Intersectional Thinking

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Thinking is like gardening

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Thinking is like gardening

Bangkok changed its name, mindfulness & note-taking, focusing on the process

Vicky Zhao
Jul 25, 2022
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Thinking is like gardening

intersectionalthinking.substack.com

Hello intersectional thinkers 👋

Greetings from Bangkok ðŸ‡đ🇭 aka Krung Thep Maha Nakhon - did you know the Thai capital updated its name in English back in February?

How to pronounce Krung Thep Maha Nakhon

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And did you know Bangkok’s full name is:

Krung Thep Maha Nakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Ayuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Piman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit

āļāļĢāļļāļ‡āđ€āļ—āļžāļĄāļŦāļēāļ™āļ„āļĢ āļ­āļĄāļĢāļĢāļąāļ•āļ™āđ‚āļāļŠāļīāļ™āļ—āļĢāđŒ āļĄāļŦāļīāļ™āļ—āļĢāļēāļĒāļļāļ˜āļĒāļē āļĄāļŦāļēāļ”āļīāļĨāļāļ āļž āļ™āļžāļĢāļąāļ•āļ™āļĢāļēāļŠāļ˜āļēāļ™āļĩāļšāļđāļĢāļĩāļĢāļĄāļĒāđŒ āļ­āļļāļ”āļĄāļĢāļēāļŠāļ™āļīāđ€āļ§āļĻāļ™āđŒāļĄāļŦāļēāļŠāļ–āļēāļ™ āļ­āļĄāļĢāļžāļīāļĄāļēāļ™āļ­āļ§āļ•āļēāļĢāļŠāļ–āļīāļ• āļŠāļąāļāļāļ°āļ—āļąāļ•āļ•āļīāļĒāļ§āļīāļĐāļ“āļļāļāļĢāļĢāļĄāļ›āļĢāļ°āļŠāļīāļ—āļ˜āļīāđŒ

If you want to give this a try

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Meaning: City of angels, great city of immortals, magnificent city of the nine gems, seat of the king, city of royal palaces, home of gods incarnate, erected by Vishvakarman at Indra's behest

Onto today’s line up!

ðŸŒą Thinking is like gardening
💎 Koān - Zen paradoxes
🍗 Some processes can’t be rushed

1 unexpected intersection

“If you think you can’t, why think.” 

Dee Hock, Founder of Visa (found via Florian’s essay on Hock)


“Is this a dumb question? ”

They say there are no stupid questions. But I’ve been a chronic worrywart about how dumb my questions sound. So I kept my hand down and my mouth shut, pretending to know what’s going on. Anyone else can relate?

Until one day, I got too tired from living in self-inflicted confusion. And I realized that no one else knew what was going on either.

So why pretend?!

Instead of judging my thoughts, I started writing them down.

Because what if Uber’s founders prematurely judged the idea of “Start a business that facilitates people getting rides from strangers”? Or Larry and Sergei thought it was impossible to “organize the world's information”?

Thinking without judgement is like gardening ðŸŒą. Not all seeds will sprout. But you won’t know which one will until you give them the chance the grow.

And also like gardening, non-judgemental thinking can be a dose of mental positivity.

Marco showed me this unexpected intersection of mindfulness and thinking here:

Being critical with the quality of our thoughts can be rigorous exercise. But thinking is also a process that can’t be rushed. Give your ideas the space to reveal its true self ðŸŒģ.

They could be a bud. Or they could be awesome :)

1 paradox

Koan, paradoxical puzzles and questions, are used in Zen Buddhism as a learning tool to “exhaust” a learner’s egotistic will, readying the mind to contemplate Truths.

Here’s a non-exhaustive list of koans.

I first learnt about koans from Christin’s guide Debug Your Meditation.

Christin shared a koan in her fable, followed by a thought-provoking prompt:

It is important to contemplate the ultimate goal of your own personal practice, because conventional goals assigned to meditation (e.g. increased productivity, even stress reduction) can sometimes lead practice astray.

This is because conventional goals are easily hijacked by the subconscious mind, and prevent us from seeing the hindrances. For example, increasing productivity may stem from a fear of not doing enough, and stress reduction may prevent us from addressing valid root causes of stress.

We can apply this to how we judge our thoughts as well. Why am I afraid of sounding stupid?

1 visual Zettelkasten

Twitter avatar for @JustSomeDev
Alvin @JustSomeDev
Some processes can't be rushed.
Roasting a turkey for 3 hours at 300 degrees fahrenheit cannot be rushed to one hour at 900 degrees fahrenheit. The turkey would be burnt outside and frozen inside.
12:02 PM ∙ Jul 12, 2022
44,482Likes11,824Retweets


The trick is knowing which is which.

One framework to think about this is speed vs velocity. Are we speeding up for the sake of speed, or are we actually trying to get somewhere?

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Have a good week!

Vicky

P.S. New Obsidian templates video is up! If you want to save time and structure your notes, check it out:

1

Audio from Banana Thai’s YouTube video:

2

Ibid.

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Thinking is like gardening

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6 Comments
TastanDN
Jul 26, 2022Liked by Vicky Zhao

Reminds me of Bodil JÃķnsson's "Ten Thoughts About Time" where she mentions we should learn

to accept that we don’t think any faster today than a hundred years ago or a thousand years ago. "Technology promises instant results, cell phones, and computers should give us the leisure we crave, but the speed of society increases to match the savings, and we end up running harder to stay in the same place."

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Adi Verma
Writes The Freedom Writer
Jul 25, 2022Liked by Vicky Zhao

Love the quote Vicky! It's right in your face haha. And the gardening analogy. Man, have I ever gotten stuck in loops cause of my overthinking 😅

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