Sloww hit 400 posts! This is a “short” summary of posts 301-400 on my journey.
I’ve been creating 100-post recaps since the beginning. They’ve become one of the most useful ways I reflect on my ongoing evolution. Browsing the topics below gives you a sense of where I’ve been—and where I may be headed.
The posts 1-100 summary focused on:
- Busyness, Slow Living, Decluttering, Minimalism, & Simple Living
- Life Purpose
- Perspective & Future
The posts 101-200 summary focused on:
- Sloww’s Evolution, New Newsletter, & New Premium Membership
- Slow Living, Simple Living, Voluntary Simplicity, & Minimalism
- Life Purpose, Self-Actualization, & Transcendence
- The Art of Living & Spiritual Growth
- Society, Work, & Money
The posts 201-300 summary focused on:
- Sloww’s Evolution, New eBooks, & Newsletter Issues
- Life Purpose, My Purpose, & Monetizing Purpose
- Better Thinking & Human Development
- The Art of Living & Spiritual Growth
- Health, Society, Culture, & History
Posts 301-400 focus on the following topics: Click a link here to jump to a section below
- Sloww’s Evolution & Newsletter Issues
- Life Optimization (Habits, Time, Money, Lifestyle Design, Reading & Note-Taking)
- Mental Mastery (Brain, Synthesis, Mental Models, Cognitive Biases, & More)
- The Art of Living (Human Development, Society/Culture, Spiritual Growth, Meaning of Life)
A “Short” Summary of Everything I Learned from Sloww’s Posts 301-400
Sloww’s Evolution & Newsletter Issues
Sloww’s Evolution:
- This was an exciting year of 100 posts! I started to gain more clarity around how Sloww has evolved and emerged since my existential crisis in late 2015 (now 6+ years ago at the time of this writing). It seems like there are at least four stages I’ve gone through:
Sloww Sunday Newsletter:
- The newsletter is now approaching 100 issues! If you’re a 🔒Premium member, you have access to the full newsletter archive of all issues along with this summary of the first 50 newsletters. Here are the issues that were released in the last 100 posts (click a random one as a “choose your own adventure,” and I guarantee you’ll learn something new): 048, 049, 050, 051, 052, 053, 054, 055, 056, 057, 058, 059, 060, 061, 062, 063, 064, 065, 066, 067, 068, 069, 070, 071, 072, 073, 074, 075, 076, 077, 078, 079, 080, 081, 082, 083, 084, 085, 086, 087, 088, 089, 090, 091, 092, 093, 094, 095, 096.
Life Optimization
Habits:
- I went back to revisit 🔒 “Atomic Habits” by James Clear to create this Premium summary with infographics of how to build effective habits.
Time:
- “Four Thousand Weeks” by Oliver Burkeman has received a lot of hype, but I don’t feel like I learned anything new from it (maybe that should be a relief rather than a letdown?).
Money:
- Similar to the book above, “Die With Zero” by Bill Perkins didn’t live up to the hype for me. In this case, I actually disagree with the author’s premise on the purpose of money.
- Instead, I recommend checking out my Money Mind Manifesto where I consolidate my latest thoughts on all things money.
Lifestyle Design:
- If you want to really take your relationship with money to the next level, start approaching it in terms of systems thinking with “Early Retirement Extreme” by Jacob Lund Fisker (+ 🔒 Premium Synthesis). Highly recommend. It’s one of the few books I plan to reread.
Better Reading:
- This is the go-to book on the art of reading: “How to Read a Book” by Mortimer Adler (+ 🔒 Premium Summary). Highly recommend.
Better Note-Taking:
- Similarly, this seems to be the go-to book on the art of note-taking: “How to Take Smart Notes” by Sönke Ahrens (+ 🔒 Premium Summary) which outlines the Zettelkasten system of Niklas Luhmann. I recommend the strategy, but I don’t plan to use the tactics or Zettelkasten system myself.
Mental Mastery
The Brain:
- There’s not much out there that’s more fascinating than Jill Bolte Taylor’s story about her stroke of insight. Her latest book covers the “four characters” in your mind: “Whole Brain Living” by Jill Bolte Taylor.
- If you want to go down the deepest brain rabbit hole possible: Left Brain & Right Brain: 20 Brain Hemisphere Differences from “The Master and His Emissary” by Iain McGilchrist.
Lifelong Learning:
- A couple quick posts highlighting 7 Intellectual YouTube Lecture Series and where good ideas come from with The “Slow Hunch” with Steven Johnson.
Synthesizing:
- I took my study of synthesis even deeper by reading “A Synthesizing Mind” by Howard Gardner and “Range” by David Epstein.
- I also did a deep dive into the life and work of world-class synthesizer 🔒 Maria Popova (of “Brain Pickings” / “The Marginalian”).
- However, the most mind-expanding concept I came across was Polarity Thinking.
Mental Models:
- Mental mastery naturally led me to mental models, and I recommend these two books: “The Great Mental Models Volume 1” by Farnam Street and “Super Thinking” by Gabriel Weinberg & Lauren McCann (+ 🔒 Premium Summary).
Cognitive Biases, Fallacies, & More:
- Mental models naturally overlaps with cognitive biases, fallacies, misjudgments, and more. Check out “The Psychology of Human Misjudgment” by Charlie Munger, “The Art of Thinking Clearly” by Rolf Dobelli (+ 🔒 Premium Summary), and “Lying” by Sam Harris.
- If you’re serious about this subject and want to straight into the deep end: 🔒 The Mental Mastery Cheatsheet: 450+ Cognitive Concepts Curated (Biases, Fallacies, Effects, Illusions, Heuristics, Mental Models, & More).
The Art of Living
Human Development Models/Frameworks:
- I read another introductory book about Integral Theory: “A Theory of Everything” by Ken Wilber and revisited Ego Development Theory.
- From a personal perspective, I gave myself a couple self-assessments: 🔒 My Ego Development Theory Self-Assessment and 🔒 My Self-Actualization Self-Assessment.
Society & Culture:
- Daniel Schmachtenberger launched his cultural renaissance initiative The Consilience Project and then I read all 18 articles on the site to create 🔒 The Consilience Project Synthesis.
- All in all, I spent some time trying to figure out: 🔒 What is Going On?
Spiritual Growth:
- If you’ve heard of IQ and EQ, you may like SQ (Spiritual Intelligence): “SQ21” by Cindy Wigglesworth.
- I also ventured into nonduality with “Being Myself” by Rupert Spira (+ 🔒 Premium Summary).
Meaning of Life:
- “Man’s Search for Meaning” is one of the best (and most important) books I’ve ever read. If you’re a fan, check out “Yes to Life” by Viktor Frankl (Book Summary + Short Story + 🔒 Premium Summary).
- If you want to reset your perspective on the meaning of life, check out: “How to Live” by Derek Sivers (+ 🔒 Premium Summary).
- And, how about the meaning of death: Why You Want a Physicist to Speak at Your Funeral (A Short Speech by Aaron Freeman).
The Art of Living:
- Last, but certainly not least, the lottery of birth (or ovarian lottery) may be the most important concept I discovered last year. It really makes you question: 🔒 Do You Control Your Life Path? And, what about free will?
If you made it this far, thank you! Want me to explore more in a certain area or topic? Please let me know in the comments.
Here’s to the next 100 posts!
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