This Weeks Adventures

Every time you make a choice you actively choose to set aside the other choice. It’s one of the greatest pains about having so many good options in life. I felt this over Thanksgiving this year – Unfortunately, you can only be at one place at one time.

Allotted only a few weeks off of work each year, I feel like the time slot for adventures vs seeing people is incredibly small. I have to make this decision every time I have work off. It sucks to choose between friends and family vs time available to travel the world.

I looked at the calendar and it felt like such a short time to go home so I ended up going snowboarding in Keystone, Colorado with some of my roommates and a couple of friends from college.

We rented a Vacasa condo, a 5-minute walk from the lift. It was an absolute blast. I went night skiing (snowboarding) for the first time and the sunset was absolutely stunning. It was a bit spooky because everything gets icy, and it’s hard to see, and you have no brakes whatsoever but 100% worth it. Def recommend.

Some Songs Stuck in My Head

I’m Still Standing by Elton John.
Yes sir, I am.

Mastermind by Taylor Swift.

I’m unashamed to say that this song has been hitting way too hard lately. I’ve been infatuated with personality types, nature vs nurture, and what makes people tick.

This song piqued my interest as it was reminiscent of some of the Keirsey ‘Idealist’ personality traits. I looked up T. Swifty’s Myers-Briggs Personality Type and sure enough, it was ENFP. NF indicates the ‘Idealist’ type and they are often times excellent communicators and tend to work in fields that deal a lot with people. It was interesting to see how this plays into Taylor’s professional career and how she expresses herself with her music.

More on Idealists here

You can take the personality test here and figure out how your brain is designed

I find it super useful to better understand your personality and as a result the types of things your brain is naturally good and bad at. It sheds light and also points out your blind spots without you having to make all those mistakes yourself.

Raised to Compete

It was interesting to be put back in an environment of hypercompetitive individuals when I went snowboarding again. It wasn’t quite the same as college but when everyone around you is incredibly driven and wants to be the best, you end up progressing much faster.

Over Thanksgiving, everyone wanted to be the best snowboarder on the mountain and as soon as someone else got a new skill, the others were quick to follow. I find that progression comes much faster in this environment, but you also are always in constant competition.

The downside is that everything feels like a competition. With D1 athletics it oftentimes feels like your worth is valued by how good you are. Small tasks on the daily feel competitive. Cooking, slacklining, snowboarding, driving. Everything feels like constant competition. Sometimes not always the most relaxing environment.

Quotes I Liked

“If you fail to plan you plan to fail”
-Mastermind by T Swifty

A Juicy Podcast

The Psychology of Advertising

Ideas to Contemplate

People don’t choose the best product. They choose the one that’s least likely to fail (from this podcast)

Hmmm, quite interesante. I guess this is why oftentimes people default to the same drink or meal order at their favorite restaurants. They don’t care about having the ‘perfect’ meal, they just want the guarantee that they won’t have a terrible one.

This is perhaps the same reason people buy name brands even when they know quality isn’t that much different. “They know the product they got before worked, so why fix what ain’t broke?

This is an interesting extension of the idea of ‘loss aversion.