It must not like something, I try it a couple more times and finally reach a state where it won't turn off.

Of course when the mover arrives I the car won't start. Actually we tried to back it up the driveway some but it was too steep and couldn't make it anyway.

The modern convinces really did help in many ways (I am still hoping the trickle charger will help, though as I write this it is still questionable). The battery is about 10 months old. But while it is great to have cell phones and apps to help us when we are stuck it is very annoying to have such bad connectivity in the 19th largest city in the USA and such lame usability failure in the Uber and Lyft apps. And it is frustrating to have to deal with your own lameness that likely caused the battery to die (I left the lights on in the car - the garage had lights on so I didn't register the car lights were no going off...) and putting in the wrong address...

And this is one of what seem like several such episodes each day for the last few weeks. I agreed to move states within about 10 days to a full time job on site with a client. I didn't really have a desire to do so but I have worked for the company as an offsite consultant for years and understood the situation they were in where I really was the best option and it was fairly important. So far it has been a struggle. I hope soon I will have passed through this spate of frustrations. If I had this one episode happen some week it wouldn't bug me much. But day after day of multiple such things is wearing me down.

And since I have no decent internet connection I can't even Netflix and chill :-(

The Continued Fall of the USA's Political Leaders that We Give Power To

A few days into the new President's administration and it is as bad as anyone paying attention would have expected. It is very sad the USA elected Trump and the Senators and Representatives standing with him. The consequences of electing Trump and the others that support his actions and that are choosing not to protect the USA constitution will be very damaging.

Photo of the White House by John Hunter. This house should be a place worthy of respect (even for those with political differences) but the current occupants are straining that hope.

As a kid in high school I couldn't understand how the USA could fail as badly as McCarthyism; Japanese internment; Nixon's enemies list, watergate etc.. Other failures I would witness later, while a shockingly abhorrent, such as the Iran-Contra scandal flaunting of the rule of law and the failure to do anything about it I saw as sad but not surprising.

The USA we created isn't a binary no-Trump = good v. yes-Trump = bad. The current situation was created by us voting for who we did for decades. The actions of the people we put in power, created the system where Trump could be elected and have huge support from the others we elected.

There were many warning signs of how bad it was during the last 2 administrations. True, it is much worse now, but we were on the path here. But we have created a toxic system that was intentionally shaped by those we granted political power. They shaped a system that ignore facts, devolve discussion into 1984 News Speak, ignore the rule of law when it was convenient for whoever was on your side in the battle for power, pretend complex realities have simple solutions, badly distorted democracy with unconscionable gerrymandering, etc..

The current president and his leadership team certainly are taking the toxic situation created by those we elected for the last few decades and are taking it extremes even more damaging than those that designed it wished for it to be. But when you create and promote a dumpster fire in order to get whatever your short term desires are you can't disown responsibility for the damage that dumpster fire continues to do after you.

Photo of the USA capital by John Hunter. If those elected officials voting in this building the next few years continue as they have done in the few decades we are going to suffer greatly for the mistake of electing them.

The kids of kids today are going to be wondering the same thing about us that I did about our McCarthyism, Japanese internment... supporting ancestors. It is devastating that for decades we allowed our political parties to destroy the fundamental aspects of what the USA should stand for.

The challenges we face as a society are great enough without continuing to put in power the people that have lead the USA to the extremely sad state of affairs we see today with the actions of the current president and his supporters in the White House, on Capital Hill and in the State houses and legislatures around the country.

Sure the current president is a huge mistake we will suffer greatly for voting into office. But the problem is much deeper than just him. The political leadership has been allowed to rot to the core. He is merely a symptom of how bad we have allowed things to get.

We need to fundamentally change who we give power to if we want change. We need to provide power to those that seek to fix problems. We need to give power to those that acknowledge scientific and economic reality. We need to elect people that appose hate. We need to elect people that care more for the country than for personal aggrandizement and reward. We need to elect people that care more for the country than following the orders of their party.

Things are much worse today than a year ago but if we believe the problem is the current president we will fail to address the real problem. He is just a symptom of how messed up our country is. Replace him with his Vice President or most of the other leadership of his party and maybe a few of the most extreme embarrassments to the country would go away but the core of what they stand for doesn't change. The president is not a King or Dictator. The Courts, House and Senate can (and the Constitution depends on them doing so) block actions that damage the country. But the House and Senate are not doing so.

As the current system has evolved the politicians state a few words about they believe in such and such and don't support this other thing and then they go ahead and vote for this other thing while undermining such and such. They have created a system in order to promote the belief that what they actually do isn't what matters but what they say. That way they can fully support actions that they claim to not support. Sure the current president is even less concerned with the truth but he is just extending the policy of News Speak that became the standard practice for both parties over the last few decades.

If we are lucky a few Republicans will stand with the USA and the Constitution and join Democrats that mainly will appose just because the current president isn't from their party and we will avoid some of the worst of what we can expect. But we may very well not be lucky for a several years. Being stuck in a position where we have to hope for a few politicians to be courageous is not a good position to be in given the poor performance of our politicians the last few decades.


Related: Living Through Your Society Becoming a Police State (2013) - Security Theatre Thinking is Damaging the USA (2013) - Freedom Increasingly at Risk (2008) - The Aim of Modern Day Political Parties is To Scare Donors Into Giving Cash (2014) - Selling Out the Country: We are Electing the Wrong People to Control Our Government (2015) - SWAT Raids – Systemic Failures? (2007) - Anti-Market Policies from Our Talking Head and Political Class (2011) - We Need to be More Capitalist and Less Cronyist (2011) - Preaching False Ideas to Men Known to be Idiots (2010) - Adding More Banker and Politician Bailouts is not the Answer (2012) - Failure to Regulate Financial Markets Leads to Predictable Consequences (2009) - Don't Excuse Immoral Looters (2009) - Lobbyists Keep Tax Off Billion Dollar Private Equities Deals and On For Our Grandchildren (2007)

Utopia (Dreamland in the USA) is an Amazing TV Program

Dreamland (USA name) is an Australian TV show (called Utopia in Australia) that is available on Netflix. It is completely awesome. It is an amazing, biting, satirical look at modern office life at the Nation Building Authority of Australia.



Even after a second tweet to my followers emphasizing how awesome this show is they failed to appreciate the importance of going to watch this show immediately. I am very disappointed in them.

Go watch this show. It is on the level of the British version of the Office (and Dilbert - the comic strip not the TV show) for sheer greatness. And while I enjoyed that a great deal I think Utopia is a significantly superior experience. As far as a TV comedy goes the only thing I can think of in this class is Seinfeld and the level the Simpson's has reached at times. But Utopia has been universally awesome from what I have seen so far, without lots of the less compelling Simpson's shows.

Better off Ted, also available on Netflix, is also quite excellent and somewhat similar Utopia.



Utopia is something no one who works in an office should miss.

The embedded videos unfortunately barely give any indication of how special this show is.

Once you watch this, if you haven't seen Better off Ted go watch that.

Related: Curious Cat Management blog - Create a System That Lets People Take Pride in Their Work

Quitting, Habits and the Examined Life

Comment on: Motivation Keep Going

People often give in without even deciding to take the easy way out. They don't even figure out what they want. As you say

"Why is it that people hate their jobs but won't quit?"
"Why are people are unhappy in a relationship yet never make a break?"

Those are examples where quitting is the brave solution of someone working toward making there life better. Habits are very powerful. We usually accept habits without questioning them. Sometimes for good (habits can be good) and sometimes for bad.

I don't think, not quitting is admirable (as quitting is so often portrayed as a weakness). Treating others fairly is admirable. Being true to your beliefs is admirable. Sacrificing in order to achieve more important long term goals is admirable. Quitting is admirable when it supports those interests. Quitting is not admirable when it is sacrificing your long term happiness to avoid some short term effort.

What I see is people far too often don't even think about what they really want out of life. They do think about a few things in this regard (so I don't mean they never think of anything they want out of life). But they allow much of life to just be done to them as if they don't have a choice. The choices might be difficult but it seems to me we own it to ourselves to figure out what we want and then we should quit the things that are not helping and adopt new practices that will help us achieve what we want.

Related: Appreciating Health - The Aim Should be the Best Life, Not Work versus Life Balance - Action Is More Important Than Sympathy - Rhinoceros Hornbills on Mount Santubong, Borneo

Challenging Conventional Thinking

Comments spurred by discussion on a closed discussion board (which is why I am talking about RA Fisher - since it is closed to the web I don't provide a link to the discussion).

RA Fisher was an outspoken person and not easy to get along with. Being difficult to get along with isn't uncommon for people that do great things - I suspect those that are willing to subsume their opinion to make those around them more comfortable are less likely to find incredible breakthroughs.

Of course you can free your mind from the constraints of conventional thinking while being very friendly and sociable and likeable, it just seems to me not uncommon for people willing to challenge intellectual orthodoxy are also willing to challenge the thinking that social niceties are of utmost importance. They would be more able to win over more people more quickly with behavior based on "you catch more bees honey..." but that seems less common.

Fisher also much has achieved a very large amount of long lasting notoriety for his contributions. It is possible he was insecure but and worried about losing it, but more often it seems those with a history of great ideas just find that believing strongly (maybe too strongly) in themselves is better than listening the the chorus of disagreement. When over and over throughout their career they find those disagreeing don't bring much merit to the argument and they were able to make breakthroughs by challenging the accepted wisdom it isn't amazing they often pay less attention to critics than others do.

Of course, just because you have some good (or great) ideas doesn't mean every single thing you say is wonderful (or even right).

For people with the capability to achieve great things the most useful breakthroughs in thinking require the right amount of listening to people that offer good ideas on what they are thinking about about and good criticisms of their proposals without being so taken with criticism that they abandon the confidence in their own new ways of thinking.

Most people are better off paying a whole lot of attention to conventional wisdom and criticism of their thinking. We all benefit if few people that have the insight and drive to come up with incredible leaps away from conventional thinking in powerful ways. Throughout history these people have also has some pretty wacky ideas and engaged in some pretty crazy social behavior. Didn't Newton (and many others) have some pretty good examples of this genius leading to incredible ideas and a willingness to consider ideas most sensible people would find idiotic?

Related: The Illusion of Knowledge - How We Know What We Know - New Management Truths Sometimes Started as Heresies - Children are Amazingly Creative At Solving Problems - Your Brain Can Jump to Incorrect Conclusions

Letting People Know You Appreciate Them

Thoughts on: Some Things Are Better Off Left Unsaid Or Unwritten

I think there are many things that we are all better off went unsaid. But there are times that people are too reluctant to speak.

I wrote about what happened after my father died on one of my blogs: I was constantly being told how thankful people were for how he treated them and what he did for them. This didn't happen for 1 or 2 months or even 1 or 2 years it went on for a long time.

It is true he was special but I also think many of those people didn't speak up directly to him (though some certainly did). We often are reluctant to directly tell people how thankfully we are for what they did. We would all benefit from people sharing those thoughts more readily.

Related: Acting Considerately - Helping Employees Improve - Appeasing Rude Selfish People Just Makes them Behave Even More Selfishly - Practicing Respect for People Requires Understanding Psychology

Buying Freedom by Buying Less Stuff

Comment on: Less Is More: Is All Your "Stuff" The Reason You Can't Travel? I really think the idea you captured with

"debt is a good motivator for two things: First, you will work hard; And secondly, you probably won’t leave."

is an important lesson for people. I know travel isn't for everyone, though I enjoy it. And if "3 snowboards" makes someone happy when they understand all the implications for their life, that is fine with me.

What makes me sad is too few people understand the impact the choices they make has on their life.

Related: Too Much Stuff (2007) - Freelance Lifestyle, Finance and Entreprenuership Blog (design your life) - Trying to Keep up with the Joneses (2008) - Can I Afford That?

Appeasing Rude Selfish People Just Makes them Behave Even More Selfishly

My comment on HackerNews, about Why are so many animals now in places where they shouldn't be?

People with genuine impairments who depend on actual service animals are infuriated by the sort of imposture I perpetrated with my phony E.S.A.s. Nancy Lagasse suffers from multiple sclerosis and owns a service dog that can do everything from turning lights on and off to emptying her clothes dryer. “I’m shocked by the number of people who go online and buy their pets vests meant for working dogs,” she told me. “These dogs snarl and go after my dog. They set me up for failure, because people then assume my dog is going to act up.”

It is sad how we allow rude people to get away with selfish behavior and make life for difficult for everyone else. Doing so encourages rude people to be even more selfish and we get the kind of behavior you see discussed in the article.

Addressing the issues directly is often challenging. That is my guess on why we allow degenerate behavior to impose costs on others until it reaches epidemic proportions when we finally attempt to address it.

It also encourages people to isolate themselves in enclaves where people that share certain expectations of behavior can shut out others and deal with those that are at least somewhat considerate of whatever behaviors the group cares about.

Allowing the rudest people to abuse society degrades the public square and tears at the benefits that can strengthen the social contract. Sadly it seems to be a pretty dominate trait in our society these last few decades and it seems likely to just keep getting worse. Hopefully I am wrong.

Related: Acting Considerately - Reasonable Accommodations Becoming Unreasonable - If You Create a System That Includes The Perfect Conditions for Scandals, Expect Scandals to Happen

Talking Out Decisions

I am someone who is much more comfortable working, thinking, deciding, traveling etc. alone. I rarely feel lonely or the need to talk things out with someone or get advice. But, that still doesn't mean, never. And some of those times when I seem to have trouble just acting don't seem very complicated or something that logically I need assistance to decide. I think it is just an emotional reaction that occasionally hits me (and I guess hits others much more). I am getting ready to start a nomadic existence (I am talking about such an existence at BarCampJB this weekend). I am delaying buying my tickets for no good reason I can think of. The people I would talk to are not going to give me any insight that is going to change my choices. Yet, I feel that lack of talking it out with others is contributing to my delay. I am sure glad I don't have this indecisiveness often. That would really be annoying. People are weird.

John Hunter at Banteay Srea temple in Cambodia

There is also a somewhat related situation of motivation on a trip. I enjoy traveling alone. There are advantages to traveling with friends or by yourself. For me the advantages of being alone are far greater, most of the time. There are some times when I wish someone were with me when I don't feel motivated to get up and go do what I wanted to do when I planned on the trip. But that is fairly rare. I find meeting up with people for a bit, lets me get the advantages of traveling together, but lets me retain the freedom to spend most of time and energy the way that I want. Actually part of the reason I am going into nomadic mode is my plans to travel from my base in Malaysia ended up resulting in less travel than I wanted. So this is my new strategy to get in more travel. We will see how it works.

Politicians Playing Special Interests and Visa Versa

President Obama gave his State of the Union speech today (I didn't watch it but saw lots of tweets about it).

Politicians attempt to use speeches to show as many special interests as they can that they politicians cares about them and will help them.

Special interest professionals know what matters is results, not talk. Getting results from politicians is much harder.

Certain special interests care about mentions because they use those mentions as political pressure. If you don't mention NRA issues they will take action. If you mention your support of the NRA they then hold you to that in every word on every piece of legislation they seek to bend to their special interest. They are extremely effective at getting politicians to do what they want.

If you are a special interest you would love to have the same power the NRA (National Rifle Association) does to dictate to politicians the wording of bills and regulations and political appointments and demands to be publicly recognized.

Many special interests are much better at getting public support from politicians but don't get results. This is a sign of a weak lobby. These are often less well off groups - poor kids, for example. But the NRA, while it has developed lots a rich infrastructure for cash really has not natural leaning toward having lots of cash to but political action (they really were an effective special interest lobby that realized they needed cash and then built that aspect of their organization).

There are also special interests that don't care what politicians say, they care about results. This is normally an interest that knows they have no political leg to stand on, they just want cash to buy what they need in the back rooms. They are perfectly happy for politicians to say all sorts of stuff about how they are against too-big-too-fail banks for example as long as they pass legislation, write regulation and appoint regulators that all advance all the interests too-big-too-fail banks want. Other example of this type of special interest is trust fund babies, hedge fund "managers" (or non-managers) that get ludicrous tax advantages... Those knowing there is no rational or political support for the benefits their special interest takes they are perfectly happy for politicians to feign dislike of the benefits the government heaps on them as long as the government keeps piling on the cash to their special interest.

You can see what type of special interest is involved based on whether politicians get away with just meaningless mentions (poor kids, small business, education, punishment of crime [strong words required, safer communities not required], environment), wether there is a some combination of mentions and delivering that is required (farmers - must use words about family farmers but instead of crafting legislation that protects them without heaping benefits on corporate farming they mainly give lip service to family farms and gear benefits to reward factory farms), wether the politicians have to say the words the special interests demand (unions, different sides of abortion/choice), wether the politicians have to do what the special interests demand (too big to fail banks, big business - often with words about small business and policies suited to big business pushed by the likes of the Chamber of Commerce) or whether the politicians have to say the words and do what the special interests demand (NRA, copyright cartel).

Most special interests fall into the the first group - they get words and some token action (usually whatever doesn't interfere in any significant way with a special interest that actual has power). But most of the lobbying that matters, that takes hundreds of billions of dollars a year and redistributes it to specific special interests (or provides non-monetary rewards) and that is where special interest politics really matters. That is where we lose and special interests gain.

And occasionally that is where we will and special interests win against other special interests (but that is rare). An example is when the special interest in support of air bags finally pushed through rules to require them against the objections of car manufacturers. This has been a big benefit to society. But those types of special interest wins that happen to aid society are not the norm.

One of the structural weaknesses is benefits to special interests are often large (for manipulating the system in their favor) the costs to society are often large but spread out in such a way it isn't very painful for most people. So the special interest can pay or cajole politicians to give them a benefit that helps them a lot (they can pay the politician a portion of their benefit and still have a huge gain) while society loses no one loses enough to care enough to try and pay or cajole politicians to save society from a big loss.

When two (and really it will often been numerous) special interests are facing off on issues the loss to society is often limited (because those facing losses are going to be pained enough that it is worth their will to object to sweetheart deals to other special interests). Sometimes these conflicting issues are actually resolved fairly sensible as you have competing interests fighting to limit damage (while it might be possible for the groups to figure out how to have them share a big gain at the expense of society this often isn't so easy - the reason this issue ended up in this pile is that the costs were concentrated in a way that a special interest was motivated to protect itself).

Sadly there is little evidence politicians in the USA today play a role that would be natural/good: seeking to optimize the benefits to the society by listening to special interests and having as their primary mission benefiting the county. Instead they seek to maximize the cash they are given, the cash they and their staffs will be given (jobs and speaking engagements) and perks (private plane trips to exotic vacation sports with some transparent excuse to claim as legitimate, seats in the luxury box at sporting events, etc.). And they also seek not angering any special interest that has power enough (cash and/or political influence) in their constituency to throw them out of office.

Related: Fed Continues Wall Street Welfare - Estate Tax Repeal (basically a kickback to the 1% for cash payments to politicians) - General Air Travel Taxes Subsidizing Private Plane Airports

Update, this article posted the day after I made this blog post provides an example of what good lobbyists get you versus nearly no lobbyists (the poor), food stamps for the poor cut, subsidies to famers increased (as usually they hide to the maximum extent they can how large the benefits to rich (often absent "farmers") farmers and corporate farms. Congress axes $8.6bn from food stamps in farm bill adds $5.7bn government handouts to farmers

The cuts to federal food stamps come on top of a $5bn cut in November and will reduce payments to 1.7 million of the poorest Americans by an estimated $90 a month.

Republicans had sought even higher cuts but a two-year tussle with Democrats was brought to an end after a compromise was agreed that also included increasing a cap for the maximum subsidy payments that can be awarded to individual farmers from $50,000 to $125,000.

The measures will also add $5.7bn to the cost of a 50% subsidy on premiums for crop insurance and extend a loophole allowing multiple people to claim government subsidies for one farm.

Though helping many poorer farmers too, critics of the bill claimed it disproportionately benefited those with large farms, including several dozen unnamed landowners who are thought to receive more than $1m a year in total support.

Appreciating Health

I agree that your health is at the very top of what is most important (perhaps the health of a loved one and the like can vie for the top spot) factors in your life. However, it gets old saying to yourself that you should appreciate what you have instead of being frustrated by events.

I am extremely lucky health-wise. I have always been very healthy, had next to no problems really my whole life. And not just avoiding really bad stuff, actually being healthy all the time. And I do appreciate it. I do try to eat fairly decently and exercise but even so much of my health is due to luck (probably pretty good genes, maybe some nice contributing bacteria, either avoiding bad breaks or diseases or my immune system fighting off those that tried to take hold, etc.).

But the last 18 months I have had a couple big, long running, bothersome problems that end up getting me very frustrated for long periods of time. The current one is big problems with my rental properties. First I had all sorts of trouble with property managers. Then I had what I thought I had bad runs of expenses (worst in 15 years by far). Then I had those followed by much worse run of larger expenses, while the problems with property managers continued.

The rental mess isn't fixed yet, expenses continue. And the house is actually not rented for what is about to be the second month (in 15 years) I have had a total of 1 month vacant until now. The location is very good, the property is nice...

I am not very good at coping with ongoing problems that I don't solve. I am good at solving them so I don't have to put up with them any longer. And good at designing around those I can't solve to avoid dealing with them. But those that I can't avoid bother me and I have trouble just accepting that I have to sit and accept it. It is better if you can do this, I know this, but still am lousy at doing so.

I know that while this situation is super annoying for me it really isn't horrible. I had a few other financial setbacks which made me count more psychologically (financially too, but really that is secondary, I am confident, having examined everything now) on the rental income. Huge numbers of people have many worse problems to deal with. And I have tried the last couple of months to stop being so annoyed by appreciating what I have, including health. I do appreciate it but it doesn't do much to make it less annoying.

And when I examine my situation I have to say I am super lucky. I have a great situation. The problems are really fairly minor compared to what billions of people have had to deal with the whole time I am bothered by my issues.

I finally decided I just needed to nearly completely remove myself and just pay someone else to deal with the properties (I would have hoped hiring a property manager should do that but it has been a succession of that not working the last couple years). It seems you need to pay someone to deal with the property manager (and get them to do their job) or just not be a bozo, like I seem to be and avoid letting it bug you. I managed the rental myself for years and then had 2 others do so for me for about 8 years without any real problems (I always think things should be better but essentially without big problems).

It isn't quick to get out from the current mess, and it will again reduce the income but I have decided (given how much hassle it is for me - others I think could deal with it fine, I just get very annoyed by things that are not done well... and can't stop trying to fix what should be fixed). And when that fails (rare, but sometimes the case) it is best to just reorder things so I don't have to keep being reminded about the poor results.

John Hunter - Thailand

I do hope once I can get the current mess fixed and off my plate (hopefully in a month or so) I will be better off. I will appreciate what I have, more. And I will have a better sense of what I need to be doing now. For me a big objective is travel in SE Asia. The last year I have failed to do nearly as much as I should while I live in Malaysia. I have let other distractions stop me from doing what I want to be near the top of my priority list. I hope that I will make a change.

As I tried to explore why I was letting frustration take much more control of my emotional state than it should that I think part of that is due to my failure to focus on travel. It is also related to some of my other attempts not turning out as well as I would like, but I am really not that worried about it. Looking back, I am much more annoyed that I used the excuse of those efforts to push my travel efforts down my priority list. I hope I will now appreciate what I have and put a better focus onto making sure I actually am doing what I want to be doing with my time (instead of getting distracted by what is seemingly urgent and seemingly items I could just clear away and then get to...).

Part of appreciating health to me, is valuing life. We don't have that long to take advantage of being healthy to do what we want. I have to make sure I am doing that, and not letting distractions sidetrack me.

Related: Curious Cat Travel Destinations - Curious Cat Travel Photo Blog

Living Abroad

One lesson that many people learn is that everywhere has idiots and jerks.  Everywhere has things some people like and those same people don't like.  While thinking of escaping, it is often easy to ignore (or be ignorant of) the things you won't like about the place you are going to.  It isn't as easy to ignore the things you don't like about where you are now.

Characteristics that has a huge bearing on whether someone enjoys being abroad or not is tolerance for what they don't enjoy and excitement at exploring new and different things.  Also it is helpful if you are not looking for someone that is missing annoyances and instead looking for somewhere to enjoy for a while.

A few people do find the perfect place for them, where all the common annoyances of that place happen to line up with stuff that person doesn't care about and all the things they most enjoy are present and abundant.  But most of the time you will find places that are possible to enjoy but that also have plenty of flaws.

I am living in Malaysia and it has many advantages for me but it is not perfect.  I find it a huge advantage to be in a new place.  I like a break from some of the annoyances of home.

I really like being able to travel around SE Asia (though I have been doing much too little of that - my plan is to do more in 2013).  Of course my plan was to do more traveling in 2012 than I did.  I think the prospects for 2013 are better, but we will see.


 Related: More tolerant not more considerate - Travel to Cambodia: Angkor Wat... - Travel to Indonesia: Borobudur... - Travel to Thailand: Khao Lak... - I Want Out subreddit

Follow Wise Advice

Comments on: Leading By Example and Some Mistaken Beliefs I agree that you should follow your own advice. I tend to like to look at things a bit different than others. The advice you give is not uncommon - be honest, be consistent, don't be a hypocrite. Good advice. One of the things I find funny is that everyone accepts that people are excused from following your advice if you don't. I think that is stupid. If your parents tell you not to smoke but they smoke. There advice is equally good. They are less good than a person that is wise enough to follow that advice. But the advice itself isn't any more or less good based on whether the person giving it follows it, or not. I find it much more sensible to evaluate advice based on whether it is wise than based on whether the person providing it is wise (or foolish) enough to follow the advice. Related: Do What You Say You Will - Arguing For Different Policies Doesn't Mean You Have to Change Behavior Before the Policies Are Adopted - Performance without Appraisal

The Wonder and Curiosity of Children

The Birth of the Scientific Method

She examined the box empty, and examined it again with all the jacks inside it. She picked up one jack on the palm of her hand, and held it out to me, saying, “Dat?” (Which is her request for information about a thing). I said, “That’s a jack.” “Jahk,” she said. And she said it again, touching various jacks: “Jahk, jahk.” 

As I sat watching her, I realized in a way I hadn’t since my own kids were small that play at this age is entirely purposeful. She was learning everything she could about those objects and how they worked. She was creating and testing hypotheses as fast as her little fingers could try them out.

I love experiencing the curiosity of kids. It is so pure and wonderful. They see the world and want to understand it. You are absolutely right about how deeply this curiosity is within us. Sadly we can still have it stomped out by our lives. It doesn't have to be, but it often is. And I think we miss that wonder, even if we don't know that is what we are missing.

I have written about this topic on my science blog: Growing Curious Children - Naturally Curious Children - Sarah, aged 3, Learns About Soap - Playing Dice and Children’s Numeracy