H²

Sometimes, after meditating, life can feel like an augmented reality. Colors can be very distinct,...

Tue, 22 May 2012 22:10:00 -0400

Sometimes, after meditating, life can feel like an augmented reality. Colors can be very distinct, smells seem to be much more easily noticed, and objects can seem to take on almost comical personalities — reminiscent of many pixar characters.

There is also a paradoxical feeling of paired stillness and vibration — as if everything was in its perfect place yet also in a state of constant interconnected change.

A designer is an emerging synthesis of artist, inventor, mechanic, objective economist and...

Fri, 18 May 2012 18:25:03 -0400

A designer is an emerging synthesis of artist, inventor, mechanic, objective economist and evolutionary strategist.

—R. Buckminster Fuller

"The True Way transcends the minutiae of Skill. There is no “Technology”. There is no..."

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 02:01:07 -0400

““The True Way transcends the minutiae of Skill. There is no “Technology”. There is no “Design”. There is only a vision of how mankind should be, and the relentless resolve to make it so. The rest is details.””

- —Bret Victor

"A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor..."

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 17:27:15 -0400

“A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor and his leisure; his mind and his body; his education and his recreation. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing, and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself, he always appears to be doing both.”

- François Auguste René Chateaubriand (via bestmadeco)

"Due to our fascination with the forms of technical inventions on the one hand, and the limiting..."

Wed, 25 Apr 2012 22:29:20 -0400

“Due to our fascination with the forms of technical inventions on the one hand, and the limiting vocabulary of the modern movement on the other, our designs have moved from the realm of feeling into that of reasoning. … However, beauty is not appreciated through reason—it is enjoyed through feelings. There is no objective beauty; it goes directly to the heart—a glowing rainbow over a field of ripe wheat needs no explanation.”

- Eva Zeisel (1906–2011)

We are part of this universe, we are in this universe, but...

Mon, 02 Apr 2012 16:04:00 -0400

We are part of this universe, we are in this universe, but perhaps more important than both of those facts… the universe is in us. We are connected, just by being alive.

This only reaffirms my constant feelings that everything is connected.

Only do work with love.

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 02:24:25 -0400

Work is love made visible.

And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy.

For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man’s hunger.

—Kahlil Gibran

Photo

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 00:11:28 -0500

The Squat = Synergy

Fri, 13 Jan 2012 15:19:00 -0500

There is simply no other exercise, and certainly no machine, that produces the level of central nervous system activity, improved balance and coordination, skeletal loading and bone density enhancement, muscular stimulation and growth, connective tissue stress and strength, psychological demand and toughness, and overall systemic conditioning than the correctly performed full squat.

— Mark Rippetoe, Starting Strength

Less looking out, more looking in.

Sun, 25 Dec 2011 03:47:35 -0500

We give market and user research too much importance. We allow it to drive our marketing techniques and product decisions despite it’s many downfalls:

1. It’s costly to conduct.

2. It’s difficult to extrapolate clear take aways from.

3. Using this research to determine what we should do next means that we’re making decisions based on what others think instead of what we believe in — and it’s hard to to do great work you don’t believe in.

4. Even if you somehow find a way to create great work based on what others are asking of you, it means you’ll constantly need to reinvent what you do and what you stand for as the outside world’s requests change. Good luck making something people believe in in the long-term with that strategy.

We need to start looking inside for answers. Though every human is unique, we aren’t that different at our core. We all seek to maximize pleasure, joy, and happiness and to avoid pain or discomfort. We all experience fear, risk, love. We all struggle with the balance between self-confidence and ego. These are the things that make use human and they guide the way we all act.

By deeply understanding yourself and fully experiencing what makes you human, you begin to better understand others. You develop a greater capacity for empathy, a trait which is often attributed with those that make life changing products. It makes sense, to make something that changes people’s lives, you must first understand people. But to understand others you must first understand yourself.

How do you get to know yourself better? The same way you get to know a stranger better. You spend time with them… or in this case, with yourself. Write, meditate, experience thoughts and feelings as they unfold.

You will make better products that way.

"My observation is that the doers are the major thinkers. The people that really create the things..."

Mon, 12 Dec 2011 19:06:24 -0500

“My observation is that the doers are the major thinkers. The people that really create the things that change this industry are both the thinker and doer in one person. And if we really go back and we examine, you know did Leonardo have a guy off to the side that was thinking five years out in the future what he would paint or the technology he would use to paint it, of course not. Leonardo was the artist but he also mixed all his own paints. He also was a fairly good chemist. He knew about pigments. Ah knew about human anatomy. And combing all of those skills together, the art and the science, the thinking and the doing, was what resulted in the exceptional result.”

- Steve Jobs, speaking in an interview about his mentor Robert Noyce, co-founder of Fairchild Semiconductor and Intel Corp. (via fjplifescript)

"All systems for developing human potential try to teach us to know and understand ourselves better."

Mon, 05 Dec 2011 15:33:24 -0500

“All systems for developing human potential try to teach us to know and understand ourselves better.”

- Robert Masters & Jean Houston in Listening to the Body: The Psychophysical Way to Health and Awareness (via jackcheng)

On being yourself

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 17:19:16 -0500

My mother said to me, “If you become a soldier, you’ll be a general, if you become a monk you’ll end up as the pope.” Instead, I became a painter and wound up as Picasso.

- Pablo Picasso

Don't know

Fri, 25 Nov 2011 16:32:23 -0500

In design, assuming that we know the solution before we find it is a weakness. By not knowing, we keep an open mind allowing us to respond accordingly to circumstances, keep our assumptions low, and feel the solution as it presents itself. Letting go of “knowing” leaves room for intuition.

Learning to ask good questions is by far one of the most important skills we overlook. Good...

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 14:29:51 -0500

Learning to ask good questions is by far one of the most important skills we overlook. Good questions can ignite the imagination.

"Man. Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate..."

Fri, 18 Nov 2011 23:50:24 -0500

““Man. Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present;the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived. ””

- Dalai Lama

“No one lives on the top of the mountain. It’s fine to go there occasionally —for inspiration,...

Thu, 10 Nov 2011 17:44:35 -0500

“No one lives on the top of the mountain. It’s fine to go there occasionally —for inspiration, for new perspectives. But you have to come down. Life is lived in the valleys. That’s where the farms and gardens and orchards are, and where the plowing and the work is done. That’s where you apply the visions you may have glimpsed from the peaks.”
Arthur Gordon

"Most people take the straight and narrow. A few take the road less traveled. I chose to cut through..."

Thu, 10 Nov 2011 16:12:00 -0500

“Most people take the straight and narrow. A few take the road less traveled. I chose to cut through the woods.”

- Unknown Source

Simon Sinek’s talk at the 99% conference “If You...

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 12:26:00 -0400

Simon Sinek’s talk at the 99% conference “If You Don’t Understand People, You Don’t Understand Business”. One of his point is that in order to be be happy we must create happiness for others. What an amazingly sincere storyteller.

"Unhappiness does not exist in the present moment. It only exists as a regret about the past or worry..."

Sun, 23 Oct 2011 22:31:51 -0400

“Unhappiness does not exist in the present moment. It only exists as a regret about the past or worry toward the future.”